It stems from a misunderstanding of what it means to say that you've changed somebody's mind. Hardly anybody ever changes their mind in the moment. That's not h

It stems from a misunderstanding of what it means to say that you've changed somebody's mind. Hardly anybody ever changes their mind in the moment. That's not how opinions or the stubborn humans who hold them work. People change their mind on issues over time, in response to multiple inputs. If you expect to see evidence of changing minds literally represented in comment threads or at the end of dinner-table arguments, then you've totally failed to understand the value of those discussions. Intense discussions routinely change minds, but they rarely end with any evidence that a change has taken place. The notion that contentious discussions on broad cultural disagreements are valueless is, I think, mistaken and the meme is, in general, profoundly damaging.