A New Way To Debate
I keep reading about a “new” but very simple method to respond to conflict over the last year or so. You just challenge the person to explain themselves. It come up a lot when women are discussing inappropriate workplace comments from men. The example I heard recently was a woman who was the only woman in a meeting with 8-10 men and one of the guys joked, “We’ll be gentle.” To which she replied, “What do you mean by that?” And he stumbled around because then he had to really think about what that joke meant and he just kind of mumbled and apology for the dumb joke and then he was the one feeling awkward and not her.
She didn’t have to do the emotional labor of proving that was a really inappropriate comment…she forced him to do that labor instead.
I realized I’ve kinda been using a similar method a bit with political conflict and I thought I’d share the ways it has helped me remove some of that same type of emotional labor from my workload.
My problem is - when I engage in debate - I tend to go overboard and feel like I need to come at any conversation with 45 reputable sources and quotes from experts. I have wasted HOURS on responding to Facebook comments before. And inevitably…the other person is not doing that for their stance. A lot of times they’re just regurgitating things they’ve seen on their own news sources or Facebook groups.
SO! My new method tends to make the other person do more work instead.
FOR EXAMPLE:
They say, “I just don’t think it’s fair that a boy could say they were a girl and then win at my daughter’s swim meet.”
I say, “What do you mean?”
“Well, before this state law was passed if a boy wanted to win a race he just had to pretend to be a girl.”
“Has that happened before? Can you show me?” This has been done on the debate floors in state legislatures and on news shows for the last few months and none of these proponents of these laws can build enough of a case using previous “issue” to make these laws seem valid.
OF COURSE THEY ARE STILL GETTING PASSED. But that’s another rant for another day. Today we’re just talking about making the other person in a debate do the work.
Basically in these situations you just keep asking them questions. Forcing them to think beyond the fear mongering or propaganda. To continue the trans athlete example you could give them this thought experiment to force them to imagine what some of these laws actually mean in practice, “So, what if a girl beats your daughter but you are convinced she’s faking her gender, what does that look like now that this state law is in effect? Does someone force the girl to show her private area? No one better tell my daughter she has to ‘prove’ she’s a girl if she wins a race because of this law.”
Or maybe take it a different way and you can say, “Does your daughter hope to swim at the collegiate level? Or the Olympic level?” And whichever way they answer you point out, “…because trans athletes are allowed to compete with the gender they identify at the higher levels of competition. Seems weird to not reflect those same practices in high school.”
Let’s use it with another recent debate I’ve stumbled upon: The 1619 Project. Them, “I don’t want that propaganda taught in my schools!”
To which you can ask a few different questions: “Is it being taught in your child’s school?” because the whole country is current outraged simply because teaching materials exist but few (if any) school systems are actually coding it into their curriculums. But then you ask, “Did you read it? What part did you not agree with?” because there has been so much fear mongering around that project where conservatives claim it was “re-writing history” and if you talk to most people who are resisting it, they didn’t read it.
One of my conversations around The 1619 Project ended up something like this:
Them, “They’re trying to say the birth of our country was in 1619.”
What I wanted to do was start getting into semantics about what they said their purpose was and send this person links to the creator’s responses to this questions that has been brought up 1,000 times. But instead, I asked a question that is kinda the point of the project.
Me, “Do you think our country’s path to today would have been the exact same if we had never had slaves?”
Them, “Of course not! I’m not saying that,”
Me, “I think that’s the purpose of the project. To make sure people know that without the existence of chattel slavery which started with that boat in 1619, our country’s path would have been very different. So it’s an important date to consider in our understanding of our country’s history.”
You see, I have found myself in many frustrating “debates” where I provide a link to an excellent piece of journalism about how we criminalize poverty in this country and it is met with, “That’s mainstream liberal media, I don’t trust that.” Or I give an academic paper and it’s scoffed at because obviously academia is elitism and can’t be trusted. Even science is considered “liberal” if it’s backing up masks or climate change. As someone who never likes “debating” without proof/links/research, this has tied my hands in these situations. Especially because they’ll then send me some Fox News clip with some pediatrician from the American College of Pediatricians as their “proof” to rebut my proof.
And no progress is ever made.
But I have found if I push back with questions to get them to dig deeper on their own views…to expand beyond the chryon on the bottom of the news screen…sometimes I can at least crack a window to let some light in. Here’s another example.
Them, “Telling someone they have white privilege is racist!”
Me, “How so?”
Them, “It’s judging someone based on the color of their skin.”
Me, “How is it judging them?”
Them, “You’re saying my life is easy because I’m white.”
Me, “Easier. How many times have you been interviewed for a job by someone with a different skin color as you? If you have been interviewed by a Black person, were you more nervous?”
Here’s the thing, they’re not going to suddenly see your point of view. As a matter of fact, they’re probably going to say, “No!” But…you got them to actually think about something real for a second, and not just recite soundbites from angry conservatives.
Once I asked someone when we were debating white privilege, “Have you ever walked into somewhere and been the only white person? How did it make you feel?” and of course they said, “Yes! All the time! It’s no big deal!”
Now…I knew this person really really really well and I almost could have told you the exact situations they were talking about and I assure you…it was a big deal to them. So my “point” was not made by any sort of debate standards. But I did follow-up with, “Well…still probably not as often as a Black person finds themselves the surrounded by white people, and I consider that part of white privilege.” And did anything change about this person? I don’t think so. At least not according to the memes I’ve seen them post since.
BUT. I escaped that “debate” without doing all sorts of emotional labor to provide “proof” and solid “rebuttals.” I made my point, got them away from the conservative talking points they normally spew, all without feeling overly frustrated and upset and having wasted hours on research. Because those conversations ZAP me, and after almost 15 years of engaging in debates like this (I didn’t realize how outnumbered I was until Obama announced his run for President), I realized they hardly do any good. I’ve never changed the mind of a hard-core conservative by providing “proof” of my points.
I do like think think though, that this method does change their worn thought patterns. It does push them outside their comfort zone of Fox News talking points. And, most importantly, it puts more of the labor on them because I’m simply asking them questions…not spending time pulling up resources like I’m doing the bibliography for my master’s thesis.