I agree with you in principle, but I think the words you’re using are flawed.
The electorate have devolved into petty, schoolyard name-calling. Still, it’s possible to use that language of pettiness to point out the factual hypocrisy, dishonesty, duplicity and lies of the Republicans’ messaging, and maybe hang a couple of relatively harmless schoolyard labels on them with it.
But, why is it effective? Many times authoritarians are insecure in themselves, almost as a rule. Call a fascist a fascist and they’ll double down as they fantasize about their boot on your neck. Call them a weirdo in front of everyone else and suddenly they’re the part of the out crowd. They already feel victimized because there’s more of us than there are of them, so it sticks.
Sometimes it’s jarring enough for them to give them pause and make them ask if this is really who they are. If maybe there’s a way to get back into the in crowd.
We don’t need to play their dishonest game using lies, they give us so much to work with already.
Finally: yes, we can certainly use better judo than we have been to beat them at it. That’s why I agree with you.
From an outside perspective on the other side of the world, I disagree. Any lie, once uncovered, makes it so much easier for even the the worst positions to be defended. ‘See, they have to make shit up about us, they have nothing’. Bam, now even all the other factual points are discredited in the eyes of many people who may have been on the fence.
Really? You haven’t seen a rise in facts being deemed false? Or maybe news being deemed fake? Maybe there’s even been a new term created for it that is being thrown around a lot by one side in particular.
Doesn’t seem like a good idea to give them more examples they can point to when they want to discredit your facts
Beating them at their own dishonest game has worked much better than trying to fact check them, and getting completely outpaced, ever did.
I agree with you in principle, but I think the words you’re using are flawed.
The electorate have devolved into petty, schoolyard name-calling. Still, it’s possible to use that language of pettiness to point out the factual hypocrisy, dishonesty, duplicity and lies of the Republicans’ messaging, and maybe hang a couple of relatively harmless schoolyard labels on them with it.
But, why is it effective? Many times authoritarians are insecure in themselves, almost as a rule. Call a fascist a fascist and they’ll double down as they fantasize about their boot on your neck. Call them a weirdo in front of everyone else and suddenly they’re the part of the out crowd. They already feel victimized because there’s more of us than there are of them, so it sticks.
Sometimes it’s jarring enough for them to give them pause and make them ask if this is really who they are. If maybe there’s a way to get back into the in crowd.
We don’t need to play their dishonest game using lies, they give us so much to work with already.
Finally: yes, we can certainly use better judo than we have been to beat them at it. That’s why I agree with you.
From an outside perspective on the other side of the world, I disagree. Any lie, once uncovered, makes it so much easier for even the the worst positions to be defended. ‘See, they have to make shit up about us, they have nothing’. Bam, now even all the other factual points are discredited in the eyes of many people who may have been on the fence.
Okay you get on stage and make a salient point about how you did infact not fuck a couch.
Not what I’ve observed in the last 20 years for either side, but I guess we’ll see.
Really? You haven’t seen a rise in facts being deemed false? Or maybe news being deemed fake? Maybe there’s even been a new term created for it that is being thrown around a lot by one side in particular.
Doesn’t seem like a good idea to give them more examples they can point to when they want to discredit your facts
That’s not at all the assertion you made.
What I haven’t seen was any effective debunking that moved the needle.