4 ms·

> misinformation is combat with MORE discussion, not less! I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? The saying goes something like

> misinformation is combat with MORE discussion, not less! I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? The saying goes something like "You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into."

deleted 6y ago
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nitsky 6y ago
I have heard this expression rephrased as "Logic is useless against those who reject it". However, in my experience, both sides are logical, they just start from different axioms.
- shakezula 6y ago
  This is my experience as well, but I've also noticed that both sides do not adhere to their base axioms with the same tenacity, and the issues can be a spectrum of adherence to their claimed base beliefs.
leesalminen 6y ago
It basically doesn’t matter if you get the other side to listen or not. Open and free discussion is out there for those who want to partake. There will always be zealots who choose not to. Censoring opposition in order to be heard more loudly doesn’t work. In an IRL discussion, if you start talking over someone forcing them to stop talking, they’re going to shut down and never listen to anything you have to say.
- shakezula 6y ago
  It matters very much when that other side has the control of your government.
  - leesalminen 6y ago
    Luckily that changes every 4 or 8 years.
colpabar 6y ago
> How do you get the other side to listen? Pretend you think like them, and make arguments that go against that thinking. Unfortunately, the way the media exists today this never happens, and both sides just attack strawmen in ways that get people to click their headlines and listen to their talking heads. I think it's disingenuous to paint the entire "other side" as unreasonable, but I may be misinterpreting what you mean by "other side" here. There will always be unreasonable people, and I don't have a solution for them. However, I think _a lot_ of people are very tired of being demonized for disagreeing. Not every republican is a rabid tea partier, and not every democrat supports antifa.
- kaibee 6y ago
  > I think it's disingenuous to paint the entire "other side" as unreasonable, but I may be misinterpreting what you mean by "other side" here. There will always be unreasonable people, and I don't have a solution for them. However, I think _a lot_ of people are very tired of being demonized for disagreeing. Not every republican is a rabid tea partier, and not every democrat supports antifa. There's a lot of fundamental issues that are just not limited to "rabid tea partiers", global warming and the pandemic/masks just to pick two.
- kbenson 6y ago
  > Pretend you think like them, and make arguments that go against that thinking. Both sides have attacked the trustworthiness of the other. You can't convince someone of something when they think you're lying, or will lie and dissemble to get what you want, and nothing you say can be taken at face value because it's all a con to get some other goal which you claim to not want. There has been such a concerted effort to so malign the other side that's it's less about clear communication than it is trust. It's got more in common with soldiers inpast wars being encouraged to use terms like krauts, gooks and chinks and those being used as stereotypes to explain the behavior and motivations of the other side than anything else, IMO.
rayiner 6y ago
The purpose isn’t to get “the other side to listen.” Its to get moderate to listen, and to make sure the other side feels heard. That procedural aspect of free speech is at least as important, if not more so, than the truth-finding aspect of free speech.
lurquer 6y ago
> I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? Re-education camps seem to be the go-to solution for many totalitarian regimes. I’m not being a smart-ass... the desire some have for others to agree with them can itself be a pernicious thing.
- shakezula 6y ago
  Maybe "agreement" isn't what I meant as the goal - only progress. Fair point to address that they're not equal.
s1artibartfast 6y ago
Assume good intentions, respect them as individuals, and listen to what they have to say even if you disagree. These are basic tenants of productive debate.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  Sometimes. I know people who only care to maximize for themselves and their immediate tribe, and could not care less what happens to others not useful for them. It is naive to play the game as if others aren't interested in capturing an outsized share of the winnings. And obviously they're not going to officially state their motives.
  - s1artibartfast 6y ago
    I'm not convinced any other strategy of discourse is a winning one. Competing disinformation campaigns are a race to the bottom where everyone looses. Also, sometimes people simply want different things.
- shakezula 6y ago
  I completely agree with these points - but that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying what do you do when your partner in debate completely ignores all of those things, but has equal say in the outcomes?
  - s1artibartfast 6y ago
    Agree to disagree, vote on it, and sometimes loose. Part of being in a democracy is that sometimes you dont get what you want, even when you are sure you are right. Change can be slow, even for good ideas. If you have faith in humanity and democracy, then you believe good ideas will prevail in the end. There were US abolitionists in 1770 and the civil rights movement ended in 1970.
    - shakezula 6y ago
      And when the problems require solutions in decades and not centuries to be agreed on? What then? I used to have a lot more faith in our democracy but I can't help but feel lately like something has fundamentally changed, and the system is just catching up to that. What changed? I have no idea, but something feels _different_ from before.
ajwin 6y ago
> I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? The only way is to stop preaching and listen to them. Really listen. This is how Daryl Davis converted the KKK according to his own accounts?
markkanof 6y ago
There is also a problem with approaching this type of dialog as one side vs. the other. People are all over the spectrum with their opinions on various issues. You might have a disagreement on one particular issue, but it's likely that you also have some common ground on other things. Use that to relate to people and try to influence their thinking to your point of view. It's not a war where you are trying to destroy "the other side".
asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
For me, a good start would be to provide evidence that people have had their minds changed because information gets discussed more. E.g. you could demonstrate that the qanon phenomenon became less popular, not more, after it began getting wide media attention. (Unfortunately in this instance the opposite is the case. You have an uphill battle ahead trying to demonstrate your position empirically.)
- shakezula 6y ago
  Q is a really interesting conspiracy theory to bring up. It seems to be at the other end of the "valley" of conspiracy theories - it's almost like the most brazenly unbelievable ones are the ones that somehow gain the most traction.
  - leesalminen 6y ago
    It combined several long running conspiracy theories into one. Because they had been around for so long individually, combining them somehow made them more believable. Connecting seemingly disparate dots together added credibility because it explained everything conspiracy theorists believed.
ihsw 6y ago
Reconciliation among people is usually governed by the reframing of sacred issues, eg: > Scientific advancement is an effort to grow closer to God as God created an infinitely complex universe, it is not an effort to grow further away from God. Additionally, hard work is a sign of having the grace of God, and as such vaccinations are provided by the grace of God and it is our duty to receive them. It doesn't take much to meet people halfway and communicate in a language that they understand, and naturally that will involve cooperation, dialogue, and compromise. "Get the other side to listen" is the wrong point of view to have, it should be "which of my ideas are appealing and which are not."
alsetmusic 6y ago
>> misinformation is combat with MORE discussion, not less! > I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? I don’t think there’s any winning some people over. My mother had a very problematic stat about police violence and racism last summer. I was able prove it wrong by getting the real stat in five seconds with a Google search. The source is well known and reputable. She refused to stop clinging to her source.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

