site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 14, 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.

11
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Given that you've blocked me and wrote this post shortly after I replied to you, I can't help but feel like I'm one of the people you're talking about. I don't personally feel like an asshole or like someone who has particularly inflexible opinions (outside my bugbears wrt to Russiagate), but c'est la vie. I can't recall getting angry at anyone on here, even if I disagree with them, and I find the argumentativeness animating rather than dispiriting. For the record, there wasn't any animosity or desire for point-scoring in my comments. But then again I'm a poster who cut their teeth on anonymous imageboards, so maybe my own internal evaluation is miscalibrated when compared to the broader internet. I've noticed more of a compulsion to post here in some cases, but the only negative aspersion I feel like casting is that it sometimes feels like the internet points I get from posting is more closely related to the position that I take rather than the quality of my post. That said...

And I myself can identify. I've thought about leaving dozens of times, because I said something that got negative pushback, or was upset by people making strong claims with which I have fundamental values clashes. (I'm sure I trigger the same response in people, and I'm sorry.) Fortunately I have just barely enough sense to stop before I start shouting curse words at people, but trust me when I say I've come close (and that was what I was worried about a while ago when I said I was afraid I'd start breaking the rules). Just recently I nearly threw my computer across the room reading some of the latest threads, which clearly demonstrates that it's not healthy I continue to be a user here. I have never left because I crave culture war content, but I have stopped talking about some of the bugbears for which I have received the least positive feedback, especially religious content.

If you are getting this angry and this potentially violent about words on an internet forum you absolutely should take a break from them and you're doing the right thing. Stress and anxiety of the kind that expresses itself in curse-word shouting and physical violence is bad for the health of the soul and body both. While I would enjoy continuing to read your posts on here(though sadly this seems one-sided), I hope for your own sake that you're able to get yourself into a more stable and healthy position.

For what is worth, I saw nothing extraordinary about that exchange. Thinking about this I maybe do have one obese friend (with BMI slightly over 30) who I really like and who is funny and very good company to be around. But he does not share my interests with other friends in my circle for things like hiking, skiing or even long walks around the city if we go somewhere on roadtrip or whatever. So from my personal experience you exaggerate a bit, but then maybe you live in a slightly different social bubble.

I live in a place that made the news due to how attractive and fit the median person was. So many people were so good looking and in such good shape that it made a tourist from the UK feel bad about themselves when they went to the beach because their relative attractiveness took such a big hit when compared to being back home.