Debate, opinions

It is well and good to know your own mind and opinions, but I've always believed that it is a belief not very well held that cannot be exposed to contradiction and debate. Flexible is strong, when it comes to minds.

xpost

Also, I agree with all of you.

I'm sorry, but I don't want to have to defend my tastes.

In work the other day some girl was bitching about asylum seekers and instead of keeping my mouth shut I raged "What's your problem? I'm actually very sympathetic to the asylum seekers and feel that they've made some of our (Glasgow) communities better and more diverse."

Big mistake, about five people rounded on me, wanting to know my reasons, wanting to pull me into debate. Maybe my problem does lie with my defensiveness but I felt myself getting upset and teary and all sorts of emotions threatened to spill out. I don't think I'd be able to change my colleagues minds - I know that they should be better informed but I don't understand how they can have such opinions without the knowledge to back them up.

Maybe I just don't have enough convictions in my own beliefs or enough facts to back myself up.

I just don't like debate. Debate please.

crosspost

So, in future, you intend keeping your mouth shut then?

Rumpie do you find debate painful to be a part of, or just boring?

I do think quite carefully about the (potential) motivation of the person trying to provoke debate - and also of the emotional energy attached - before I will get into one very deeply.

i found the best way to deal with it was to look fondly, as upon a child, and *imply* that he was a drunken, pompous ass, and i think it kind of worked. but now i think about the argument, i actually basically agreed with him, but he was being such a tit and i had to stop him at all costs from harshing my buzz.

I LOVE to hear other peoples point of view, I try not to argue against it.

What onions did you prefer Madchen?

I do find debating painful. As I said, I'm prone to tears of frustration.

If somebody says something like your personal taste in music is shit then they are fucking stupid. end of.

Who here has attended a debate as a speaker? were any minds changed?

SPELLED WITHOUT AN E
TRULY
THAT IS THE FACTS
I AM RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG
JUST LIKE ANYBODY WHO DOESN'T LIKE THE CLASH, OR DENKI GROOVE
THEY ARE WRONG TOO
ALSO, YOU REMIND ME OF HITLER

I'm just not sure if that approach is any more progressive than wading into the big fite sleeves rolled up.

If you hold the opinion, "I like rice pudding," well I cannot say that is right or wrong.

It all depends on what your opinion or statement is, whether you need to back it up with facts or whether you can be wrong about it.

I was leaving myself open to correction.

I'm generally too afraid to make statements.

Except ones like that.

Notice though how I bowed out when I couldn't take the heat?

Perhaps debate is between the two? In which case, perhaps my view of it is between my view of the two.

However, also... it depends on the debate. There are some debates which I have had so many times with so many different people that I really don't ever need to have them again. And so if anyone ever tries to drag me into a debate about these subjects (vegetarianism: why?, manufactured pop - it's rubbish isn't it? etc.) I will politely, or not so politely, depending on how voiciferous the oponent is, decline to discuss them again.

Sometimes he'd give the impression of listening and you'd think 'Hallelujah! A breakthrough" but when you finished making the point he would just repeat exactly what he said before.

Example "Technology will stop soon."

He was also the kind of guy who'd come marching in from the boozers and slam off whatever cd I was listening too - "That's shite."

Or if I was quietly reading "Books are boring."

Maybe he's the reason I tend to shut up.

I love discussion! If nothing else I'm tenacious -- the more someone uses force of personality to try to change my mind, the more my heels dig in. Arguments best when completely moot and unimportant to the normal course of things, and when conducted drunk (as inebriation allows for silly, bombastic gestures with a lit cigarette).

With colleagues/random associates though there's just no telling what might get spouted, and sometimes other peoples ignorance can be flabbergasting.

I know that I can discuss issues such as asylum seekers etc in the company of my own friends despite us having various views on the matter, because I am absolutely safe in the knowledge that they won't come out with something like "They should all go back to their own country" unlike some of the shallow brained morons I work with.

ie: Talking about going for a meal in her local Indian restaurant in which she knows the owners, (Indian restaurant mind) she said "Rahils son is away for two weeks doing a martial arts course - yeah - more like he's training to be a suicide bomber"

How can you even acknowledge that?

I'd like to staple her lip to the desk, yesiree.

She is also one of many people in here who refuses to distinguish between different races - folk are either white, chinese, black or terrorists. The frustration is starting to build again.....

I was thinking about the Ben Shapiro phenomenon and it occurred to me that a lot of people, and by people I 95% mean men, who think they are "good debaters" are actually just so insufferable that you can't bear to keep arguing with them.

Those kind of people are obsessed with knowing all the names and definitions of all of the logical fallacies

I can't stand debate. I don't like the idea of trying to change other peoples minds.

I think it is helpful to be able to tell someone else how you arrived at your conclusions clearly enough that they will understand your position, and to listen to others engage in the same exercise. This will only rarely change either person's mind, but does tend to allow both of you to see the other as human and thoughtful, even if the other person is "wrong".

Those kind of people are obsessed with knowing all the names and definitions of all of the logical fallacies

― Evan, Friday, September 28, 2018 11:03 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I outgrew this by age 20 I think

https://longreads.com/2018/09/18/no-i-will-not-debate-you/

ilx 2018

what's your proof