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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   3899 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 14, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Obviously I get all my news from the most reliable sources, The Motte. So imagine my surprise when I randomly heard a news clip today and someone said MAGA, pronouncing the MA, like from the word maw, instead of mad. Before I embarrass myself in conversation, the reporter was a weirdo right, everyone says MAGA with the MA sound from mad, right?

Neither, it's may-guh. The same vowel sound as in "make".

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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