Discussing politics and other contentious sunjects online feels to me like it’s counterproductive these days and even though I try not to get suckered in, I often can’t help myself. Usually though I just end up feeling frustrated and sometimes angry at the other person either missing my points or refusing to accept them.
Thinking back to conversations I’ve had here and previously on Reddit, not only can I not remember an example of me “winning” the discussion and the other person changing their mind or conceding the point, I also cannot think of a time where my mind was changed either.
So have you ever begun a discussion online with someone with a different view point to yours and either you, or they, changed the others mind?
Yes, coming from a very conservative religious background challenging my world-view with every media and discussions I read online (reddit when it was good) I changed for the better good.
I personally like to expose myself to ideas which are contradicting my personal experience/views. It is painful, but rewarding.
Also like to use the arguments I heard/read in a debate where I agree with my ‘oposition’ but want to keep the conversation going. I learned the hard way, that I have to be very clear upfront about it. And the other side has to think through the arguments instead of responding with emotions.
I higly disagree on your point, discussion are required, they don’t have to change either side’s mind, but should build them. Also don’t forget the audience, it is possible they don’t have a pre existing strong opinion (or at all) on the topic.
It is very unlikely you will ever get a feedback that your opinion mattered, but it can happen, and it can change lifes.
Debates aren’t always about changing the mind of the person you’re debating, they are about presenting your ideas to an audience.
Follow up question: Have you ever read a thread where a bunch of people are arguing and changed your opinion because of it?
Personally, I’ve never changed my mind because of an online post. I’ve changed my mind from articles, papers, documentaries, video essays, discussions with friends and family, but never from a comment section.
Yes: Reddit threads planted the seeds for veganism because all the counter arguments were so easily disputed
wow. totally opposite thing happened for me.
Yea we know, you dedicate your life to arguing against animal rights.
not exactly. and importantly, I don’t believe in any rights.
I have. But, they did have facts to back it up and sources. That helped a lot.
Personally, no.
But I think that I’ve become more knowledgeable because of arguments I’ve read.
I did. Not from a single thread, but many-many accumulating over the years, combined with other sources.
It is especially true with new topics which I don’t have a pre-existing knowledge.
Same for me. A few comments are unlikely to be persuasive by themselves but they are great at introducing me to new perspectives. It’s not uncommon with some follow up research that I do change my mind, and comments are what get the ball rolling. Especially true for topics I haven’t thought much about.
Bingo.
You don’t even need cover the debate subject to win, if you can convince the audience your opponent is an idiot.
In highschool (which is a very long time ago), I was woefully underprepared for a debate. My opponent not so much. He made some very good arguments. Unfortunately, he made a fatal mistake with his opening, “Good morning”. It was the first period after lunch.
That allowed me to eviscerate him. If you don’t even know what time of day it is, how can you possibly know anything about the subject of the debate.
I won the debate handily. I barely touched on the actual debate subject.
That’s like 90% of political debates.
Who/what decided you won the debate (handily)?
Yes, I have changed a mind or two. Low single digit percentage, I’m sure. I’m more focused on countering bad information information or presenting a perspective that hasn’t been represented yet. I don’t really expect to change the mind of the person I’m arguing with.
As for not getting sucked in, does the Lemmy app you use have User Tags? Best feature reddit was completely missing (aside from, you know, the whole FOSS federation thing). I use to apply a tag and color to users. I use yellow to warn myself about someone who I think previously argued in bad faith or might be trolling. I use red for “do not engage”; on reddit I probably would have blocked them but just red-tafging them, I can still see the rest of the community respond to them. Any time a post or comment comes up from someone I’ve red-tagged, I know not to get sucked in. I use Voyager app on Android.
Good point, and I love when someone presenting other perspectives (even when I disagree!)
Tags are a good suggestion. I did not know about them before. Probably won’t use them. I hate to categorize ppl, and would fear that my current emotions and their state of mind when they commented would missplace them.
I think I never blocked anyone either. (probably not enough engagement from my part to feed trolls)
Never preemptively blocked obvious trolls or repost bots? Brave of you. I guess by ‘preemptive’ I mostly mean without engaging first.
I just tagged your name with ‘guy who colors people’ and put it in blue.
What a cool option!
Everybody’s getting tagged up now
I tag ppl I want to pay special attention to, as well. They get green. There’s a dude around here somewhere who works on the Jellyfin for Roku app, tagged green so I can spot their posts easier.
Have you ever perused a thread on a subject and had your mind changed without engaging? Maybe you had the wrong perspective and changed your mind or didn’t know enough to have an opinion going in but came out with a more informed stance?
That’s why I do it. And I’ve had that happen numerous times.
yep. especially if you go and look up the facts somewhere else and see what evidence supports which side and to what extent.
