site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   32956 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 1, 2023

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.

9
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

revolution and social upheaval are often worse for women than for men.

...this sounds suspiciously close to "women have always been the primary victims of war".

Was the Bolshevik revolution worse for women or men? I genuinely don't know; I'm asking. I'd be willing to hear arguments for both sides.

Men play high stakes but in times of war increase their power advantage over women, so men die but do lots of sacking and raping.

Mind you, war increases the desire for chivalrous protection of women and could enhance in-group honour codes that prohibit taking advantage of women of one's own side.

I guess you could cheat and not count The Eastern Front of WWI or the Russian Civil War. If you do count them, well, I’ll just leave this here.

well, I’ll just leave this here.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that the more modernity I see, the more the Soviet Union's collapse becomes inexplicable (because our society is so rife with Fake And Gay Economics, and yet doesn't collapse, that the official narrative of "The USSR collapsed due to its Fake And Gay Economics" must also be false).

That datum raises only further questions, because I know I wouldn't be protesting the CCCP in Red Square if I had 1.6 Russian women per man to distract me.

the official narrative of "The USSR collapsed due to its Fake And Gay Economics" must also be false

It is false. It collapsed because the soviet elite believed its own political formula to be fake and gay.

If the soviet elite was still communist despite their lying eyes, there would still be a Soviet Union today, and probably a pretty powerful one at that. And I know because that's what happened in China thanks to Deng's careful maneuvers.

Time and time again throughout history and empire, collapse always happens when the elite lose faith in their own right to rule. Of course their ideology leading them to stupid places can help with that, but you can always twist the lie to make it do what you want if you're competent enough to back it up with success.

It’s not just that the USSR collapsed because it had Fake and Gay Economics, it’s that there was a hot and ready example of what a less Fake and Gay economy looks like. If China starts kicking out ass economically and culturally in the next decades, I fully expect to see mobs in the street demanding “Socialism with American Characteristics”.

Also, note that the sex ratio returns to normal for the generation that was too young to fight in WWII. It is interesting that there were no protests in Red Square during the post-war decades, though the population would have returned to normal by 1990.

our society is so rife with Fake And Gay Economics, and yet doesn't collapse, that the official narrative of "The USSR collapsed due to its Fake And Gay Economics" must also be false

The USSR's economics was much gayer and much, much faker. The US is David Bowie; USSR was Holly Johnson (this comment is now itself gay).

That is an excellent analogy, so excellent I feel compelled to post about it.

Sure, it's just like how we all acknowledge that men are the primary victims in situations where a mother dies giving birth.

'Women have always been the primary victims of war' was a fair statement because most war discourse draws a difference between 'victim' and 'combatant'.

Feel free to ignore as you said you weren't interested but it's difficult no to bite at this. If you are distinguishing one group, which is roughly half the popular, from the other and the other half is dying as combatants and thus aren't victims then the whole statement becomes devoid of meaning. It's like saying the apples left in the crate have always been the primary apples left in the crate. It is a fair assumption that statements are not supposed to be entirely devoid of meaning.

Male non-combatants/civilians are killed at far, far, higher rates than female non-combatants/civilians. I remember reading that in Afghanistan, 75% percent or so of civilian casualties were male. This even extends to children, when boys were killed at higher rates than girls comparable to that of adults.

'Women have always been the primary victims of war' was a fair statement because most war discourse draws a difference between 'victim' and 'combatant'.

This is just playing a shell game with words here, no different to redefining racism as "privilege + power, impossible to be racist to whitey". If someone who just got his arms blown off by a mortar while he was eating his campfire beans doesn't count as a victim, then I contend that you have changed the word beyond all plausible recognition.

I feel like you might be conflating the concepts of "victim" and "non-combatant" and claiming that those categories are exactly identical. But it's pretty clear to me that there are combatants who are also victims.

The most clear-cut case would be wars where one side is an unjust aggressor and the other side is engaging in self-defense. For the defensive side, I think even voluntary enlistees are victims, despite also being combatants for legal purposes; they're fighting a war of self-preservation that they didn't ask for. In cases where we agree that one party bears the moral blame for the war, it would seem odd to suggest that the other party's combatants are as equally culpable as the aggressor's. People have a right to self-defense.

Can you at least agree that the primary victims in the current war in Ukraine are Ukrainian men?

If he volunteered to invade another country for ideological reasons and has freely killed for that purpose, is he still a victim?

No, but neither is any woman in his life.

'Women have always been the primary victims of war' was a fair statement because most war discourse draws a difference between 'victim' and 'combatant'.

Then it should be "everyone except men in their 20s have always been the primary victims of war".

In a civil war, I would expect more men to die than women, but for the men on the winning side to have better post-war lives than the women. I doubt I can find persuasive evidence of that and I express it with very little confidence in the accuracy or generalizability of the claim.

I think the balance is also likely impacted by how organized the factions of the civil war are and how clear the lines are. I can't imagine the American Civil War, for instance, being worse as a woman than as a man. But when you get into stuff like competing warlords and ethnic cleansing with no separation between the frontlines and the homefront I could see it being worse for women, especially in cases where resources are scarce (food requisitioned for soldiers so anyone not seen as fit to fight is left to starve).

Yeah. I feel men are more liable to reap the benefits of the 'chaos is a ladder' phenomenon but are also going to have the very bad outcomes.

Then again conquered men's genes and memories get wiped out. Conquered women are generally kept alive and reproducing.

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