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 -
Just like with Murder and Cancer, the optimal amount of victim blaming is non-zero.
Not giving certain kinds of advice also makes certain types of crimes happen more often, e.g. not locking your front door when there's been lots of thefts in your area, or e.g. not warning people of pickpockets in a tube station and telling them to keep any eye on their belongings. The blame for the thefts lies 100% on the thief, but you are an idiot for not locking your door at night and calling out your stupidity serves to get other people to lock their doors more. Yes calling you out here hurts you, the victim, but it is a good deal for society if it prevents further thefts. Same with many other things. Western society does not victim blame anywhere near the optimal amount.
The optimal amount of crime-avoidant advice-giving is non-zero.
The optimal amount of crime-avoidant advice-giving right after the recipient was just raped is zero.
This quickly gets interpreted into, "The optimal amount of crime-avoidant advice-giving right after anyone is a victim of a crime is zero." Which, of course, means that since crimes happen pretty much every hour of every day, it can be easily rounded off to, "The optimal amount of crime-avoidant advice-giving is actually always zero, due to Rule 2."
Alternatively, we can just ask you to give one example of an acceptable time/place to give crime-avoidant advice. Note that the OP here has literally nothing to do with anyone in particular being raped.
More options
Context Copy link
This is assuming the advice is meant for the person who just got raped, it's not, the advice is meant for the rest of society, and giving it temporally close to when a incident happened when the event is fresh in society's minds is actually the best time to do it. The person who got raped is irrelevant, they could spontaneously combust and the right amount of advice to be given would be unchanged.
Even better would be to give the advice right before the rape happened, because the victim might have benefited from it beforehand an the incident may never have taken place (just like how "best practices to avoid getting struck by lightning" advice is normally given close in time to events with lots of lightning), but unfortunately unlike the weather we can't predict when a rape will happen with much degree of accuracy, so we're forced to give it after the event.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I agree with you in many things and disagree in some.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link