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A Worsening Culture War

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Re: A Worsening Culture War

#61

Post by refurb »

ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote: post #55
DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If American politics are straining your relationship with your sister and you are not even American, sorry to put it like this but only you two have yourselves to blame. Next time your sister brings the topic up say "yeah right" and move on. This. America is not actively shoving its politics into our conversations, we're doing that ourselves (I'm from Germany as well, btw.). Yes, talking about whatever social shena…

America is funding European academics to spread its toxic ideology. It's also shoving its culture in our news, movies, music, etc. Overstating personal responsibility in this matter is naive and very American.

"Shoving"? Are you saying European news organizations don't have the freedom to cover what news they want?

They choose to cover it.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#62

Post by 1986 »

hprotagonist wrote: post #3

"That's all the media and the politicians are ever talking about, the things that separate us, things that make us different from one another. That's the way the ruling class operates in any society. They try to divide the rest of the people. They keep the lower and the middle classes fighting with each other so that they the rich, can run off with all the fucking money. Fairly simple thing. Happens to work. You know…

Yup, like many in the civil rights movement, King leaned heavily towards socialism and economic justice (see the Poor People's Campaign) in addition to, and as an integral part of, racial justice. But the Cold War and the boogeyman of Communism meant that that was weaponized against them while the struggle was ongoing, and whitewashed from their history as they became mythologized afterwards. Unfortunately things haven't changed much today - "Black Lives Matter is Marxist" is one of many common tropes used in right wing media where the boogeyman of socialism is alive and well.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#63

Post by wayne_skylar »

harryf wrote: post #12

The real question to me is whether FaceBook and Google are _deliberately_ complicit in creating devisive bubbles through recommendation systems or whether that’s just an unfortunate byproduct that’s unfixable? In Taiwan they have social media designed to reward agreement - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/27/taiwan-civic-h... - whether it’s truly successful or not I can’t say but if so, then Facebook and Go…

I don't think it was deliberate. But after they realized it's a problem, they also realized that it's the best way to drive engagement so they do nothing.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#64

Post by kodah »

puranjay wrote: post #19

Social media has made it wildly easy and incredibly cheap to propagate any misinformation. Head over 4chan and you'll see a factory line of ideas being thrown at the wall to see what sticks - which is then further spread across social media. If you were a foreign power and wanted to sow discord in a rival country, you had to buy off dozens of journalists and funnel money to media houses and hope that they'd at least…

> Social media has made it wildly easy and incredibly cheap to propagate any misinformation. Head over 4chan and you'll see a factory line of ideas being thrown at the wall to see what sticks - which is then further spread across social media.

4chan has always been like this. Pre-2007 it was basically the boiler room of the internet. You could find memes before they hit mainstream along with all the shitty ones that didn't make the cut.

I'm sure this natural filtering was disrupted when we brought millions of users online for the first time and convinced them that social media is the internet.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#65

Post by criddell »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #51
bluntfang wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offense, but neither the 2 major parties in the US are left/workers rights. I don't see any candidate running on the "improve quality of life for wage earners" platform. for example Joe "nothing with fundamentally change" Biden...and well the last 4 years.

See the list of states with parental leave: https://www.patriotsoftware.com/blog/payroll/states-with-pai... Similarly, see the list of states (and cities) with half decent unemployment benefits, minimum wage laws, non tipped wages, sick leave, required meal breaks, non compete bans, Medicaid, marijuana legalization, etc. You will see a trend in which parties’ governance wage earners have these benefits (which are a p…

While being a very Republican state, Oklahoma has a pretty long history of some very progressive programs. For example, Oklahoma funds pre-K programs for children:

https://hechingerreport.org/why-oklahomas-public-preschools-...

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#66

Post by the_duke »

eznzt wrote: post #15
Roritharr wrote: post #9

The craziest part of this american culture war, to me, is that it seems to spill over to the rest of the world. My sister and I, living in Germany, have a very loving relationship, but we absolutely disagree on almost everything political and basically are stuck in our seperate bubbles. This gave us an interesting observation: 5 years ago it took us about two to three months, to have a fight over something that start…

>The craziest part of this american culture war, to me, is that it seems to spill over to the rest of the world. It does not seem so crazy to me, after decades of cultural imperialism from America, that we are mirroring the same patterns of behaviour and fighting the same battles. (Just to be clear, I'm not against imperialism) If American politics are straining your relationship with your sister and you are not even…

> but only you two have yourselves to blame

This is a very dismissive argument to make. It's just like saying Americans have just themselves to blame for this culture ware and should just stop arguing and move on.

