For the Sake of Science

In any debate, there’s a good chance one or both sides will find something frustrating. It happens to me all the time. That’s the nature of debate. However, I think one of the more insidious ways frustration creeps in – especially in our 2018, you-either-100%-agree-with-me-or-you’re-literally-a-Nazi/commie/libtard/cuck culture – is when a person refuses to acknowledge that one particular point they’ve been using might be bad or in some way flawed. There seems to be this belief that if a single thing about an argument is wrong, then the entire conclusion and/or the broader point(s) being made have to be thrown out. Many of my more recent posts focus on this sort of thing. For example:

In this post, I talked about people who used bad correlation to claim Confederate statues were racist. The correlation sucked and it was bad science. But does any reasonable person think that means the case for Confederate statues being racist just got weaker?

In this post, Shaun King claimed 1) Thomas Jefferson never did anything as President to stop slavery and 2) Jefferson refused to free Sally Hemings while he was alive. The first claim is blatantly false and the second one is dubious; delving into the second claim reveals that Sally Hemings, while in the free country of France where she was paid a wage, actually negotiated a future for herself and her children. None of these facts mean King has to stop hating Thomas Jefferson for owning slaves with whom he fathered upwards of 6 children.

In this post, I talked about the nonsense claims that said Joe Arpaio was accepting guilt by accepting his pardon. The case law supports exactly the opposite conclusion, and, ultimately, the issue isn’t settled law. But does that mean Joe Arpaio isn’t a racist piece of shit who knowingly broke a host of laws? Of course not. But that doesn’t mean my point wasn’t met (elsewhere) with accusations of supporting Arpaio and his shitty policies.

I greatly dislike the level of polarization that permeates seemingly everything today. Person 1 should be able to draw conclusion X while using points A, B, C, D, and E, and Person 2 should be able to agree with conclusion X even though he may reject point C. Why Person 1 so often thinks this means he must be mortal enemies with Person 2 is both baffling and disheartening.

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