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PaperclipPerfector  19d ago (text post)   35144 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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See my edited reply with references. The post in which he announced The Schism points to a Rittenhouse thread (NOT a boogaloo thread, though he has on other occasions referenced those) as why he feels "a large chunk of the prevailing culture here is overtly hostile towards my strongly-felt values".

The post in which he announced The Schism points to a Rittenhouse thread (NOT a boogaloo thread, though he has on other occasions referenced those)

Really. Let's take a look.

  1. Why are you building this?
    While /r/TheMotte is and will always be intended as a neutral meeting ground for divergent perspectives, it's developed a strong consensus on a wide range of issues. I—like, I suspect, many of you—identify strongly with this comment on political affiliation from /u/cincilator. /u/RulerFrank expanded on a similar point the other day. I'm not here to raise the tired debate of whether or how right-wing /r/themotte is. Instead, I'll simply say that a large chunk of the prevailing culture here is overtly hostile towards my strongly-felt values, as illustrated most eloquently by this comment.

"This comment" being (sorry FC):

I wrote a long reply to this, and given my heart rate and breathing by the end of it, it's probably for the best that I accidentally deleted it before I could post. I was literally seething.

I think I understand where you're coming from pretty well, but I likewise find your views profoundly repugnant, to a degree that charity becomes difficult. Specifically, the appeal to statistics is a complete non-starter for me. The attacker is the one choosing to roll the dice, and the defender is the one being forced to live with the consequences. Even if the chances of death are fairly low, the person who gets a bad roll is still absolutely fucked, and even the people who get a good roll are still significantly worse off than they should be... and for what? So that people who deliberately chose to force the roll can rest assured that they will never have to deal with the consequences? And don't appeal to the police and the legal process. I've been watching the police stand down for these rioters for half a decade. I've been watching the few who do get arrested plea-bargain for probation, or be simply released with no charges. I've been watching their victims suck it up with no recourse, or attempt to defend themselves and then get hit with the full force of the criminal justice system.

You appear to want a system where the overall danger is as low as possible. I want a system where the danger is apportioned to the people who volunteer to experience it. I have axiomatic faith that my system will result in lower overall danger as well, given the incentives, and seeing people arguing for the welfare of violent criminals over that of their victims- and I see no other way to interpret your argument- prompts instant volcanic rage. Especially since this violence is so culturally and politically partisan in nature.

...I'm not sure where to go with the conversation at this point. I do not think I share a common understanding of peace and justice with you. I don't want to live in the same country as people like you. I don't want people like you to rule people like me anywhere, ever. Preventing such an outcome seems like a moral imperative.

...And this is the result given that I know in my bones that you are a deeply, uncommonly decent and good person, at least in the abstract. This is mistake theory breaking down in the best possible scenario.

I'll leave it there. Stay safe and be well.

That was in response to a Rittenhouse thread, but it was the "I don't want to live in the same country as people like you" post.

TW, referring to that post immediately after linking to it, said:

More alarming for me is the feeling that there's a sharp uptick in what I'd describe as radicalization here: people proposing, and cheering, violent conflict against their enemies in a number of ways, including groups that viewed widely include my loved ones. It's hard to look at people the same way after that sort of line has been crossed, you know?

I'd rather not get into another back-and-forth like I had with Steve and Arjin below, in which we're both dissecting what other people actually meant when they posted something four years ago, but it is plainly obvious to me that TW created the Schism because in his own words, he felt that too many people (including FC) were expressing a desire for violent conflict, including against his ingroup.

This is not me saying Trace was right, or that FC meant to do violence to him, or that I agree with him about Rittenhouse, or any of the other things I have already rebutted. It is me saying you are wrong that Trace's problem was "people advocating for lethal self-defense." That's an extremely disingenuous way to frame a post about a specific case, and how he responded to others' reaction to it, as Trace creating the Schism and leaving the Motte because he had an ideological opposition to any use of lethal force in self-defense.

Also: your "gay furry" crack is in fact a cheap shot. Yes, everyone knows he is a gay furry. He says he's a gay furry. He's not ashamed of it. But calling him a gay furry every time you to refer to why you don't respect him is not just a "by the way, he's a gay furry." Come on. If you want to keep highlighting how contemptible he is because you consider him a sexual deviant, do that, but don't keep calling him a gay furry and then deny why you're doing it. Why don't you ever refer to him as an "ex-Mormon" or "military veteran," which he also is? Not the same valence.

the proximate cause of Trace creating the Schism was people literally suggesting they wanted to kill him and everyone on his side.

I'm hoping that I've missed something--maybe you were referring to some other comment? You can't possibly be characterizing the comment you quoted as "suggesting they wanted to kill him and everyone on his side," right?

I don't see how any reasonable person could read that meaning into the comment you quoted. If you're going to nitpick about how ACKTUALLY we were talking about Trace's stated justification and therefore he didn't ACKTUALLY leave because of people advocating for lethal self-defense, you can't also turn around and spin whoppers like this which are easily a thousand times less accurate.

For the record I am not talking about Trace's words but your own. Don't nitpick me on this. Trace may have said the reason was the violent conflict, but you baldly asserted not that that was Trace's reason but rather that it actually happened and prompted Trace's next steps. This is comparable to Nybbler ascribing a different reason to the creation of the Schism.

You say "This is not me saying Trace was right, or that FC meant to do violence to him" but here you do precisely that, directly suggesting that FC meant to do violence to him! This is a far more dishonest, biased summary of what FC said than Nybbler's summary of what Trace said!

I also find it quite dishonest to frame Nybbler's words as inaccurate because they are not Trace's words. Nybbler did not claim that that was Trace's stated reasoning, he just claimed that that was the actual reason. These are not the same thing, people are often dishonest or wrong about their own reasons for doing things, and it's fair game to ascribe different reasoning to someone than what they themselves have stated. Honestly it looks like a pretty accurate summary to me.

He said the culture was overtly hostile towards his strongly-held values. He presented, as his prime example, FCs post which was indeed overtly hostile. The strongly-held value FC was being hostile to was in fact the morality of Rittenhouse's actions that night. TW was very upset that people were killed, and thought that Rittenhouse only had a 1-2% chance of dying if he didn't defend himself using deadly force, and therefore was not morally justified in using it. Reducing this to "couldn't stand to share a forum with people who advocated for lethal self-defense" may be imprecise, but I don't think it's inaccurate.

Agreed, but even if I thought your summary was inaccurate I wouldn't call it disingenuous.

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