Daily Archive

 One of the confounding aspects of trying to have a conversation with an activist is the staunch refusal to meaningfully engage.

This refusal comes in many forms but it usually breaks down like this:

1.  Statement about a topic in society – for instance – School libraries should not carry age inappropriate materials on their shelves.

The activist reply usually goes down two familiar paths.  The first is to attack the person making the statement – “Only people on the far right say such terribly bigoted and hateful things.  Why are you so filled with hate?

Notice here they have selected the way of social coercion, in this gambit they are attempting to bring social pressure down on you for making a neutral innocuous statement.  This hinges on the idea of guilt by association:  Who wants to be labelled a far right ‘nazi’?

No one, of course.  But does their name calling equal a meaningful answer to the assertion being put forward?  Of course not.

The second method is formally called drawing a false equivalence/strawmanning, but in practice it can be thought of as comparing apples to oranges and attempting to make a judgement based on the the misapprehension of the facts of the matter.  The activist apples to oranges tack looks something like this:

How could you be in favour of banning books?  Don’t you believe in a free society and freedom of speech?  What kind of authoritarian are you to want to ban books in a free society, you know Hitler banned books right (they often can’t resist a combination approach)?

Does the activist meaningfully address the claim?  Nope.  What happened is they took a false reading of what their interlocutor said, and then argued against what they added to the conversation.  To reiterate, the claim was that age inappropriate materials should not be in school libraries.  Our claim wasn’t about banning books outright, and never allowing children access.  Our claim was based on child cognitive development and the need for having age appropriate materials that will best address the needs of the children.

Notice their (erroneous) argument is easy to make.  “You are for banning books!”  “You are a right-wing hateful bigot!”.  It takes much more time to carefully sort out their accusations and clear up all the mud they’ve thrown into the waters.

It is a pain but it is always necessary to name the dynamic that is in play.  This isn’t about ‘winning’ an argument or ‘owning the Libs’ and if it is you are engaged in the same sort of bad faith your opponent is employing.  In a worthwhile conversation both parties should be looking to try and decipher what the truth of the matter actually is.  It requires both parties to be willing to change their positions based on a set of agreed upon facts that comport with reality.

Name calling and arguing against your notion of what your opponent is saying is the opposite of a constructive conversation.  Thus, it behooves you to show the argumentative dodges in play and ask your interlocutor to make a charitable assertion with regards to what you’ve asserted.  It is perfectly acceptable to ignore the various slings and arrows (naming them as they happen) and continue to ask for a reasonable response to your assertion.

What you’ve done has placed the ball firmly in their court.  They can continue to make baseless claims and continue to demonstrate their dishonesty, or they can choose to address what you’ve actually said.

The takeaway for this is to let your opponent demonstrate their honesty or dishonesty – it is their choice and their motivations will become clear depending on which path they choose.