In his book Synergetics , Buckminster Fuller points out (don’t have the exact quote) that you almost never hear a politician say, “you know, the evidence and logic of the other side are now overwhelmingly persuasive; I must change my political affiliation” – but among scientists, you hear the equivalent all the time.
Back before Newt Gingrich, Jerry Falwell, and Ronald Reagan pushed the GOP to the extreme Right, politicians voting against their party wasn’t seen as harmful or unusual.
Have you ever changed your mind?
I often feel like debate entrenches a belief in both audience and debaters.
Personally, I have on some things in decades being online. Especially if there is peer-reviewed evidence/studies about the topic in question.
I’ve changed my mind over time; quite a lot in fact. However, debates just stoke the fight or flight for me.
As person who use to be anti gay and racist I was changed.
Now I’m bi and have admitted to having it bad for women of color.
Which has led me to a happier life overall. Loving people is a lot easier than hate I can tell you that.
May I ask what changed your mind?
Do you remember Gmod? There used to be, I don’t know if it is still going, a forum that Gary (the creator of gmod) made called Facepunch.
I went on there to download models for gmod, dived deeper and found different subsections like news and stuff.
I am the type of person to tell you my beliefs. Well I talked about how being gay was against God and blah blah blah.
I got chewed out and banned for like a month. For some reason it kept going over n my head. Over n over n over. I went back and lurked. Read what people thought and felt.
Ended up losing both my faith in religion and my bigotry. I started seeing how black folks were and are treated. How the LGBT folks are treated.
Then I asked myself do I want to make people feel small? Is that me? I have been made to feel small. To feel powerless. I hated it. I wouldn’t want anyone else to feel how I have felt.
I will always hold Facepunch and its members in high regard for knocking sense into me.
That’s awesome! Thanks for sharing!
I try to. Debates aren’t (or at least in an ideal world shouldn’t be) a victory to win over the other party. It’s to present your ideas and convince. Because of that I try to do it for a few reasons. Namely:
I would wish the other party to hear me out, I should do the same. Especially in a debate with emotional stakes putting yourself in there shoes can help
And considering the other party’s point of view puts you in a position to understand them, and if you’re going to be debating against it then that’s important to know
Plus, especially in politics, I feel as if I become naive enough to become convinced by an idea of moral dubiousness then that is partly a failure on my part to be fooled by it
I think and folks have given me new perspectives. There is decent discourse that develops but not always and not even the majority. Like the rest of life you got to appreciate it when its good because its certainly not always going to be.
No, I suck at it. I suck at defending my opinions with facts and logic. That is why I am always changing my opinions. It is hard to form an opinion that might work, and then find out all the reasons why it is wrong and then have to change it. I should have payed attention in school when they had us write persuasive essays.
Only with debating reasonable people. Otherwise they just detract, use whataboutism, or unplug.
Online debates are more about influencing the audience, who are undecided, the opponent doesn’t matter.
My strategy is usually to ask them questions that challenge their assumptions. Studies have shown this to be the best way to get someone to change there mind. However, most of the time they stop replying before I can gage if they have changed their mind or not. I assume that my questions make them uncomfortable so they stop engaging instead of evaluating their opinions.
Is that right?
This is a good first attempt, but it’s a little open ended, can you think of a question that is a little directed?
(oh snap, the reversal!.. this is heating up… Ugh, am I even doing it right? Better bail)
crickets
Lol
No. Possibly because I have never really tried to, after realizing that:
- People entering said debates are mostly just there to win an argument.
- I am under no obligation to convince them that their beliefs are utterly stupid
Those who hold stupid positions aren’t really the ones with a mind open enough to the position that they might in fact be in the wrong. Plus, I don’t have the capacity for bullshit that such an endeavor requires.
I have long since concluded that people will not only hold stupid beliefs, but desperately cling to them and consider me not having the fortitude to put up with all the fallacies that follows as a sign that they’re right.
I don’t really have an audience, and I therefore don’t feel like entering a debate, because debates to me seem mostly performative in an effort to gather soundbites and/or screenshots.
I’m sure you (yes, you reading this) have plenty of positions I find utterly idiotic, but I frankly don’t think I’m the one who will be able to convince you. I can’t educate the world, the world needs to converge on that on its own.
It’s rare, but I’ve been on both convincer and convinced sides. If both people arguing are rational, it often ends with both of them learning something new and adjusting their worldviews to fit each other.
Though usually it very quickly becomes obvious whether the other person actually looks for a debate or is just trying to provoke an emotional response.
The other way around (who has been convinced themselves) would make more sense imo, because when people change their mind about things it happens after they’ve had time to process it, not immediately on the spot. If you change someone’s mind with an argument online you are likely not going to find out about it. I’ve changed my mind about a lot of things and what people say online plays a big role in that, but it happens later, unless it was like a clear factual oversight on my part in which case I try to admit glaring mistakes.
