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 -
It's special genre of comedy for me personally to see Americans on this site with severe lack of knowledge about how things can be different from their own "exceptional way of doing things." In my noname 200k Russian town I could go to all these activities by myself at age 6. Bus or in my case "marshrutka" can arrive every 5 minutes without even remotely Tokio level of density, more accurately seven times smaller than it.
I understand that it's your own favorite way of life and you're trying to defend it but the problem is that it's forced on everyone. And generally we can see worldwide tendency of people wanting to live in big cities where all the job opportunities and interesting things are. Urbanists hate car-centric policies because they are artificially stifling this trend not because they want to force people like you out of suburbs. Europe has suburbs, they are an option there.
Five minute headway is actually pretty rare for a town of 200k, even in Europe. It's usually 30 minutes, 20 if you're lucky, on trunk routes.
It's not my favorite way of life. I love how Tokyo has the infrastructure and culture that allows ten year old kids to have the freedom of the city.
Given the constraints I have, it's a good way of life though. You don't see people like me telling New York to raze their skyscrapers and put in what I want, but you see plenty of Blue Tribers mocking my way of life and trying to ban it.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link