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Culture War Roundup for the week of January 8, 2024

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To lay some cards on the table, what you're arguing seems to be that most conservatives are some flavor of white nationalist. I assume at the mild end of the spectrum you describe, this is less blood and soil rhetoric and more 'it's okay that my tabletop game club is made up entirely of white men’

I am possibly misunderstanding you here, but it sounds like you are saying you would consider “it’s okay that my tabletop game club is made up entirely of white men” to be a mild form of white nationalism. If so, and if that is the standard liberal view, the inferential gap between liberals and conservatives on this subject is frankly too large to overcome. No conservative I know would have the slightest problem with an all-white group of friends hanging out; they wouldn’t consider it racist, wouldn’t consider it an example of white nationalism, and would most likely think of anyone who disagrees as the genuine racist.

As far as I can understand, he would call that the moderate position, no?

It is both moderate and right wing to think that white people have legitimate ethnic communities too. But in terms of identification, it tends to attract people who identify more as right wingers in certain countries. But is in fact the moderate position.

I'm assuming that tabletop community would be a 'legitimate ethnic community.' But even that is fraught - if it's recognized as a 'legitimate white ethnic community' and a black person wants to join, what happens? If you just happen to have a board game group that happens to be all white I think progressives would ding you on not being inclusive enough but not call you a white nationalist, if you happen to have a white ethnic board game group that would actively exclude others based on race, then I think you deserve the label of either racist or white nationalist, no?

I'm assuming that tabletop community would be a 'legitimate ethnic community.' But even that is fraught - if it's recognized as a 'legitimate white ethnic community' and a black person wants to join, what happens? If you just happen to have a board game group that happens to be all white I think progressives would ding you on not being inclusive enough but not call you a white nationalist, if you happen to have a white ethnic board game group that would actively exclude others based on race, then I think you deserve the label of either racist or white nationalist, no?

What if it was an exclusively black or Indian or Chinese, etc, etc. club? Which would be acceptable and why? What about subcategories of white, like Irish or British or French?

To lay my own cards on the table, I am not white, and I think forming exclusive clubs of this sort are in poor taste at best and would rather they not exist. But we do not live in that world.