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 -
If we could somehow ensure that the people doing the censoring had correctly learned the lessons of history that other people had failed to learn then this would be great. But ensuring that is about as hard an just ensuring that we all collectively remember those lessons in the first place.
I see an ambiguity in the notion of learning the lesson of history.
One version involves people poring over the history. Doing X didn't work last time. It didn't work the time before either. People make adjustments, informed by the past. They do X version 3. It doesn't work. Merde! Some commentators claim that the adjustments were silly and stood no chance of making a difference to the outcome. People knew the history and did X anyway because they don't learn from history.
An alternative version involves people ignoring the history. A few point out that X didn't work last time. One more knowledgeable person points out that it didn't work the time before that either. The naysayers get told "this time is different". The people saying "this time is different" know nothing of last time and know of no difference between this time and last time. But they want to do X and "this time is different" are the magic words that let you do X. They repeat X version 1 and it fails the same way it failed the previous two times.
I believe in both versions. Sometimes there is a real, but unsuccessful effort to learn from history. We say that people didn't learn from history, because we judge by results. But there was an honest effort. I see no reason to censor such efforts. Other times, only a few people study the history. They are unanimous: don't do it! But they get out voted, and X gets done with foreseeable bad results. If you were paying attention, you notice that the bad results were actually foreseen. We would be much better off if we censored those saying "We should do X. This time is different."
Well, that is my claim. I don't think it fails because it is hard to learn the correct lesson from history. I think that there are cases were a policy doesn't work in theory, doesn't work in practice, and those in the know, know. There are low hanging fruit, ripe for plucking. Society screws up because people ignore the history because they don't care.
But is my claim true? I think that the weakest point is that the power to censor is a power honey pot that will attract a lot of wasps. I'm talking of technocrats carefully selecting the low hanging fruit. But society is run by chancers and grifters who don't care whether the fruit hangs low or is ripe. They want power. They want money. If there is an Office of Censorship, they will fight to control it, planning to censor any-one who blocks their route to power and money. I don't know what to do with this insight. It proves too much. If I take it seriously I end up an anarchist and reject government and power structures entirely.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link