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 -
Are you planning to live in the Midwest or in one of the large coastal cities? There are shabby, run-down, neglected, dying on their feet parts of the USA as well.
Everybody wants the life they see in the movies and on TV. Reality is different, be it Europe, Asia or America. The point about absurdly cheap oil prices is part of all that; Americans have cheap energy, and they need it, because of the size of the 'proper' continent and the dependence on cars to get you to work, etc. If you're that electrician, you need the cheap energy to run your house and your cars and your truck and everything else, hence the memes about America going to war for oil. If the people of the US had to pay comparable prices for oil and energy as over here in Europe, there would be huge upheaval, protests, and maybe even a bit of economic collapse. You can live in the hot areas of the country because you have air conditioning, and you can run air conditioning becaue your energy prices are cheap, and your energy prices are cheap because your government ensures they are, and your government ensures they are because your entire economy is built around cheap energy.
All this is not to blame or mock America, just to point out that there's a lot of underpinning the life we see on the surface, just as in other countries. In our own countries, we know what's going on below the surface level. When we look at America, we're looking through the lens of decades of movies creating an image in our minds.
Prior to the Ukraine war, I was under the impression high energy prices were government policy enforced by taxation, no?
More options
Context Copy link
I can hardly afford to be all that picky, especially since I'm hellbent on Psychiatry if I manage to match into it.
In an ideal world, I'd go to the Bay Area and find my fellow rats (and then form an enormous ratking through Aella's orgies), but even if I ended up in one of the more rundown parts of the nation, I expect to have some degree of geographic mobility when I'm done with the residency.
At the end of the day, energy is still cheap there. Why does it matter if things would get worse if it isn't likely? There's no real risk of that that I can see, the fracking boom did great things for domestic oil production.
A great deal of what we consider progress hinges on the availability of massive amounts of energy, and cheaply. The amounts involved have been getting larger and usually cheaper, and a graph of wealth compared to energy consumption is quite linear from what I recall.
It's a massive flex to build a city or golf club in the middle of a desert, and I'm all for humanity telling Nature to go fuck itself, we're here to terraform at scale.
Well yeah, as long as you have resources to burn. But do we? And it gets to a point where "yippee, I can waste water in the desert" is just showing off for the sake of it. I mean, for those to whom this is impressive, great. But I'd much rather (for instance) that something was done about the coastal erosion on a local road in my locality, which any day now really is going to topple into the sea because the soft earth of the cliffside is being eaten away.
But again, this is not to say that you're wrong or dumb. If the Bay Area is your dream of the Earthly Paradise, I hope you get there one day. Me, I like where I am and even if given a free ticket to the Big Cities wouldn't take it. Each to their own.
Desalination at industrial scale has gone from being a pipedream (heh) to now making Israel a net exporter of water. It's only getting cheaper, and if there's one thing we're not running out of, it's sea water.
Good luck finding a place you like, or saving that path. I don't think my preferences are anything but my own either!
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link