site banner
PaperclipPerfector  8d ago (text post)   32690 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 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.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

From what I can tell, most of the accusations here are very minor, though. Using immigration laws to sidestep due process is wrong, though.

In many of these conversations, the term "due process" is doing a ton of work that isn't consistent with my understanding of it. Without looking anything up and prior to these arguments, if someone asked me what "due process" meant, I think I would have said that it refers to having a clear and legible legal standard that can't be circumvented to achieve an end goal. That doesn't actually mean that it must take particularly long, that there is no discretion involved, and that there must be some remedy to having it executed. In the case of the Hamas-sympathetic immigrants, I do not interpret "due process" as meaning that they're entitled to anything other than the explicitly laid out statutory considerations, which include discretion for removal at the behest of the Secretary of State's judgment. That's it, that's the due process, it's that when you're a non-citizen in the United States, the Secretary of State has discretion for your removal. If you think that's a bad law, that's fine, but the law exists and was passed legitimately by the United States Congress and signed into law by the President.

As a matter of principle, I am completely fine with the due process leading to deportation being pretty short and shallow. You just don't have any actual right to live in countries that you're not a citizen of (Schengen and other arrangements notwithstanding). If the host country simply thinks you're really annoying, they can tell you to leave.

I think there should be a taboo on citing "due process" as a concern without articulating what process you think is due in this particular case.

For example, I don't think that anyone is claiming that countries may never expel someone short of a full criminal conviction. Nor do I think anyone is claiming that countries don't have discretion when to renew temporary visas or confer discretionary status.

Rather, it just seems like a free-for-all term.

I think "due process" has come to be a Russell's Conjugation: "I am a peacefully requesting my due process rights recognized by law, you are raising procedural hurdles to ensure the law is respected, and that guy over there is claiming 'due process' to indefinitely forestall judgement against himself."

And I can see why some are frustrated this only seems to apply in some directions: some legal decisions can get handed down quickly and hamfistedly (vaccine mandates, forcing closed houses of worship), while others (asylum claims, death penalty appeals, cashless bail) can get backlogged indefinitely to the clear benefit of the party claiming "due process."

Sovereign is he who decides on the exception.

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