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Calling all Lurkers: Share your Dreams of Effortposting

It’s been pointed out recently that the topics discussed in the Culture War thread have gotten a bit repetitive. While I do think the Motte has a good spread on intellectual discussion, I’m always pushing for a wider range (dare I say diversity?) of viewpoints and topics in the CW thread.

I was a lurker for years, and I know that the barrier between having a thought and writing a top level comment in the CW thread can loom large indeed. Luckily I’m fresh out of inspiration, and would love to hear thoughts from folks about effortposts they want to write but haven’t gotten around to.

This of course applies to regulars who post frequently as well - share any and all topics you wish were discussed in the CW thread!

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Nuclear power and how/why it become so polemicized. I'm sure that everyone knows the big incidents like Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, but I'd be willing to bet there's a story to be told about the behind the scenes politicking that led to the current status quo where nuclear is toxic (heh) in public discourse.

In generally, in the US, what? How "toxic" nuclear varies hugely from country to country. In Finland, it's probably currently toxic to be anti-nuclear. However, several polls also indicate that the pro-nuclear view holds anywhere from a majority to a really comfortable majority of support in the American public, and at the very least there are no credible suggestions to actually start proactively running nuclear power stations down in the US, a la Germany.

Historically, I'd say the biggest motivator in anti-nuclear sentiment weren't the accidents, though those played a part, but rather the mental link between nuclear power and nuclear weapons. It's not an accident that Greenpeace has the word "peace" in name.