site banner
PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   21714 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 14, 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.

7
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Step 1 in any emergency is secure the scene first, even with more "medically informed" training an irritable crowd with an insufficient number of officers and a very large suspect is going to mean that options are excruciatingly limited. I'm not sure there really is anything different to do with more medical training anyway. There isn't any secret sauce for managing overdose or agitated patients. Additionally "I can't breath" or "that hurts" "you're hurting me" is not useful information from a restrained perp or patient, since the fact that they aren't going to be a useful source of information is intimately related to why you are doing it. Excessive struggle (secondary to discomfort) or no struggle at all (secondary to the position being...unhealthy) are not useful pieces of information since most patients will either go crazy or try and wait and save energy.

Obviously their are minor things you can do to make things safer but its never "safe" it's all risk mitigation, and elsewhere in this thread someone noted that this whole thing could easily be Chauvin getting abandoned for following standard operation procedure, or a small miscalculus based on how long it was supposed to take backup.

Now you may say "doc you paint a pretty stark picture, where the fuck are the rest of the people in the medical community agreeing with you?" I have no idea. It was a huge black pill for me. We know this.

I agree that, speaking fully generally, it's very difficult to detain a suspect who is high on drugs in a way that is completely benign when considering all the unknowns in securing a scene and maintaining officer and public safety. This is not a fully general scenario, though, but one with a very specific fact pattern:

  • Chauvin had the backup of three other officers, two of whom were helping him physically restrain Floyd, and the other controlling the crowd.
  • The officers knew Floyd was on drugs based on their own judgment and experience of suspect behavior. Tou Thao made reference to it on video.
  • Floyd was already cuffed.
  • Floyd was uncooperative, but not a violent threat.
  • Thomas Lane twice expressed concern and suggested moving Floyd into a recovery position, but Chauvin replied no.

Under this specific fact pattern, where officers were well in control and could spare time to contemplate the well-being of the suspect, the refusal to try changing restraint position seems incompetent or negligent. This wasn't some split-second decision made under gun fire, it was simply a bad call by the senior officer, and it led to an unnecessary death.

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