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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   3661 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 21, 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?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

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

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What have your personal public conversations about the Trump shooting looked like?

I feel like everyone around me has barely mentioned it outside immediate family and friends. It's like everyone just backed off, left wingers and right wingers are giving fewer zingers. The closest I've gotten to having a real conversation about it was at a gun store, explaining why I wanted something in stock with a reference to "you know, everything going on..." Which he nodded to acknowledge and said something like yeah it's crazy.

My favorite reply from a relative: “this is the first time I wish Trump leaned further right”. Comedy knows no political aisle

That's actually pretty funny.

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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."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


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