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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   2933 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 5, 2025

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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Recommendations for True Crime books?

I got violently ill over the holidays, and in my mix of delirium and tedium I re-listened to Tom.O'Neill's Chaos about the Manson family murders, and really enjoyed it. Now I'm in the mood for more in the genre, but I'm having trouble finding ones that don't completely blow. Tom did a great job in Chaos of blending the lurid with the Nancy Drew with solid reporting. I'd want something just like that if it exists.

Obviously you should start with In Cold Blood, arguably the first of the genre. Unless you've already read it. Helter Skelter by Bugliosi offers what was the contemporary take on the Manson family, though folks like Lynette Fromme and Sandra Goode say Bugliosi was making up his own narrative.

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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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