So maybe the art of debate is dead in America. Lord knows it’s been missing in action so far in the presidential debates, has perhaps never seen any air time on talk radio, and suffers insurmountable stupidity on the forums and comment swathes of the internet. Reminds me of a recent conversation I had about the deficit, tax loopholes, and a budget slash. Try as I might to employ logic, reason, and ( yawn ) sourced facts against what I consider broad generalizations and gut instincts, we just couldn’t come to any suitable conclusion on the matter.
Maybe that’s the problem with American politics – or possibly politics in general, or even humanity today – that the overload of noxious talking heads and the seemingly endless supply of information available to anyone with internet access suddenly makes everybody feel knowledge-empowered. Masters of various subjects. Intelligent, I suppose one could say. But rather than actually trying to answer questions, a terrifying many people seem to go about picking out fact blurbs and twisting figures (and the very question) to suit their predispositions.
And I wonder, has it always been this way? I can recall the bitter (at time acidic) arguments of the Federalists and Anti-Federalists two-hundred and twenty-some years ago (eleven score, by Lincoln’s reckoning). Yellow journalism, caricatures, inquisitions, libel and name calling and Elijah Lovejoy. McCarthyism and countless panics. Are people generally stupid? Or is there more to debate than knowing your stuff and presenting it in a straightforward fashion? Many tools in the arsenal, maybe...
So if the art of debate is alive and thriving, I wonder if there was ever a real spirit of acquiescence and grace. It could be those were just bullshit ideals too, Jesus preaching meekness sort of thing so that basilicas could be built and empires forged. The information revolution has not only freed the people to boundless porn, but has given them the tools to be obtuse experts of most everything. It’s the end of empires, the harbinger to the end of human progress. It’s alive in politics on the floor of the House, on the angrily-lettered or else overly-worded pickets carried by protesters and occupiers and tea partiers. It’s soon to be an end to bipartisanship and compromise. Just wait – we’ll be living in an overbearingly effective dictatorship by the decade’s end, democratic principles having died the previous winter.
Not as bad as all that, perhaps, but it makes me wonder. An example of things to come, conversing with a future leader in the world of business:
[Guy 1] Ok, so I have $100 debt and will decrease spending by 50 ($50) and will increase spending by $50 ($100). So we are left with a grand total of $100! That is a Democrats idea of cutting the budget.
[Guy 2] Hold up, Mr. Specious Reasoning; you'd lower your spending by $50 (freeing up $50 that you normally throw away - say on designer socks) and you'd be bringing in an additional $50 (Christmas card from your grandma). $100 debt would be paid in that scenario.
[Guy 1] 100-50+50=100???
[Guy 2 shakes head, fist at God]
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