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 -
There was no discussion of self determination after because the South lost. The point is that the South believed they had the right to change their form of government and the North said “no you don’t.” That is a violation of self determination. Of course, the reason the South wanted that right was to brutally oppress a minority. But that implies the right to self determination is at best contingent based upon what you will do with it.
As for propaganda, when you read Hamas’ charter which cites to the (apparently happy) day when even trees will call out to Muslims that a Jew is hiding behind them and it is time to kill the Jew do you believe Hamas has zero desire to wipe out Jews? Why disregard their stated intention?
Is your idea that the British solution was somehow wrong? Keep in mind it wasn’t the Israelis who fucked up the British solution but a number of Arabs who couldn’t dare imagine a Jewish state.
Please also inform us how the Jews have been invading Gaza. In 2005 Israel pulled their citizens forcibly out of Gaza. Gaza then attack Israel. I’m sure I will hear something about the disputed West Bank but of course that isn’t Gaza.
Finally you talk about propaganda and then cite to an ethnostate? Really hard argument when Israel is surrounded by theocratic authoritarian governments (including Hamas which hasn’t held an election since 2006). Hell even Arabs have a party in the Knesset. Do Arabs have a bit of a second class right in Israel? Yeah. But funny enough those second class rights are often better than rights in other Arab countries and far better than the rights Jews have in those autocratic countries they are surrounded by. There is a clear difference between Israel and the non-Israelis in the Middle East. It isn’t a hard choice to say which one is better (even if none are perfect).
PS — part of my point was that right of self determination conflicts a lot with other supposed rights. For example, could France choose to keep France for the French by refusing to take in any immigration? I’m sure NGOs would claim that violates immigrants’ rights even if that conflicts with the French supposed right of self determination. So is there a right to self determination?
Not saying they aren't real pieces of work, but they adopted a new charter back in 2017 that abandoned such language and states their war is specifically with the Zionists occupying Palestine rather than Judaism. I would also caution against conflating the organization Hamas with Palestinians as an ethnicity/nationality.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link