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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
There is one thing I tend to see as a vulnerability that I never see addressed: reporting the results as a race. When the votes are cast and the counting begins, the result is already decided and it's just a matter of finding out what it is, I don't see any utility in gradually reporting partial counts as if it were a race, and I think that creates a vulnerability in that it tells a potential malicious actor exactly how many votes they need to add in order to flip the result without being too obvious. The longer the counting takes, the more of a vulnerability this becomes.
Now, if results were reported after the counting was done, a potential malicious actor would have to accurately guess beforehand how many votes they are going to need, and that is much more difficult to do.
This seems like an obvious fix, and would also maybe save us from tedious Election Night coverage that all the networks do with reporting every single miniscule change in the race over the course of hours and also racing to 'call' an election as quickly as possible. Would be nice to just be able to tune in once at like 11 p.m. when outcomes are known and just get a brief report reflecting said outcomes, and which are still in flux.
Although I admit that the 2016 election was amazingly high quality entertainment for me as the unexpected Trump win became apparent through the slow tally of the votes.
I'd guess, but I do NOT know for certain, there's probably some kind of rules around gov't transparency that requires results to reported as quick as possible, even piecemeal ones, so this probably will not change.
But as you say, avoiding these periods where some outcomes are known, some remain uncertain, and there are brief windows in which malicious actors can attempt to flip an outcome once they know how many votes they must fabricate would really shore up faith in overall election integrity.
I just doubt there's any way to ensure that all states get their counts done at approximately the same time, and having periods where some outcomes have been determined but not reported yet while waiting on others to catch up can make it look like there is something being hidden anyway.
I hadn’t thought of that. It seemed obvious that the media circus was business as usual for American stations. But it’s quite plausible that there’s something pushing early reporting.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link