site banner
PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   27875 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 27, 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
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I use to be in favor of the bare link repository, I was heavily against removing it.

I have since changed my mind because of the culturewarroundup subreddit. They died. We lived.

The reason I think this has happened is that we require people to have discussion worthy things to bring to the table. How do we determine if something is discussion worthy? We ask our posters to start the discussion. If they can't it tells us one of a few things:

  1. They can't start the discussion on a given topic, because the topic sucks for the discussion purposes. This was one of the original reasons for creating the bare link repository and then removing it altogether. What tended to happen is people just dropped controversial thing #937 into the mix, and it wasn't very interesting to anyone. The topic is a dead horse, heavily beaten. Or the topic is just boring and not actually very culture war ladden.
  2. They can't start the discussion on a given topic, because they aren't a great writer and they don't know how to start the discussion. Many of these turned into flame threads.
  3. They won't start the discussion on a given topic, because they are lazy. As grognard said "I know man, how frustrating it can be when these goddamn wordcels won’t give me my insight porn fix. Daddy needs his medicine." There seems to be this type of person that comes here looking for insight porn, but yet providing nothing. They want to dictate the direction of insight porn without providing any. Fuck them. They are leeches and parasites. Contribute first, and then you can dictate the direction of insight porn.

There will always be one place that caters to the leeches and parasites. It will be the best place for reaching the most number of people. We aren't that place. We can't compete on that dimension. If you want to contribute we do our best to help. If you want to constantly bitch and complain about your inability to dictate the direction of discussion, we aren't a great place to be. You are in the latter category. Your only quality contribution is a long winded complaint about the BLR. Your numerous warnings are all a result of you complaing about someone posting top level comment about a topic you don't want to discuss. You are a leech and a parasite on the good discussions of others.

Wow cjet, I disagree with you on something, and when the topic comes up, I say that I like brevity and provide that side of the argument for it.

That makes me a leech and a parasite on the good discussions of others?

Absolutely unnecessarily mean and hurtful. Yeah that’s the only comments you see from me because they’re usually replies to you when you’re being a jerk to somebody.

+1 on a hell no for the BLR. The point isn't even about a place dying, places like these can be pretty active, but they become one-note, depressing, and intellectually vacuous. My go to example was KotakuInAction, it was getting plenty of new posts and hundreds of comments for as long as I bothered checking up on it.

Just go back to some of the very old CWR threads from the SSC sub. Low effort posts were policed, sneering was removed, and tons of good discussions were had.

Sneering is bad, rdrma, KIA and whatever cesspools are obviously a model for what not to do.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats