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 -
If HlynkaCG messaged the mods with a clear description of how he's not been engaging constructively recently and expressed an intent to not do that in the future, he'd probably be unbanned quickly. He's probably not going to do that though.
The only thing keeping us all here is both 1) that it's the best place to be and 2) that it's the only place to be. Not unlike America or Ancient Rome, even as it dives evermore into the shitter, it's still wrong to unperson someone because both of those things will remain true for the foreseeable future.
More options
Context Copy link
NTA but no one ever's probably going to do that, in this very thread (in other branches) people have clearly expressed their views on bending the knee and writing mea culpas to the janitors. I'm not keen on getting modded any time soon but I'm happy to join in the collective sentiment of "fuck that noise". It sounds like a good idea in the abstract but one mental test run of you yourself doing that should reliably dispel any notion of real-world applications.
I've seen it done on other forums, it's definitely cringe but it often works - just the ability to coherently articulate the mods' perspective on what the user was doing wrong is something most people who get banned for being annoying lack - and if it doesn't work the first time you just permaban them again.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link