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 -
«As is well known to you, these specialists of ours have been drawing to fit them for rule the information they need from our political plans from the lessons of history, from observations made in the events of every moment as it passes. The goyim are not guided by practical use of unprejudiced historical observation, but by theoretical routine without any critical regard for consequent results. We need not, therefore, take any account of them—let them amuse themselves until the hour strikes, or live on hopes of new forms of enterprising pastime, or on the memories of all they have enjoyed.»
You can guess the source, probably. In a more reductionist style: smugness grounded in historical accomplishment and not psychometrics has been the undoing of many a people, starting with the Chaldean Empire at the latest. The Book of Daniel is instructive here.
More to the point, yours is an understandable perspective; but one should note that contemporary leftist spirit is the opposite of Faustian. Barring unorthodox voices like Yglesias and Klein with their «supply-side progressivism» (presented as a novel vision and not a rebranding of common-sensical Modernist philosophy that follows from basic Enlightenment), current leftism is characterized by deep suspicion about technological solutions and by the expectation of dystopian scenarios that almost unites them with the trad far right, lack of commitment to specific conditional predictions – we know for certain what spells doom, but not what may positively suffice to avert it, short of doom with extra steps – and by utter reliance on zero-sum redistributive approaches. The best they can offer «underrepresented minorities» is more pablum about school funding, antiracist brainwashing and affirmative action. They scoff at AI and actively suppress genetic technology. They just want status quo with a revised gibs ratio. Self-professed Faustians like Musk freak them out.
As for whether victimhood can serve as a valid platform for whites. If anything can, that's the best option – the narrative of collective victimhood is the standard cornerstone of collective identity. You ask «Why would one choose to identify as a powerless victim», but the crux is that if you don't have systemic power, you don't get to choose your identity – like those Jewish victims that the Western civic religion is built around didn't have the choice of converting into Aryans. If you are hated, if you are denied resources because a politically dominant coalition takes issue with your skin or ancestry and prefers you be deprived while they increase their share, then you – at least, you as you currently conceive of yourself – aren't welcome in the camp of victors, and will have to either prove your usefulness through ritual humiliations, or fight for the slice of the pie the collective identity you have been defined into gets. Your belonging to a group is largely constructed by your ghettoization. And if there is none, there isn't much point to having a group, and pursuing self-actualization as an atomized agent makes more sense. Doubly so for peoples without a strong collectivist and clannish drive.
I guess most whites think this is the case. Fair enough – they enjoy enviable standards of living, absolutely and relatively speaking.
This might be true of your average Democrat politician or shitlib bluecheck, but have you read any of the stuff the World Economic Forum is putting out? Or UNESCO? Say whatever you will about it - and I have endless negative things to say about it myself - but this is a group of people with an intense Will to Power and an unshakeable belief that they have the power to fundamentally transform humanity. They seem to have a boundless confidence in the power of technologies - both mechanical and social - to rewrite the bounds of what we consider possible. It is ultra-Faustian - here, some would helpfully remind us that Faust is, in fact, the victim of a demon, offering us a self-serving temptation which will lead us to ruin, and not in fact a role model to be emulated - and I completely understand why it appeals to so many capable and intelligent white people. It’s downright Promethean. The strain of European man who looks at every supposed limit or guardrail as an engineering problem to be overcome has a lot to be inspired by in the writings of the WEF, which is itself a recapitulation of the Hermetic mythos which has inspired so many generations of hyper-intelligent European aristocrats and autodidacts over the course of millennia.
More options
Context Copy link
Do you think blacks got their current status in western society by "winning" it from whites?
Isn't this the official Civil Rights story?
Yes, but that doesnt mean its true. Black activism has always mostly looked how progressivism at the time thought it was supposed to look, and its successes were mostly given to them by white people either directly or by giving them things that materially imply them.
I mean, if our elites decided that riots will no longer be tolerated, what do you think happens? You of all people should know better than to think a reverse of the old race relations could really happen.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link