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 -
You think that's bad? How about when the very same people who go after social manias for a hobby, and who have a history of blasting the use of puberty blockers on autistic children, end up defending puberty blockers as reversible, when the autistic children believe they're the opposite sex.
There's a lot of reasons I can come up with for why people would act this way: fear of people in power, wanting to be on the Right Side Of History... but at the end of the day it's rank speculatiion.
Will read in detail but that looks like a particularly craven reversal. I think maintaining status is probably a big motivator for such people, who are already in the public eye and don't want to lose what they have. It's why you'll never see an episode on the gender cult, or gender gurus on Conspirituality or DTG.
But the people who I am interested in are people like my friend or brother in law. People who when you explain some of the concern, end up with 'its complicated' and don't want to go further even in their own minds. I mean I get blue tribe v red tribe tribalism, but shouldn't there be some curiosity of the issue at hand?
I know it's all speculation but I really want to know, are people actually not concerned with fidelity to actual reality? Is my mind one of say 20% and there's like another 50-60% that appear like me but actually have a fundamentally different mind?
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link