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 -
As an occasional drunk-poster myself, I can sympathize. I usually lose a lot of nuance when I'm drunk.
Regarding the Latvian/Pole comparison, the thing is yes they suffered genocide to some degree, but I doubt that the number of people who were killed by the USSR's political repressions in those places is statistically very different as a percentage from the number of blacks who died in various ways as a result of slavery (overworked, killed while trying to escape, etc.).
The USSR also did not destroy Latvian and Polish culture any more significantly than American slavery destroyed the culture of the slaves, when you look at it from the slaves' perspective. Yes, the practice of slavery did not destroy the African cultures that the slaves were originally from, but from the perspective of the enslaved subset, it was a near-total cultural erasure.
As brutal as the USSR was, it is not like pre-USSR Latvian and Polish cultures got destroyed.
Black American culture is thriving in many ways, and is certainly globally recognized, but I think this is because black Americans' most popular cultural products, such as athletic performance and music, are ones in which black Americans as a group are just better at creating really popular things than Poles and Latvians are, and also have the benefit of using English, one of the world's most widely known languages, and having access to the US' pop media marketing and distribution machine, the strongest in world history. Sure, there is no globally famous Polish version of Michael Jackson or Michael Jordan, but I don't think this is caused by what the USSR did to Poland.
More options
Context Copy link