site banner
PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   26475 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 15, 2024

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.

13
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

But in a wider sense, American conservatives aren’t serious people. They consider forcing impoverished black single mothers to give birth to more children higher priority than ending mass immigration.

How many times does it need to be expressed that a huge chunk of American conservatives are also religious and consider ending what they conceptualize as mass scale baby murder to be extremely serious? Please stop using this like it's some kind of a dunk, all it does is indicate that the person using it like a dunk doesn't have a good mental model of the minds of the people they are trying to dunk on.

If that was their motivation they wouldn't vote for Trump a second time, they already got their judges and Trump has expressed much milder and more reserved pro-life sentiments than many of his contemporaries on the primary ballot.

  • -10

Religious conservatives have reasons for supporting the GOP and being very invested in GOP judicial appointments that go beyond abortion. Notable among them are conscience rights/religious objection, support for parental rights, especially in education, and preventing discrimination against religiously-based organizations by public agencies. And the GOP does in fact deliver on these promises to its conservative Christian base; it's generally easier to live the trad conservative christian lifestyle in red states than blue states, and generally easier in blue states than in western Europe.

The GOP, yes; I'm talking about supporting a different Republican.

Why? Trump delivers on his promises to that section of his base, it’s only fair to give him loyalty in return.

He appointed a conservative Justice when a seat opened up, which is what literally anyone with an R next to their name would have done at the time.

He's been a lot softer on the pro-life message than some of his competitors, it's pretty reasonable to predict he's not the option that would deliver the most on that front.

Of course if your decision metric is 'giving loyalty for past favors' instead of 'doing the thing that will accomplish your goals in the future' then yeah that makes sense.

  1. The real-or-feigned inability to build a mental model of the majority of conservatives that aren't "internet-brained rightoid" is a problem that extends beyond this immediate topic.
  2. To respond to your specific point, I wouldn't expect anyone who got a win that big to immediately change horses. Their choices are between the guy that indirectly got them their biggest wins in 50 years, or more of the same losing strategy. Why wouldn't they vote for him again?

I mean, if they're paying attention: The win was from Mitch McConnell stealing a seat from Obama. Literally any warm body with an R next to their name would have produced the same or better results for the pro-lifers during Trump's term, that's just when the last seat needed happened to open up.

Literally any warm body with an R next to their name

we have decades of history with people with R next to their name who nominated justices who refused to do just that

arguing counterfactuals are nice for the proponents because in practice they're unfalsifiable; no other GOP candidate was going to flip PA, MI, WI, likely even Ohio, and other states to win the presidency in 2016

the corporate neocon grift of GOP, Inc., which had lost elections for over a generation in those states, was somehow going to accomplish what Donald Trump accomplished with a radically different message who near single-handedly made the 2016 election about immigration and trade while explicitly denouncing the idiotic neocon projects to boos from GOP, Inc., stooges

Mitch McConnell blocking Obama from replacing Scalia was likely a conditional to the win, but the rest of your statement is based on counterfactuals supported by an unfalsifiable myth of the great alternative GOP winner which does not exist

yup. There were always better pro-life alternatives. It was clearly obvious in 2015/2016 that Trump was not a pro-lifer

...And yet Trump still managed to be one of, if not the, most Pro-life presidents we've had since the days of Reagan and Carter. I dont recall either of the Bushes participating in the March for Life. Do You?

Trump opposed DeSantis on abortion ban https://apnews.com/article/trump-desantis-abortion-ban-republican-primary-5bdbba55f9c2f328d49b5fbe9727677e

Speaking Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Trump repeatedly declined to say whether he would support a federal ban on abortion. He said he could “live with” the procedure being banned by individual states or nationwide through federal action, though he said “from a legal standpoint, I think it’s probably better” to be handled at the state level.

Trump has a long history of prevaricating on this issue.

George W. Bush signed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act , although it was drafted by Rick Santorum.

And the elder Bush https://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/22/us/as-expected-bush-vetoes-bill-that-would-pay-for-some-abortions.html

The evidence would suggest the Bushes are more stridently pro-life compared to Trump.

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