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 -
I think this rationale is mostly in defending military aid to Ukraine. In two years, the US spent a total of $75 billion on Ukraine aid. This is like 5% of its military budget over the same time frame. I think it is hard to overstate how much of a bargain that is. If they could keep China occupied for another 10% of their military spending a Machiavellian strategist would of course do this.
And the Ukrainian cause is quite photogenic. They are somewhat democratic and western and fighting against annexation by a much larger warmonger. Much better than previous allies the US supported against the USSR, like the Mujaheddin.
If the US was smuggling a nuke into St Petersburg and detonated it there to weaken Russia, that would be incredibly evil, yes. But this is not what is happening.
Forget about the small scale conflict of 2014. Putin has no moral claim to occupy Kiev. He is the aggressor in this conflict. NATO is not mind-controlling the Ukrainians. They want to continue to fight, foolishly dreaming of reclaiming every square meter of their country from 2014 back. I think that they might be better served by pursuing a negotiated peace where they cede the occupied parts and then join NATO so Putin can not come back for another slice.
You might be a radical pacifist who thinks that violence is always wrong, and the decent people of the world should just roll over and give the bullies what they want.
I think that fighting wars which can be won or at least fought to a stalemate is sometimes worth it. I am not even firmly opposed to fighting losing wars. Sometimes extracting the maximum cost from an enemy can be a sound strategy. It does not help you in your timeline, apart from satisfying petty feelings of revenge, but it might help you in all the other timelines. If every military operation where the attacker was twice as strong as the defender resulted in the defender surrendering without conditions and the aggressor reaping the full productivity of their new possession, a lot more aggression would happen. Instead, the mere threat of a long war followed by decades of asymmetric conflict eating up the productivity of the region is a lot of the reason why wars of conquest are rare.
I do not expect the Ukrainians to be especially grateful for NATO for the military support. They know that we treat them as pawns, with them doing all the dying. I am strictly against sending NATO troops into Ukraine, Russia and NATO shooting directly at each other is how nuclear wars start. If Ukraine was in NATO, then it would be worth risking World War III in its defense because the alternative would be to defect from the obligations of Article 5 and destroy any deterrence NATO offers, which would enable Russia to pick off European countries one by one.
More options
Context Copy link