As with many things, it can be contextual. For instance, it might be pertinent to know that the person with whom you’re discussing climate change is a flat Earther.
Which is true, and their note agrees with that. You won’t always be talking to someone who cares. Or even normally, arguing on the toilet with bored strangers on the internet, where most people are just looking for entertainment and one or both people is usually dismissed entirely the moment they don’t wholesale agree.
Which is not how a conversation is supposed to work. But it’s almost never about convincing anyone, is it? It’s about yelling at whichever people it’s socially acceptable to yell at for points, and encouraging people to listen to each other garners insults. From often the same people who complain nothing is getting fixed and people are so mean these days.
Their main point — that there are three sides to an argument: yours, theirs, and the truth — is still salient if you want anyone in any situation to hear anything you’re saying who didn’t already agree with you anyway. If you’re talking past each other, you might as well just shut up and go look at memes.
Especially irl. There was another commentor here that said everyone just wants to be heard. This is 101 in defusing an (honest) argument, and nothing is moving anywhere until they feel like they’re being taken seriously. Go to any type of counseling, and the first thing they’re going to do is make you sit there, fingernails digging into the upholstery, and listen to each other without interrupting.
The onus is not always on you. There are millions of people that just have to see it for themselves before they’ll admit anything you say is actually happening or indeed important. Maybe not even then.
But the snarky name-calling dismissal the internet approaches every argument with doesn’t even include room for a maybe, and it objectively doesn’t make sense to bother engaging in. Getting to the bottom of what the problem someone is having actually IS, even if you think it’s a stupid problem, can only be a benefit to solving it and making the stupid thing go away.
That user isn’t actually the “what if the nazi has some points” kind of centrist that they got called. They’ve just been to therapy before, or had parents and spouses who cared how they felt, and now they care how others feel.
And they will only care if you also show you care.
I would say even higher than “refuting the central point” is “extracting the central truth from both sides and finding enlightenment”.
Note: this is only useful if the opponent has some redeeming quality in his argument.
If you have a bad faith actor, just find the quickest and cleanest way to exit. If clean isn’t possible, prioritize quickness.
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And why is it you, instead of them, that went aaaaall the way to the bottom :/
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As with many things, it can be contextual. For instance, it might be pertinent to know that the person with whom you’re discussing climate change is a flat Earther.
Which is true, and their note agrees with that. You won’t always be talking to someone who cares. Or even normally, arguing on the toilet with bored strangers on the internet, where most people are just looking for entertainment and one or both people is usually dismissed entirely the moment they don’t wholesale agree.
Which is not how a conversation is supposed to work. But it’s almost never about convincing anyone, is it? It’s about yelling at whichever people it’s socially acceptable to yell at for points, and encouraging people to listen to each other garners insults. From often the same people who complain nothing is getting fixed and people are so mean these days.
Their main point — that there are three sides to an argument: yours, theirs, and the truth — is still salient if you want anyone in any situation to hear anything you’re saying who didn’t already agree with you anyway. If you’re talking past each other, you might as well just shut up and go look at memes.
Especially irl. There was another commentor here that said everyone just wants to be heard. This is 101 in defusing an (honest) argument, and nothing is moving anywhere until they feel like they’re being taken seriously. Go to any type of counseling, and the first thing they’re going to do is make you sit there, fingernails digging into the upholstery, and listen to each other without interrupting.
The onus is not always on you. There are millions of people that just have to see it for themselves before they’ll admit anything you say is actually happening or indeed important. Maybe not even then.
But the snarky name-calling dismissal the internet approaches every argument with doesn’t even include room for a maybe, and it objectively doesn’t make sense to bother engaging in. Getting to the bottom of what the problem someone is having actually IS, even if you think it’s a stupid problem, can only be a benefit to solving it and making the stupid thing go away.
That user isn’t actually the “what if the nazi has some points” kind of centrist that they got called. They’ve just been to therapy before, or had parents and spouses who cared how they felt, and now they care how others feel.