nitsky 6y ago

I have heard this expression rephrased as "Logic is useless against those who reject it". However, in my experience, both sides are logical, they just start from different axioms.

shakezula 6y ago
This is my experience as well, but I've also noticed that both sides do not adhere to their base axioms with the same tenacity, and the issues can be a spectrum of adherence to their claimed base beliefs.

leesalminen 6y ago

It basically doesn’t matter if you get the other side to listen or not. Open and free discussion is out there for those who want to partake. There will always be zealots who choose not to. Censoring opposition in order to be heard more loudly doesn’t work. In an IRL discussion, if you start talking over someone forcing them to stop talking, they’re going to shut down and never listen to anything you have to say.

shakezula 6y ago
It matters very much when that other side has the control of your government.
- leesalminen 6y ago
  Luckily that changes every 4 or 8 years.

colpabar 6y ago

> How do you get the other side to listen? Pretend you think like them, and make arguments that go against that thinking. Unfortunately, the way the media exists today this never happens, and both sides just attack strawmen in ways that get people to click their headlines and listen to their talking heads. I think it's disingenuous to paint the entire "other side" as unreasonable, but I may be misinterpreting what you mean by "other side" here. There will always be unreasonable people, and I don't have a solution for them. However, I think _a lot_ of people are very tired of being demonized for disagreeing. Not every republican is a rabid tea partier, and not every democrat supports antifa.

kaibee 6y ago
> I think it's disingenuous to paint the entire "other side" as unreasonable, but I may be misinterpreting what you mean by "other side" here. There will always be unreasonable people, and I don't have a solution for them. However, I think _a lot_ of people are very tired of being demonized for disagreeing. Not every republican is a rabid tea partier, and not every democrat supports antifa. There's a lot of fundamental issues that are just not limited to "rabid tea partiers", global warming and the pandemic/masks just to pick two.
kbenson 6y ago
> Pretend you think like them, and make arguments that go against that thinking. Both sides have attacked the trustworthiness of the other. You can't convince someone of something when they think you're lying, or will lie and dissemble to get what you want, and nothing you say can be taken at face value because it's all a con to get some other goal which you claim to not want. There has been such a concerted effort to so malign the other side that's it's less about clear communication than it is trust. It's got more in common with soldiers inpast wars being encouraged to use terms like krauts, gooks and chinks and those being used as stereotypes to explain the behavior and motivations of the other side than anything else, IMO.

