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 -
In this post, I argued that support for authoritarianism could be tied to internal vs. external locus of control, and specifically a person's belief that they are capable of protecting themselves from harm (or lack thereof). All things being equal, a gymrat is probably more likely to think he's capable of defending himself from a mugger than someone who rarely exercises. Even a physically fit person will tend to be more confident in their ability to flee from someone who comes at them with a knife, when compared to an obese person who gets winded walking up a flight of stairs. If you don't think you can protect yourself from harm, the natural assumption is that it's the government's job.
This theory would predict that men will generally tend to be more libertarian than women, that gun owners will be more libertarian than non-gun owners (e.g.), that women with husbands will tend to be more libertarian than single women ("I can't defend myself from a home invader, but my husband can protect me"), that younger people will tend to be more libertarian than older people (particularly pronounced in men as their body stops producing as much testosterone).
There was a lot of pushback on my theory at first brush, and the way I phrased it made it sound a bit like I was saying all Democrats are effeminate weaklings and all Republicans are ripped alpha males (obviously neither is remotely true). I think the internal vs. external locus of control might be a more productive framing: an authoritarian believes that it's the government's responsibility to protect him from various kinds of harm (whether that means criminals, Covid or mean words on the Internet), whereas a libertarian believes that it's his own responsibility to protect himself from most kinds of harm. For most people, if you can't do something (and don't want to put the effort into learning), it's only a hop, skip and a jump away from thinking that you shouldn't be expected to do it, that it isn't your responsibility to do it - because otherwise you've admitted that you have responsibilities which you're shirking. From this perspective, support for authoritarianism is sort of like weaponised incompetence on a societal level: much like your annoying colleague who insists that they can't do some trivial task in Excel because they're "not good with computers", authoritarians are people who are unable to protect themselves from harm, refuse to learn (or even change their behaviour in order to make harm less likely) and demand that someone else do it for them. And that belief doesn't sit in isolation: if you think it's the government's responsibility to protect you from a range of harms (up to and including nasty words on the Internet), that necessitates the creation or expansion of governmental bodies to carry out said protection, which means raising taxes. Conversely, if Joe (believes that he) can protect himself from certain kinds of harm, and the people who think it's the government's responsibility to protect them from that harm want to raise Joe's taxes to fund it, Joe will quite reasonably retort: "I can do this myself and don't need the government's help - why can't you?"
It's also worth reiterating that a person's assessment of their ability to protect themselves from harm can be flat wrong: there are plenty of physically fit Zoomers who are made of glass and think that catching Covid is a death sentence, and plenty of Red men in their seventies who refuse to get vaccinated, stop smoking or wear a seatbelt. But there's probably some kind of middling-strength correlation between one's actual ability to protect oneself and one's personal assessment of one's ability to protect oneself from harm. To reiterate, a man who goes to the gym three times a week is more likely to believe that he can protect himself than a man who doesn't. A man who owns a gun is more likely to believe that he can protect himself than a man who doesn't, even if he's a clumsy oaf who's more likely to literally shoot himself in the foot than shoot a home invader.
As I pointed out here, it's fascinating to note how recently mocking obese people for refusing to take responsibility for their condition was a left-coded belief. Consider this meme, or this one, or this one. Post these on left-leaning subreddits ten years ago and you'll be showered with upvotes; post them today and you'll be accused of being fatphobic, unless the subject of the meme is clearly a member of the Red tribe (prominent MAGA hat).
I'd be curious to see research regarding whether obese conservatives are more likely to hold themselves responsible for the size of their bodies than obese liberals. My gut feeling is that, the higher a person's BMI gets, the probability of blaming their condition on factors outside their control approaches 1, regardless of political alignment.
As much as we'd like to claim that Red Tribers have internal locus of control and Blue Tribers external, I don't think it's quite that simple. I think the real difference is between people with high life satisfaction and low life satisfaction, or high-status vs. low-status. If you're a Blue loser who can't hold down a steady job, the reflexive cope is to blame the patriarchy or Amerikkka or say that you can't work because of your depression or fibromyalgia. If you're a Red loser who can't hold down a steady job, the reflexive cope is to blame it on Biden flooding your county with Mexicans who'll work for peanuts. Successful people, whether Red or Blue, are bound to attribute their success to personal traits and hard work: the "nepo baby" accusation stings even if (especially if!) you self-identify as a woke person who acknowledges that society is set up in such a way that numerous people are afforded all sorts of hereditary unearned privileges. A successful woke person placing their hand on their heart and declaring, unprompted, "I acknowledge that my success is partly a result of my unearned white privilege" is effectively a kind of humblebrag, because the category includes hundreds of millions of white people who are nowhere near as successful as them. Good luck finding a successful woke person placing their hand on their heart and saying "I acknowledge that my success is partly a result of my dad buying me a house when I was 21 and getting me an internship in Lockheed Martin because the CEO is his golfing buddy."
I think there is something to your main thrust re: locus of control, but:
I have multiple progressive friends who would absolutely say that they were given significant advantages due to their family connections. I do think it helps that in several of the cases it would be absolutely ridiculous for them to claim otherwise (probably a lot easier to disavow your dad being the golfing buddy of a CEO than your dad being a CEO or if your last name is on a building at the college you went to).
Though if anything that further supports your main argument.
More options
Context Copy link
Having been around obese conservatives quite a bit more than the median motteizean, lots of them don’t think staying fat is their fault, but all of them admit that getting fat was their fault.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link