Everyone watches US TV shows and movies. Many media outlets all over the world give way too much attention to US news topics, for reasons that are not really clear to me.

This kind of cultural affiliation is not a personal choice, but brought on by news media and the dominance of US entertainment.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#67

Post by Retric »

TMWNN wrote: post #17
ixtli wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This tracks for me, having lots of friends and connections outside of America. Personally I think it’s yet more evidence that what we can often dismissively refer to as a “culture war.” Is a disagreement over fundamental moral issues that we just refuse to talk about directly or really act on.

An example of how the US argues over the death penalty in a way which doesn't happen elsewhere, but perhaps should: >In fact, opinion polls show that Europeans and Canadians crave executions almost as much as their American counterparts do. It's just that their politicians don't listen to them. In other words, if these countries' political cultures are morally superior to America's, it's because they're less democrat…

Wisconsin outlawed the death penalty in 1853, so that’s hardly a new issue. What’s changed is how much such things are emphasized. Rather than the 2020 presidential candidates talking about meaningful policy differences it was mostly about token issues and identity politics. Occasionally, they would signal which groups they where supporting, but as quietly as possible.

That’s how unpopular choices can become policy. It breaks down to people with strong preferences deciding issues rather than the majority deciding issues. Farmers care a lot more about subsidies than most people making farm subsidies an easy choice.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#68

Post by mikepurvis »

DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #27
eznzt wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The craziest part of this american culture war, to me, is that it seems to spill over to the rest of the world. It does not seem so crazy to me, after decades of cultural imperialism from America, that we are mirroring the same patterns of behaviour and fighting the same battles. (Just to be clear, I'm not against imperialism) If American politics are straining your relationship with your sister and you are not even…

> If American politics are straining your relationship with your sister and you are not even American, sorry to put it like this but only you two have yourselves to blame. Next time your sister brings the topic up say "yeah right" and move on. This. America is not actively shoving its politics into our conversations, we're doing that ourselves (I'm from Germany as well, btw.). Yes, talking about whatever social shena…

There's obviously cultural differences, but the political priorities and overall dialogue are just completely different too. Like in Canada, we already have gun registration and background checks (the "common sense" laws that Biden wants but that the NRA says are radical) and the fight is about banning specific classes of assault rifles. In Canada, we already have state health insurance, and the fight is about whether it should cover things like pharmacare, dental treatments, and counseling sessions for mental health. In Canada, the debates about abortion and gay marriage are long settled (1988 and 2003 respectively)— even discussing them is considered political suicide, and the Conservative party has at various points banned back-benchers from attempting to start the debate (for example, by putting forth weaselly, redundant laws about fetal personhood).

You could easily argue that the "Conservative" party in Canada is equivalent or possibly even to the left of the mainstream Democratic party in the US. So yeah, it gets a bit weird when right-leaning people in Canada then also support Trumpian politics— sometimes it's hard to know if they're there after a considered review of the positions, or if it's just a knee jerk "pick the guy on the right" response.

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#69

Post by aiisjustanif »

colordrops wrote: post #49
rossdavidh wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Never ascribe to conspiracy, that which is adequately explained by incompetence."

Aphorisms such as these are loved by the think tanks orchestrating these conspiracies.

This comment section feels like Reddit. shiver

Re: A Worsening Culture War

#70

Post by fallingfrog »

Ironically, the idea that ethnicity and other signifiers are used to divide the working class against itself has been a pillar of socialist thought for over 100 years- it’s not a centrist position.

Edit: you don’t have to agree with the position I just stated but it is a fact that that it is a socialist position and has been since the days of Marx. I’m just pointing out that the author is trying to paint it as a middle position, and it’s not, it’s a left position. In its most extreme form it has a specific name: class reductionism.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.urbandictionary.com/define....

Now I think you can make the case that this is too ideological and not good HN material. That’s fine. But if it is HN material is it not fair to make basic points about the topic of the article itself?

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