site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   31544 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 7, 2022

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

13
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

It's ironic and sad, I thought the DE creators would get purged by the woke but they apparently fell out between each other over money.

Kender supposedly played an important role in the project, as did the the 3 other guys.

If it is as they say, I hope they get somewhere. Also, it doesn't really strike me as possible Kurvitz & co are actual communists; the game is way too nuanaced to be a product of true believer cogitation.

They strike me more as pranksters who used the retarded western fascination with superficial communism to get promoted. Also, intelligent Balts being unironically communist.. what?

Also, it doesn't really strike me as possible Kurvitz & co are actual communists; the game is way too nuanaced to be a product of true believer cogitation.

Does being a true believer mean you have to be a mindless follower of the existing dogma? I think the game makes it quite clear that ZA/UM consider communism a valid reaction to the injustices of existing socioeconomic systems. They don't blame people for wanting social justice and economic equality, but they don't know how to do this without spilling rivers of blood or ending up ruled by corrupt bureaucrats or oppressive dictators or remaining a useless discussion club. A heart vs mind conflict.

At this point, you cannot possibly be in favor of communism, that is, state ownership of means of production unless you're an idiot, which the writeres aren't, so..

Why planned economy cannot possibly work efficiently or without being tyrannical has been explained sufficiently by Hayek around the end of WW2, and subsequent developments have only supported his ideas.

EDIT:

although reading the wiki, if it's accurately describing details from the history mentioned in the game, they might actually be commies. In-game communism is portrayed as less dire than actual real-world communism, in broad strokes.

I guess it makes sense if we consider intelligence to be often used to rationalise away innate drives. The communist revolutionaries were typically not very successful children of middle classes, who, having not succeeded in the existing order riled up the lower classes in order to usurp power, and inevitably created regimes way more nightmarish than the ones they had rebelled against.

I hope this caused you to update away from believing "people who disagree with me are all idiots, because they're obviously wrong" is a good heuristic.

I generally did not believe that, though..

The impression I got from playing Disco Elysium was that they are some kind of post-Marxists, or disillusioned Marxists. They are still support the Marxist project, but they see Marxism more like the lesser evil than a grand utopian vision. It's a begrudging kind of support for Marxism.

I always felt that that Disco Elysium was went easiest on its criticism of Marxism of all the ideologies the game critiques and satirises - I thought this even before I knew the background of the developers. Much of the criticism of Marxism within the game itself isn't actually levelled at the philosophy of Marxism, but rather how Marxism is (in)effectively implemented. The union boss is less a critique of Marxist or socialist organising, but more about how self-serving people will abuse the idea of Marxism/socialism to enrich or empower themselves. It occasionally veers dangerously close to 'Marxism doesn't fail people, people fail Marxism' territory. Not to say it the game doesn't have any substantial critique of Marxism, but I definitely felt it was less substantive than some of the other critiques.

It's just hard to figure out. The union boss is disgusting and corrupt but also possibly quite efficient and ruthless in bring about the violence which is all that matters to true bolsheviks, no?

They corporate negotiator there is portrayed somewhat positively - she's not snobbish or out of touch or arrogant but dignified and sympathetic and fairly brave operating mostly solo in a restive neighborhood, eventually you figure out she's a billionaire who owns part of the company involved. IIRC, she doesn't want to use violence and is alarmed that the security contractors they hired have gone rogue.

Weird game. I feel like this all might end up with them being RPG players with a rather more nuanced view of people's characters than basic ideologues may have.

I'm also perplexed by the three racists.

The first is a typical stock character, the basic garden variety racist prole that exists in the real world in great numbers.

The second is an amusing hulk of a black supremacists spinning cute racist theories about the various races of the fictional world, with three adorable groupies.

But he's also an important asset to the local revolutionary wannabes, personally brave and quite intelligent and can help the protagonist get over his alcoholism.

The third one is some sort of lower middle class twit so pathetic and contemptible and one dimensional in a game full of nuanced characters that he feels out of place, like they're making fun out of anyone who'd take him seriously. What gives here ?

Interestingly I'd say that personwise the ultraliberal characters are portrayed the best. Most communists tend to be violent dicks, but Joyce Messier is one of the objectively most positively portrayed characters in the game, and the guy who is so rich light bends around him is more comical than anything else.

I struggle to remember a third racist, maybe I didn't take note of him. Is the truck driver who says something like "welcome to Revachol" (and your partner takes offence to it) the first or the third in your list?

No, that's the first racist. The third racist is Gary the cryptofascist.

What about the fascist petanque player?

Oh, you mean the monarchist veteran guy? I think he isn't described as especially racist. Or fascist, just an old guy who is nostalgic for the monarchy he defended in his youth.

My read of Revacholian fascism is that it's not strictly similar to our world's fascism, more like nostalgia for late-stage dictatorial Revacholian monarchy combined with atavistic racism and sexism. Agreeing with René's points moves you along with the fascism path quite considerably.

Yeah, I guess. Language issue, same as e.g. normie meaning of 'democracy' and the woke meaning.

But Revacholian monarchy wasn't particularly dictatorial or totalitarian, it was a somewhat feckless constitutional monarchy.

Ah, well.

He's a monarchist, isn't he?

Also, it doesn't really strike me as possible Kurvitz & co are actual communists; the game is way too nuanaced to be a product of true believer cogitation.

"Communist" probably means anarchist here, mostly. The game makes it fairly obvious they aren't really that sympathetic towards old Soviet-style communism, figures as much.

They also aren't sympathetic to revolutionaries eitgher. One thing that cemented it was mention of a staff of a small cutting edge computing company getting lined up and shot during the revolution..for unclear reasons.

They have a portrait of Stalin hanging in their office and gave thanks to Marx and Engels during their VGA award acceptance speech. Maybe some part of it is ironic and/or they're like the portion of /pol/ who like to use Hitler and the swastika as edgy symbols despite not being neo-nazis themselves, but it's not as straightforward as just being anti-Soviet anarchists.

I feel that has to be a psy-op on their part, getting the clueless idiots in gaming journalism on their side.

In-game communist are portrayed as bloody handed idealists who leave corpses in their wake, slaughter a small computing company for no good reason and manage to build a nuclear reactor but fuck it up and get their very own meltdown. They replace a corrupt monarchy with something that doesn't work and it all ends in a bloody failure.

Moralintern is deeply weird. Eh. Dammit, I hoped for a second game.

Moralintern is basically EU. Crossed with NATO, but mostly EU. The conversation with the Moralintern bureaucrat who has a thing going on with the guy smoking in the balcony makes this very clear to anyone with even a passing familiarity with EU rhetoric. Moralism is basically equivalent to EU's functional guiding ideology, stripped of the federalist impulse: ever-present, continuous progress at a snail's pace, so slowly one might not even notice it at all times... but above all economic stability ("constant 2 % inflation rate" and so on).

That part (the EU bureaucrat being a homo sex tourist) made me chuckle.

It's too bad people who make up the EU bureaucracy are working from false premises. I could imagine being in favor of a Moralintern. It works, sort of.

EU doesn't. But EU is absolutely wrong on energy policy, immigration, education and also defense. It's not actively working to kick yanks out, it's wrong on education and the energy debacle is absolutely a catastrophe. Mind you, yanks are now talking about how to drag EU into their China war because they have 'saved us' from the Russian menace in Ukraine.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats