Are insults legitimate debate tactics?
So if there was no real insult thrown at you personally, is it legitimate to use insults, puts-downs, sneering sarcasm, fake exasperation and the like as part of your argument?
Also I'm tired of doing this, but is there anyone else out there who understands a difference between a criticism aimed at a poster/post and an actual argument engaging the substantive argument at hand? Sometimes it's hard to tell because certain posters tend to intertwine the two, thus trying to get away with a criticism while presenting a legitimate argument. Why not just stick to the argument? Wouldn't criticism be rhetorical bullshit to cause consternation? Is unnecessarily poisoning the well a legitimate argument tactic?
Also I'm tired of doing this, but is there anyone else out there who understands a difference between a criticism aimed at a poster/post and an actual argument engaging the substantive argument at hand? Sometimes it's hard to tell because certain posters tend to intertwine the two, thus trying to get away with a criticism while presenting a legitimate argument. Why not just stick to the argument? Wouldn't criticism be rhetorical bullshit to cause consternation? Is unnecessarily poisoning the well a legitimate argument tactic?
Comments (73)
For fuck's sake...
If done well, I think they can be very effective. But as noted, most of the time they aren't a good idea. There are degrees of insults too.
Jesus Christ, this is bad.
I'm not expert on "debate" and I'm not even sure I really know what it means. I once saw a few seconds of a moderated high school debate on TV, using rules. I was flummoxed. I always thought debate was logical argument. Boy was I wrong.
So, insults may be legitimate debate tactics; I'm not sure. But insults are legitimate logical argument tactic in the the same way that shucking a gun and shooting your opponent in the face is a legitimate logical argument tactic.
I don't really know either, but this forum isn't it. I would say having a good faith dialectic with someone is what should be happening (thesis-antithesis-synthesis), considering things that haven't been considered. I don't expect a "winner" but what can happen is that each side finds ways to strengthen their arguments and consider things otherwise not considered. However, often it just ends up with interjections, mean-spirited sarcasm, and insults. And thus, you are correct here:
Quoting James Riley
Yep.
You sir are as sleezy a hunk of scum as I've ever seen at the water's edge at low tide.
I refrain from ever insulting people during discussion because I find insults unnecessary, but I don't mind if people insult me.
My view would be that insults are fine as long as the person insulting also answers the objections against their position, and doesn't merely insult while ignoring the arguments of the other party.
I'd say one can just ignore the insults.
Quoting schopenhauer1
It can be successful toward gaining approval of others who view an argument negatively but can never establish the ground for an alternative view.
I struggle with myself over this difference all the time because the spirit of punishment is strong. Disagreement is not only about weighing propositions as propositions. I lose it sometimes. It is very rare when that was appropriate. Never in a dialectic.
But people do it as part of their argument style. If one person does it, that seems asymmetrical and unfair because the argument seems to have more weight when smarmy sarcasm is added. It seems a rhetorical trick, and like you said.. it is really a rhetorical ploy to::
Quoting Valentinus
But isn't that sort of cowardly? If both people employ it, it just becomes vitriolic argumentation. So it's either asymmetrical or too personal for calm argumentation.
As someone I admire used to say "sounds like a whole lot of kitsch to me."
Generally I don't like them because they've become the go-to weapon for the ignorant when one is losing a logical or moral argument to save face or perhaps continue their misdeeds and corruption of others. The people like what they like however..
There is a quality Socrates exemplified while he bobbed and weaved with those who assigned malign motives to his process. He never answered in kind. The method looks easy until one holds themselves to the rules. I am not an advanced student of the art.
Right, but how is this "legitimate". If we were to have a fair boxing match and I throw sand in your eye before the match, how is that a legitimate fight?
Fair enough, so the burden lies in silently taking the insults... is your answer mainly? What does it say about the insulter though? We keep addressing the insulted.
Is this sand available only to you? Have you become resistant to such sand? If either of these are true you have a clear advantage. I wouldn't participate in a setting I don't find inherently legitimate which implies there are rules in place. The difference between a real debate of importance and a boxing match is that the latter is purely for entertainment and ticket sales while the former is what allows/determines/or dictates something far greater. One would hope at least.
This implies that it would be okay to throw the sand if people can do it.. Shouldn't they both just not throw the sand?
Quoting Outlander
I meant the boxing match as something of importance.. We can make the analogy to whatever suits your sense of important.
People should "just not" do lots of things. This is why wars are fought. :grin:
Quoting schopenhauer1
Humor and a sense of projected strength is favored by many. It's disheartening to acknowledge and think about how genuine logic and morality can be defeated and hold less ground in the minds of many. So they don't. :grin:
I suppose the counterargument would be "if candidate B is so smart, correct, confident, and faithful in how his beliefs would hold in true chaos, yet he mentally and emotionally retreats under controlled scrutiny, what torch or rather for how long would he be able to hold it against the views of candidate A", etc.
You'd have to translate that a bit.
People like a guy who can take a punch. Or who don't abandon their beliefs under pressure, especially low pressure.
Shallow as this may be, people view leaders as extensions of themselves subconsciously and without knowing it, so, the stronger your leader is perceived to be, the stronger or perhaps more confident you as a follower or whatever you want to call yourself will be. It's all subconscious. I'd even call it nonsense. Yet that would make me the majority. It's how the world works.
Edit: that would make me the minority, sorry.
So then for example, you would say if someone was debating policy and leadership quality, but your interlocutor, let's call him "Trump" starts talking about how your a bumbling idiot with kids who take cocaine and are of low character.. this is legitimate argumentation? I don't get your machismo, "who can take a punch". The punch is the argument, the throwing sand in your eyes is the illegitimate part.
I don't recommend "silently taking insults." What Socrates did was turn them into propositions the interlocutor either owned or disowned.
Fair enough. But it's harder when the insults are more like mock indignation or exasperation..
Things like.. "For fuck's sake", "Jesus Christ", "Crikey", blah blah
If it was easy, everybody would be doing it.
Yeah people like to wrap their arguments in turds. Makes it harder to uncover the bad content inside.
No, TPF is not a debating club. There's no "audience" per se; everybody is a participant. There are no judges. There is no formal structure for a debate. What we have here are discussions--or sometimes multiple monologues.
Insults? Not an acceptable method in debate. Sarcasm? Yes, but not casually sliding into ridicule.
Are insults OK here? They seem to be, as long as they don't trigger moderator action. Ridicule? Sarcasm? Seems to be fairly common here.
What should you do?
You have been presenting an immensely consistent anti-natalist argument with infinite patience for years, and you haven't resorted to ranting, raving, insult, or even (as far as I know) cutting sarcasm.
You could, possibly? Perhaps? Maybe? talk about something else. Granted, reproduction perpetuates suffering, but that does not seem to be a remotely effective reason to cease reproducing. For one thing, reproduction also perpetuates joy. Joy and suffering side by side, and much else.
Anti-natalism is a lost cause. There are almost 8 billion people most of who have or will attempt to reproduce, suffering and all. Given our pathetic collective response to global warming, everything may be a lost cause.
Maybe we should all just shut up and go plant trees.
I've backed lost causes too. Even If they were morally and intellectually superior, they just didn't appeal to most people. C'est la vie.
I am not on board with classifying people in this way.
I'm wondering how insults that are anything less than this can be taken seriously.
Not sure what you mean.. I'm just saying try not to wrap your content in insult. Just make the argument.
True
Quoting Bitter Crank
Thank you for at least noting that, haha. I try.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Understand this sentiment.
Quoting Bitter Crank
True enough. I do get something out of it if the person I'm debating brings up things to consider.. even if eventually they just get subsumed in strengthening my argument. I was saying earlier that I see productive argumentation in a form similar to Hegel's dialectic. That is to say, thesis-antithesis-and synthesis. There are nascent things revealed in the disagreement that then become realized.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Agreed. But I don't have to know much about who doesn't agree with that to agree. I don't care very much about the other side.
:up: :100:
The only point of arguing is to exchange new ideas.
It's a tactic, sure, but a particularly lowbrow one at that. It also precludes the discussion from flowing in a "civilized" manner, especially when both parties start engaging in random potshots.
I believe I just explicitly called it nonsense but nevertheless the right crowd will eat it up. In a land of the blind the one eyed man is king, even or especially rather if he only pretends to be. Am I a bumbling idiot? I could be. That implies he'd be willing to compare intellectual works. Do my kids in fact take cocaine and happen to be of low character? Another opportunity for comparison. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Of course, it all circles back to the why a discussion or argument began in the first place and in a political context what the observers and crowd is expecting, entertainment or productivity. Though its usually about swaying opinion, garnishing interest, or sometimes even simply gaining attention.
It is not "my" anything, I already told you or at least implied I find that style of communication revolting. I simply know how some people, who even if are not the majority are unfortunately sizeable enough to not be dismissed entirely, think and go about life.
Agreed, especially on a philosophy forum, if everyone's arguing in good faith and not just because one gets some weird kick being pissed off or pissing others off.
Yes, exactly.
Sarcasm is not the same as an insult. Sarcasm is not necessarily disrespectful. In fact, it is one of the staples of a lively argumentation. It also helps illuminate a point that could otherwise be ignored or not reach the "aha!" moment.
Insults are unavoidable in heated arguments, or controversial topics. And there are types of insults -- personal, technical, professional, or topical. It's the personal insults that have no place in philosophical arguments.
Those who create threads for discussion, like you, will naturally have a share of sarcasms and insults. That is the nature of the beast. Call them out if it's personal -- otherwise, you can respond to insults and sarcasms and move the topic along.
Quoting Ying
Cruelly insulting, like ridiculing the handicapped. I mean, people can't help it if they are lowbrow slobs, really. Also humiliating--particularly for people who have intellectual aspirations--is calling would-be elite aspirants "middlebrow. They want to be highbrow! They just don't have the right educational history to either be highbrow, or to produce the verisimilitude of natural born highbrow elitism. Getting nailed with the "middlebrow" monicker is much like hoping you can join the in-crowd for lunch and being told to fuck off.
Tragic really.
I've been thinking about starting a discussion about how ad hominem arguments are different from insults. They are, but I sometimes have trouble deciding if an example is one or the other. An insult is not an argument.
"Verisimilitude" - highbrow or middlebrow? I'd say highbrow. For me, there is no worse insult than "middlebrow." Wayne Dyer, Malcolm Gladwell, most of TED, "Scientific American" now (As opposed to how it used to be), "Time" magazine. Sorry, off track.
Procedurally, on pf, I think they're allowed.
But also: the world insults us, continually.
Is that insult legitimate?
Maybe a thread on legitimacy would best-focus the anti-natalist question. Not joking.
Is it legitimate that I live to suffer, that others cause others to suffer? etc.
Book of Job?
There is rational discussion, where the goal is to find the truth, and there is rhetoric, where the goal is to convince, i.e. to win the argument. Insults are not legitimate in a rational argument. They don't lead to achieving the goal. Are they legitimate in a debate, polemic, or political speech? They're not nice. They're not civil or honorable. They might work or they might backfire. Are they legitimate? I guess the answer is "who cares."
It's no more logical than a punch in the nose.
I had a thought the other day that seems like a plausible explanation behind a lot of behavior that I see here and similar places on the internet. Metaphorically, people are looking for the satisfaction of beating someone up. So if you're not fighting them, they'll be upset at you, because they're here to fight damnit! And if you're unmoved by their blows, they'll be upset at you, because just punching a pillow or a brick wall or whatever is no fun, it's only satisfying if what you hit breaks. Not fighting or just quietly absorbing or deflecting their attacks isn't "playing fair", it's some kind of "foul play" in their minds. But of course if you do react to being hit with some kind of hurt response, they'll be gleeful and gloat over that. Basically the only "winning" move (inasmuch as it's a move that will make them stop fighting and not whine about you cheating somehow) is to concede defeat. Because that's what they're here for: the thrill of victory over someone else.
And while philosophy is aptly analogized to a "martial art of the mind", as someone who trained in TaeKwonDo for 11 years I can tell you the kind of students who come into a class just looking to beat someone up for fun are not taken well. Studying how to fight in a calm, friendly, cooperative, disciplined way has a very different emotional energy than an actual fight, and people coming into such a discipline with that actual-fight emotional energy are not usually welcomed.
I wish there was a place on the internet that was more like a real martial arts club than an MMA FFA ring.
It is a legitimate action and argument but the main goal here, inside in this forum, is how to attract people to debate. Sometimes I don’t even have answers in the posts. So, it doesn’t matter if you insult if you keep the thread alive to be honest
Well put.
Quoting Pfhorrest
Yep, also true.
Quoting Pfhorrest
Yep, also true it seems.
Quoting Pfhorrest
It would be nice.
Yep, good distinction an one that seems to be blurred here a lot. Once someone continually shows the rhetoric card, then I am forced to get in the mud it seems too. I don't like the asymmetry, but then.. there I am with mud, so in a way I am already dirty. The problem is that if you don't want to do it, you either take the abuse or go to their level, both are bad options.
So my taste is to poison the well, therefore poisoning the well is legitimate. My taste is to X therefore Xing is legitimate. Is this a case for no rules of conduct whatsoever?
I see insults as being the worst aspect of debate, because it seems to be going beyond that, to personal attacking of someone. Once a person goes off into insulting, I usually dismiss what the person is saying, because it seems that they are going outside of rational exploration of ideas.
Agreed, but there is a sort smamriness that pervades legitimate remarks. It's not just "outright" insult. That would be too obvious.. It is the subtly of things.. like if I were to say, "For fuck's sake.." etc. So what of those? What of legitimate content wrapped in those kind of unnecessary rhetorical devices?
I do agree that it is often more subtle than outright insults. This is probably true in all levels of life beyond debates. There are backhanded compliments and all kinds of ways people use to put other people down. At least with insults, it makes it easier to identify, because they stand out, whereas with other more subtle attacks, it is possible to miss them, and, nevertheless, the experience of receiving them may have an insidious effect.
So personally I want to see expressions of frustration, or boredom or confusion, or arrogance, or amusement, or love, from time to time. I want to see the passion behind the argument; if nobody cares about the argument the conclusion is - ahem - "academic" (in the insulting belittling sense). But there are limits of course, and if your limits are exceeded, there are 2 things I recommend; 1, stop responding, and 2, report to the mods.
Why so much of that one though? Is that a philosophy thing, an internet thing, a forum thing, a cultural thing, an individual thing? I'm not sure why people can't disagree without being disagreeable.
I think people mostly think the other side is the one being disagreeable. People generally don't seem themselves as instigators. In an insult-off, it is common that both sides think the other started it. What counts as "disagreeable" is different for each person. You never know what someone will take offence to. It's like minesweeper.
With some exceptions of course. Some people are just plain disagreeable cunts. Most aren't.
Then there are the saints that continue to keep calm even when they perceive the other side is being disagreeable (regardless of whether they intend to). Those are even rarer.
I think it's a philosophy thing particularly, but not exclusively. Philosophy depts are notorious for sexism, racism and all forms of assumed superiority. You and I of course are above such things. :wink:
I'm looking to test my arguments, and I'm not that interested in convincing others of them, so insults and "poisoning the well" wouldn't make much difference to me. However I can see such underhanded tactics being frustrating when trying to put a very minority view.
