site banner
PaperclipPerfector  26d ago (text post)   32084 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025

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.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I understand what you mean, but i resent the use of the term "traditionalist" to describe this tendency, when actual tradition explicitly rejects the idea that beauty is of primary importance in favor of motherhood and homemaking.

There used to be a whole genre of fiction praising men who choose plain moral women over femmes fatales, and this general wisdom is so hard to kill that it even bubbles up in modern fiction (to wit, Knives Chau's obvious moral superiority over Ramona Flowers).

BAPism and other such Nietzchean ersatz reject in part this wisdom in favor of more base passions, but they needn't do so and the devil is in the details. The whole internal contradiction of that movement is a known problem that they haven't managed to deal with yet, mostly bursting out as that constant tension between Christians and neo-pagans.

Hence I believe it important to name things accurately given how tricky this philosophical entanglement is.

when actual tradition explicitly rejects the idea that beauty is of primary importance in favor of motherhood and homemaking

Kind of like actual progressivism, which also explicitly rejects the idea that beauty is of primary importance in favor of the exact opposite of those things.

I'm aware of the steelmen on both sides; I'm also aware of what they tend to mean in practice when the rubber of ideology meets the road of rational self-interest.

Which is why BAPism and other such Nietzchean ersatz are full-bore "don't bother with the plain girl who actually gets along with you, go for the hottest chick you can" (which is exactly how progressives treat men, but replace "hottest" for "richest"). The childhood friend never wins in anime partially for this reason.

And I'd actually say they're correct to do so for a significant subset of women who share the same level of self-interestedness. Married couples were seldom friends- and I'd actually say that, for a lot of people, the suggestion that they should be is an outright lie (which comes from the liberals, not trads/progs). A set amount of challenge (in a predictable and well-defined way) in a relationship can be healthy.

There used to be a whole genre of fiction praising men who choose plain moral women over femmes fatales, and this general wisdom is so hard to kill that it even bubbles up in modern fiction (to wit, Knives Chau's obvious moral superiority over Ramona Flowers).

Although in the movie Knives Chau gets tossed and the Good Ending involves Scott getting Ramona. My take on the movie (I haven't read the comic) is that the screenwriters want to, but don't explicitly, condemn the Scott-Knives relationship as inappropriate because she is still in school and he isn't.

Also, I don't think Ramona is supposed to hotter than Knives in the movie - her most prominent feature apart from being taller than Knives (who IIRC is tiny) is her electric pink buzz-cut hair - this is not something that is attractive to most hetrosexual men. Ramona is supposed to fun (unspoken subtext - slutty) in a way which an Asian-Canadian middle class teenager is not.

It’s a good comic, especially for someone starting college. Fun, funny, and thematically cohesive. I highly recommend it.

It’s also not a rom-com.

Characters comment on how the age gap makes Scott kind of creepy from the beginning. This is not moralist condemnation, because this is a comedy. Scott is being set up as goofy and likable but also pathetic and self-absorbed. From this springs the entire plot.

Likewise, Ramona is supposed to be fun and hot and a walking red flag. Yes, that includes the hair (which you might be misremembering). If you don’t think her look would be catnip to the Scotts of the world, you’re delusional.

There’s a particularly good bit near the end which may or may not have made it into the movie. Scott, during his dark-night-of-the-soul, hits Knives up knowing she used to have a thing for him. “Would you care for some…CASUAL SEX?” It’s awful. Pathetic. Naturally, she’s long over him, and he has to actually figure out what he wants to do with his life rather than paper over it with hedonism.

And that runs directly into the finale—people actually expressing agency. Scott doesn’t pick Ramona over Knives. Knives was never a real option. Once he knows what he wants he actually has to work for it rather than remain in a stasis of rebounds and second choices. Extended adolescence. That’s how Scott completes his arc from a loser to a functional adult. It’s not a rom-com, but a coming of age story.

There’s a particularly good bit near the end which may or may not have made it into the movie. Scott, during his dark-night-of-the-soul, hits Knives up knowing she used to have a thing for him. “Would you care for some…CASUAL SEX?” It’s awful. Pathetic.

Link.

The only thing more pathetic than that scene itself is the fact someone wrote it in the first place.

I rate it Californian brainrot/10.

Isn't he Canadian. Which means the whole thing's retarded because she was legal the whole time, and he was just a coward to give up on Best Girl.

he's Canadian, which means the whole thing's retarded

I wholeheartedly agree. Even worse, AoC was 14 in Canada when the first volumes of the book were written; it wasn't changed until 2006.

