*** The Official MAGAposting thread ***

[MadMojoMonkey]

Why is culture such an alien concept to you?

I know what I mean when I say culture, but what you're talking about doesn't fit what my picture of culture is, so I want to bridge that gap.

For me, culture is a dynamic thing that varies in time and space. It's a coincidence of many, many people following unwritten social behaviors that are expected as "normal," and the many, many ways that the norm is not all that "normal" after all. I think laws come from culture and not that laws create culture, so I'm happy to leave the "written rules" off the table in any explicit sense.
St Louis culture isn't the same as Seattle culture or Colorado farmland culture, and none of those cultures are the same as they were 100 years ago. There are similarities and differences.
A ton of those differences would have been decried as "evil" by people living 100 years ago, and yet, here we are - considering their lack of these cultural principles as the evil.

I want to understand your argument that change in your culture is something you put weight on as a bad thing, and to what extent you feel that way.

Just to reiterate, I don't give a flying fuck what you end up believing. I just want to understand what that is and why. If either of us changes our mind in coming to understand each-other's Truth, then that's a cool perk, IMO.

Culture is language, law, arts, architecture, regional accents, cricket, tea, dickheads shaming the country at football events, terrible food, complaining about the weather... it's also a sense of respect for women, acceptance of gays, and respect for other cultures... so long as those cultures don't stand in stark contrast to our values, at least.

Especially the end of that list is bunch of relatively recent developments. Why is it that the change to adopt those elements was good, but other changes are bad?
Isn't it really about something else, deeper than a simple demand that your culture stay the same as it is now?

Our cultural acceptance of interracial marriage, homosexuality, women's right to vote... those ideals you say are a part of our culture, none of that stuff has been part of our culture for very long, and there is still widespread disagreement as to whether or not allowing gay marriage is a positive move for our culture. (in America. I think you guys are a bit more chill about gay marriage in the UK, so feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken.)
Christianity is going on 2,000 years old and these values you ascribe to Christian culture haven't even been around for 100 years, yet. (Women's suffrage is getting pretty close to its centennial, at least in America. That'll be nest year.) I don't think Christianity has everything to do with it, maybe something, but definitely not the whole story.
Furthermore, it's Christian values that fight against women's right to abortion, it's Christian values that continue to persecute homosexuals. I don't think you have much of a leg to stand on if you're saying that increasing the rights and liberties of these things are Christian values. If anything, they've come out of our culture despite being against many Christians' values.

I said that? Or did you assume that? It's both. I am no fan of any religion. I tolerate Christianity more than others because that's the majority religion of British people. Also, I like churches, from an architecture pov, there's one nearby that predates Norman times (which began 1066). Christianity is a very deep part of our history and culture. I have to respect that.

Well, I thought it was a paraphrase that captures your position, but if it's not a good way to summarize, then please correct me.

You can respect whatever you like. If you say you "have to" from a purely subjective, "otherwise I'm lying to myself" position, then I totally get that.

It's my understanding that the core of your opposition to allowing Mulsims to immigrate to the UK is not simply because they're religious. I.e. you're not saying, "those people don't belong here because they're religious." You're saying, "those people don't belong here because they don't want to assimilate into my culture, they want to inundate my culture with their own."

If that's not apt, then I'm not even understanding your argument. Please clarify.

I don't have to respect Islam.

*shrug* I know, man. (and I really don't care)
So long as you're being respectful to me in the way we are sharing our perspectives with each other, then I don't care if you argue that cancer is great for people. I'll probably always think you're fucking with me on some level if you do, but I'm more interested in the thought process behind your positions than the positions themselves.

I'm not remotely interested in changing your mind. I respect you more than that, and I know better.
Even when I was trying to change your mind, I would never have said you "have" to do anything. I'd think you know me better than that.

I don't doubt that some other voices in this conversation are trying to change your mind, and that can be difficult to navigate when I'm on a slightly different tack.
I can lay off if it's getting tedious to separate the conversations.