Na man, it's fine. The vast majority of the time it's pretty childish and establishes no point.
But it can be amusing. As when Schopenhauer talked about his contemporaries, I think it's fantastic that he felt so strongly about his views.
This will be quite familiar to you, as he says such things many times:
"But the height of audacity in serving up pure nonsense, in stringing together senseless and extravagant mazes of words, such as had previously been known only in madhouses, was finally reached in Hegel, and became the instrument of the most barefaced general mystification that has ever taken place, with a result which will appear fabulous to posterity, and will remain as a monument to German stupidity."
This too, is fun to skim:
https://www.flavorwire.com/469065/the-30-harshest-philosopher-on-philosopher-insults-in-history
;)
I agree with your position completely. Although, admittedly, I also agree with your second statement. I have responded on occasion with what would be considered an insult. Not as an opener, but mostly from exasperation when dealing with someone who refuses to consider an alternate perspective, despite numerous attempts to reframe it in various ways. I find insults always detract from the discussion. In my mind the one that first falls to insults has, in effect, admitted defeat: I can't out think you, so I will simply hurl insults as a cover.
At a forum like this, a part (or sometimes most) of one's verbal performance is about performing for an audience, not for the poster one is replying to. So the insults etc. aren't necessarily part of one's argument, just part of one's performance, depending on who one is trying to impress.
I think there are a few instances where insult is appropriate in debate. Insult can make debate enjoyable and accessible when it is used as a rhetorical flourish or to provide pathos to an otherwise boring argument. It can be used as a form of banter and camaraderie between two opponents. It should be used, without exception, whenever it is used against you—one cannot give a snide little bully the satisfaction. But on its own and without argument, insult is the basest propaganda.
:100:
I don't want to shock you, but I am imperfect in this regard. Like you, I am mostly responsive rather than aggressive. Mostly, but not completely. I've been working on being more civil for years. Decades. When I'm being all mature and everything, I address uncivil posts by calling them out directly. I usually say something like "that's not a valid argument" and then repeating it till they get sick. That's civil [s]disobedience[/s] passive-aggressiveness.
I think in a regular conversation this make sense, but if we are all trying to be "philosophical" to some extent, then it is rhetorical flourish to simply state this. I think it just poisons the well. Explain it with an argument.
Ultimately it does seem that the majority of the time, insults are just bullying, just people making themselves feel superior by putting other people down.
Yes this seems to make sense to me for reasons why people do it. People's personalities, rhetorical tactic for an audience, throw someone off their game, straight up just aggressiveness, trying to feel superior, all these are good candidates.
If you start from a place of "I'm right because it's obvious", then you give yourself the appearance of being right from the start. Often one way to do this is to say, "Are you fucking kidding me?" in not so many words.. seething condescension, and other styles to wrap what you are trying to say. I just think it all poisons the well. Does disagreeing with someone automatically call for poisoning the well? I mean there are certain lines of thought I can see it being appropriate to respond with immediate disdain and all the rest, but most debates probably don't fall under this. I can see clearly racist ideas and calls for massive violence for example falling under this.
Perhaps antinatalism seems to be this way for people, but it's not. There is no forcing of anything (actually quite the opposite). I liken it to veganism. If I want to eat a hamburger, I don't treat vegans with disdain for their strong views.
If there was a sticker that let people label their ideas as important, everyone would use that sticker on every single idea they had and it wouldn't mean anything. But a well-crafted insult demonstrates intelligence and makes people pay attention.
Cutting remarks are always made to bring a person a few notches down. It is hurtful and always personal. Insults, when done cleverly, can make another listen intently and agree. Other insults are delivered to "win" an ongoing battle of personalities: Consider the following (a well known exchange):
"You're drunk!" -- cutting
"Madam, in the morning I will be sober but you will still be ugly." -- insult
I avoid these types of exchange. It saddens me when people go this low. Otherwise, I, too, enjoy reading insults and sarcasms.