It is truly ridiculous how Hollywood has managed to meme 18 into the one true age of consent around the world despite it being lower in 39 states and most countries you could mention (Japan: 16, Russia: 16, Canada: 16, UK: 16, Spain: 15, France: 15, Germany: 14) just because that's what it happens to be in California.

Australia: 16/17 depending on state (16 in the four biggest states).

This is a large part of why Prince Andrew was not prosecuted - Virginia Guiffre was 17 when they had sex, which makes her legal in London (16) and NYC (17). So for there to be a crime they would have to prove they had sex specifically on Epstein's island (age of consent is 18 in the US Virgin Islands).

That Epstein transported teenage girls from jurisdictions where they were legal to the USVI where they were jailbait is one of the great absurdities of the whole affair, and a point in favour of the "planned blackmail op" hypothesis.

I do not believe most heterosexual men are going to classify her haircut as an explicit turnoff.

Ramona's danger hair definitely classifies her as casual sex material rather than wife material; she is not the kind of girl you bring home to mom.

Perhaps so. Then again, as far as I understand it, in many properly trad societies a "respectable" girl was rarely sexually attractive.

is her electric pink buzz-cut hair - this is not something that is attractive to most hetrosexual men

It isn’t that attractive today because it has culturally barber-polled down to having lots of low status associations. Back when the comic was made, having electric pink hair meant you were a cool/hot alt-girl.

Regardless of the colour, the buzz cut is unattractive to heterosexual men in the vast majority of times and places.

I think the distinction between "cool/hot alt-girl", "fun" and "slutty" is one without a difference. I mean this girl is in her mid-twenties and has already had seven messy breakups.

Movie Ramona is mid by the standards of female characters in Hollywood movies. I assume this is deliberate on the part of the filmmakers.

I mean this girl is in her mid-twenties and has already had seven messy breakups.

Not by non-comedy standards.

It’s still not a buzz cut.

/images/1741961768061841.webp

Yeah I'm unfamiliar with any of these properties and understood BigGuy to mean something more cyberpunk than 'mid-lesbo' -- like a Chelsea with some gel-work on top.

It’s more the association. In the late 2000s, unnaturally colored hair dye and outré haircuts tended to be associated with the Alt and Scene aesthetic movements. Most of the girls who had that style back then tended to be stylish and attractive. Then in the early 2010s, partially because of the Scott Pilgrim movie, those kinds of hairstyles got very very popular. Odd cuts, side shaves, pink and blue hair dye was everywhere. Many women pulled it off well but a lot didn’t. As the 2010s wore on (and the culture war started to heat up) it gradually began to acquire negative associations. This is when the stereotype of the “300 lb blue-haired social justice warrior with BPD” started to develop (I don’t like to make fun of anyone’s appearances, but that was the stereotype). As time went on, and the millennial demographic aged, but still maintained a lot of those haircuts, it morphed into the “HR political commissar who is about to fire you” stereotype haircut. That’s why you see a lot of posters on here calling it “danger warning hair” or saying it’s very unattractive to heterosexual men. So when people today look back at Scott Pilgrim and see Ramona with that haircut, they get the wrong cultural signal from it. It’s supposed to signal that Ramona is unusually cool, sexy and a bit dangerous. But today a lot of people see it and just think it looks kind of cringe and lame and wonder why Scott didn’t see the obvious warning signs.

I am with you 100%, and I'm more thinking about chicks from the 1990s FFS -- I'm just saying that that particular haircut and that particular actress are... kind of ugly -- the dye doesn't really tip the scales one way or the other for me.

that particular actress are... kind of ugly

Everyone in that movie was ugly. Ramona, in particular, looks like a man (and even looking at her actress after the fact gives me that impression- it's not just for the movie).

The film tries to make Scott/Knives into something creepy and bad, but my point is that it fails. You'll easily find plenty of people online who find the alternate ending where they stay together superior.

Like many, I have problems with the morality of Scott Pilgrim's universe, but it is a useful and genuine piece of art that gives access to millennial mores in a way few others do. And I see its failure to depict slutty mature fun as superior to naive true love as the weight of tradition (in the sense of perennial moral necessity) reasserting itself. Scott is a terrible person, and what he gets is actually the bad ending.

I'm sure this isn't a consensual opinion given how hot button age gap discourse has become, but it's how I see it.

I'm sure this isn't a consensual opinion given how hot button age gap discourse has become, but it's how I see it.

Let the record show that @IGI-111 plied me with multiple gin-and-tonics, held me down, overpowered me, and forced me to read this opinion. I will be preparing a long and detailed Tumblr post, with accompanying YouTube video, detailing my accusations. Users here will be harshly scrutinized based on how fully and unflinchingly they believe and signal-boost my story.

I don't care. Given the way that take was punctuated, it was asking for it.

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