The Scarcity of True Friendly Fire

First, our culture has a huge problem of defining the in group as “those who never criticize the group.” So, anyone who criticizes, is, by definition “Them,” and not “Us.”

We need to be really careful not to fall into that trap.

Second, how does Scott Alexander know what is going on in the mind of the person delivering the criticism? How does he know what they’re “really” doing?

It goes without saying that if, for example, a surfer blogs about how uneducated surfers are these days, he’s not usually talking about himself. If he cares about the problem he’s going after, he will usually already have put effort into being part of the solution rather than part of the problem. That doesn’t make uneducated surfers an “outgroup” for him.

Third, fundamentalism and fundamentalist-heritage ministries don’t, in my experience, have a history of being overly self-critical of the movement/group. Quite the opposite.

… but if we’ve defined the ingroup as “those we never criticize,” we’ve basically defined “self criticism” or “internal criticism” or “friendly fire” out of existence anyway. It becomes an oxymoron.

Ultimately, I don’t think it’s all that important whether the ideas or groups being criticized are “ingroup” or “outgroup.” What’s important is whether the criticism is true and needed, and whether those who need it most will let it help them.

Finally, make sure the group you are least likely to tolerate is not one that you should actually be most likely to tolerate

Tolerating doesn’t mean “withholding needed criticism.” Neither is criticism intolerance.