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 -
I’m not convinced by the court’s reasoning.
First of all, I don’t think it’s well established that anyone at the rally expected a riot. They expected a protest certainly, but I’m not sure they expected the full force of the crowd trying to breech the Capitol. Exhibit A in my view is that speakers at the event — Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz specifically— spoke at the event and then went to the Capitol to debate certification. If there were reason to suspect a riot, then why would they want to be anywhere near the Capitol when the crowds arrived? If republicans literally believed that the 1/6 rally was going to be a coup attempt, why were they so open about funding people going? If the orders to use political violence were so clear, why is it that after they managed to get into the Capitol, they weren’t doing violence or even real property damage. In fact I’ve seen more property damage done in videos of people in restaurants being charged extra for dipping sauce than happened in the Capitol.
I think there were some elements influenced by Q who wanted to overthrow the election. But the presence of a tiny minority of people who choose to riot doesn’t mean much when it comes to whether or not the leaders and speakers intended a riot.
Of course not. Up until then, conventional wisdom was that the left riots, not the right, particularly not the mainstream right (which the crowd mostly was -- aside from some of the actual rioters, some of whom weren't even on the right!). There'd been violence at Trump rallies, but all of the form "Lefties attempt to disrupt rally, Trumpists treat them roughly". Even Charlottesville required the powers that be literally cause the violence by first canceling the legal assembly, then forcing one group through the counterprotestors.
More options
Context Copy link
Alternatively, if a riot after a politician speaks on a topic is strong evidence of incitement to riot, there are a lot of BLM riot-promoters that should be rotting in prison for an extended stretch. I wouldn't necessarily have any problem with that, I do think many of these speakers encouraged riots and caused billions of dollars in damage across the country, costing dozens of people their lives directly, and many, many more through riot-enforced depolicing policies. The promotion of BLM was a "threat to our democracy". If nothing that any politician egging on rioters did in 2020 qualifies as causing a riot, then Trump certainly does not qualify either.
Well, sure, if they’re guilty of promoting a riot, then they’re guilty of that. But they’d have to be actively trying to convince people to riot, which at least for the actual Elipse speech (which would be the most relevant here) I just don’t see anything that someone reading the speech cold (with no knowledge of what happened afterwards) would see Trump giving marching orders to have people break into the capitol. In fact, if there’s no break-in nobody would have thought much about it. The reasoning thusly seems to be working backwards— there was a riot, and pretty soon after Trump gave a speech; therefore Trump incited the riots.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link