rayiner 6y ago

The purpose isn’t to get “the other side to listen.” Its to get moderate to listen, and to make sure the other side feels heard. That procedural aspect of free speech is at least as important, if not more so, than the truth-finding aspect of free speech.

lurquer 6y ago

> I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? Re-education camps seem to be the go-to solution for many totalitarian regimes. I’m not being a smart-ass... the desire some have for others to agree with them can itself be a pernicious thing.

shakezula 6y ago
Maybe "agreement" isn't what I meant as the goal - only progress. Fair point to address that they're not equal.

s1artibartfast 6y ago

Assume good intentions, respect them as individuals, and listen to what they have to say even if you disagree. These are basic tenants of productive debate.

lotsofpulp 6y ago
Sometimes. I know people who only care to maximize for themselves and their immediate tribe, and could not care less what happens to others not useful for them. It is naive to play the game as if others aren't interested in capturing an outsized share of the winnings. And obviously they're not going to officially state their motives.
- s1artibartfast 6y ago
  I'm not convinced any other strategy of discourse is a winning one. Competing disinformation campaigns are a race to the bottom where everyone looses. Also, sometimes people simply want different things.
shakezula 6y ago
I completely agree with these points - but that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying what do you do when your partner in debate completely ignores all of those things, but has equal say in the outcomes?
- s1artibartfast 6y ago
  Agree to disagree, vote on it, and sometimes loose. Part of being in a democracy is that sometimes you dont get what you want, even when you are sure you are right. Change can be slow, even for good ideas. If you have faith in humanity and democracy, then you believe good ideas will prevail in the end. There were US abolitionists in 1770 and the civil rights movement ended in 1970.
  - shakezula 6y ago
    And when the problems require solutions in decades and not centuries to be agreed on? What then? I used to have a lot more faith in our democracy but I can't help but feel lately like something has fundamentally changed, and the system is just catching up to that. What changed? I have no idea, but something feels _different_ from before.

ajwin 6y ago

> I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? The only way is to stop preaching and listen to them. Really listen. This is how Daryl Davis converted the KKK according to his own accounts?

markkanof 6y ago

There is also a problem with approaching this type of dialog as one side vs. the other. People are all over the spectrum with their opinions on various issues. You might have a disagreement on one particular issue, but it's likely that you also have some common ground on other things. Use that to relate to people and try to influence their thinking to your point of view. It's not a war where you are trying to destroy "the other side".

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago

For me, a good start would be to provide evidence that people have had their minds changed because information gets discussed more. E.g. you could demonstrate that the qanon phenomenon became less popular, not more, after it began getting wide media attention. (Unfortunately in this instance the opposite is the case. You have an uphill battle ahead trying to demonstrate your position empirically.)

shakezula 6y ago
Q is a really interesting conspiracy theory to bring up. It seems to be at the other end of the "valley" of conspiracy theories - it's almost like the most brazenly unbelievable ones are the ones that somehow gain the most traction.
- leesalminen 6y ago
  It combined several long running conspiracy theories into one. Because they had been around for so long individually, combining them somehow made them more believable. Connecting seemingly disparate dots together added credibility because it explained everything conspiracy theorists believed.

ihsw 6y ago

Reconciliation among people is usually governed by the reframing of sacred issues, eg: > Scientific advancement is an effort to grow closer to God as God created an infinitely complex universe, it is not an effort to grow further away from God. Additionally, hard work is a sign of having the grace of God, and as such vaccinations are provided by the grace of God and it is our duty to receive them. It doesn't take much to meet people halfway and communicate in a language that they understand, and naturally that will involve cooperation, dialogue, and compromise. "Get the other side to listen" is the wrong point of view to have, it should be "which of my ideas are appealing and which are not."

alsetmusic 6y ago

>> misinformation is combat with MORE discussion, not less! > I wholeheartedly agree, but how do you get the other side to listen? I don’t think there’s any winning some people over. My mother had a very problematic stat about police violence and racism last summer. I was able prove it wrong by getting the real stat in five seconds with a Google search. The source is well known and reputable. She refused to stop clinging to her source.