Or: How to Fight a War Nobody Can Find on a Map
I’ve been hearing about the Culture War for years now. Decades, really. And I have to confess something that even though I was a part of it in the early ’00s: I still don’t know where it is.
I’ve looked. I checked under the bed. I googled it. I asked my dogs Gigi and Eli, who both tilted their heads at me in that way that means either “I don’t know either” or “is it dinnertime?”
Gigi tilted left. Eli tilted right.
Even my dogs are divided.
But apparently the Culture War is very real, very urgent, and according to a new CNN poll, Americans are deeply divided over it — and Republicans are leaning into that division hard heading into the midterms.
So I figured: someone should write the field guide. Consider this my contribution to civic life.
WHAT IS THE CULTURE WAR?
The Culture War is a conflict in which two sides fight bitterly over who gets to decide what’s normal. It has no official start date, no geographical front lines, no exit strategy, and — crucially — no definition both sides agree on.
One side believes the Culture War is about protecting children, preserving tradition, and making sure that somewhere in America, a nativity scene can sit unmolested on a courthouse lawn in December.
The other side believes the Culture War is about whether their kids can learn actual history, whether their families can exist in public without being legislated out of existence, and whether the word “normal” is allowed to include them.
Both sides are convinced they are losing.
This is, statistically speaking, a miracle.
HOW DO YOU KNOW IF YOU’RE IN IT?
Signs you may be a Culture War combatant:
You’ve used the phrase “they’re coming for our—” in the last thirty days. (Fill in the blank with: guns, gas stoves, Christmas, children, way of life, Bud Light, pronouns, Mr. Potato Head.)
You have strong feelings about a cartoon character’s sexuality.
You’ve described a children’s book as an act of aggression.
You believe the other side controls: Hollywood, the schools, the banks, the media, the government, and also somehow is simultaneously weak and failing.
You believe your side controls: nothing, despite being correct about everything.
WHO’S WINNING?
Nobody. Everyone. Depends on the news cycle.
Here’s what I’ve noticed after a lifetime of being on the wrong side of someone else’s culture war: the people who declare the wars are never the ones who bleed in them.
The politicians who campaign on cultural panic go home to their gated communities and their lobbyist dinners. The voters who turn out furious about what’s being taught in schools they’ve never visited, about people they’ve never met, about books they’ve never read — they go home to rising grocery bills and crumbling infrastructure and healthcare they can’t afford.
And the people who actually live the issues — the queer person in a small town, the Black family in a gerrymandered district, the immigrant trying to understand what the rules are this week — they don’t get to treat it like a culture war. For them, it’s just another day.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
The midterms are coming. The rhetoric will get louder. Someone will say something about bathrooms or women’s sports. Someone will discover a new book to ban. A politician will stand in front of a flag and talk about freedom while voting to restrict it.
And the rest of us will sit here, tired and bewildered, wondering how we got drafted into a war we never enlisted in.
Here’s my unsolicited field guide advice: follow the fruit.
I know, I know — I say this a lot. But Galatians 5 didn’t become my personal compass because it sounds nice on a throw pillow. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. If the people leading your side of the culture war aren’t producing any of that — if what you’re harvesting is fear, contempt, exhaustion, and rage — maybe ask yourself who benefits from the harvest.
Spoiler: it isn’t you.
The war will go on. The polls will be cited. The ads will run.
Gigi and Eli will be here, heads tilted in opposite directions, united only in the firm belief that it is definitely dinnertime.
They might be the wisest ones in the room.
What’s your Culture War front line? Drop it in the comments — I promise to read it with great patience and mild bewilderment. And if you haven’t subscribed yet, now’s a good time. The war will still be here when you get back.
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