There are two comments here on the Motte that have, for the past month or so, been sitting amidst the 71 tabs I've got opened in my browser.
The two comments are fairly different;
The first is a more personal meditation on the human desire to 'be a good person', and how that may or may not align with the equally-human desires to 'fit in', and 'pursue Truth'.
The second is a political argument over whether Democrats/progressives/libs are the real hypocrites, and whether or not they were the ones to 'defect first' in the game of American partisan politics; pretty standard stuff around here, really.
The thing they have in common is that I've been intending to respond to them.
And yet, I haven't.
Part of this is due to a dynamic that ought to be familiar to anyone with a maladaptive relationship with deadlines- if you're late turning something in, the longer you wait afterwards to get around to it, the harder it becomes to ever actually do it; it's easy to put it off for a day or two or three, and before you know it, a week's gone by, and length of the delay in your response might raise some eyebrows when you eventually do respond. Repeat this cycle a few times, and eventually a month or two has passed you by- at which point, you might as well just not bother to respond at all- assuming you're even still in the same headspace necessary to give a coherent response, and that events in the meantime haven't made your response irrelevant, the other person's really going to wondering about your penchant for necro-ing old threads.
A larger part, however, comes down to a much simpler -and much less easily overcome- barrier:
Why bother?
In my very first comment on this site, I noted that the 'two screens' effect is very real, and that the picture that the screen the self-identified 'Red Tribers' on this site are watching is showing a very different picture than the one the few self-identified 'Blue Tribers' still active on this site are watching.
This isn't particularly surprising. For decades, Americans have been slowly but steadily self-segregating along 'tribal' lines; fewer and fewer of us spend much time interacting with other Americans radically different from ourselves. We might live in the same neighborhoods, frequent the same shops and restaurants, and be theoretically 'close' to each other (or not; the same self-segregating dynamic increasingly applies to physical locations as well), but it's increasingly rare for us to ever actually interact with our Others to any real extent.
Combined with the general shifts in how people interact with and perceive what are 'their' communities (triply so in the online age!), the balkanization of 'common' hobbies & interests, the fracturing of the media landscape, and the overall decline in common cultural touchstones and trusted authorities, the end is result is that nowadays its easier than ever for all of us to live in our own Bespoke Realities™. It isn't just that political polarization & disagreements are tenser & higher-profile then they've been in decades (though they are!); now, we no longer even need to have similar conceptions of what it is we're even arguing over in the first place!
I can rage over how Republicans are trying to destroy the government and intentionally harm millions of the worst-off Americans with their new tariff, tax, & budget idiocies- and you can scoff and dispute my entire framing, say how I'm being absurdly hyperbolic and hysterical.
You can denounce the large-scale concerted push by progressives to trans the nations youth; to turn them into Marxist-indoctrinated eunuchs conscripted as soldiers in the frontlines of the culture wars. I can roll my eyes and say there is no such phenomenon, and it's all a conservative bogeyman.
Etc, etc.
So in light of this situation, where we not only argue endlessly about the most basic facts of any given political disagreement, without either side ever having to concede to either the opposition's arguments, or even their basic worldview and underlying framing of the situation...
Why bother?
Why bother continuing to argue (and especially why bother continuing to argue online- an exercise in futility if I ever heard one!) when doing so is unlikely to change the other person's mind?
Why bother continuing to argue when the people I'm disagreeing with seem to have beliefs & experiences so wildly opposite of my own that I have to wonder if we're even living in the same country?
Why bother continuing to argue when people I disagree with just seem like they fundamentally can't be reasoned with at all?
And especially why bother continuing to argue when doing so is only likely to be """rewarded""" with mass-downvotes and distributed dogpiles by commentators on a forum you don't even really like, and only stick around on out of some sort of... IDK, perverse masochism, I guess?
Seems kinda pointless to me, tbh.
Despite my faint hopes, the dysfunction in this country appears to be acclerating.
We seem to be waiting on the precipice, holding our breath to see if the next few days heralds the opening salvos of the beginning of true, active civil conflict.
So I ask again- why bother? Is the time for talking over?
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Notes -
I've thought about this question a lot. It's why I've never really posted on this site. I spend lots of time on many other forums but post very infrequently. In-person I don't talk much either.
I often reflect on the things I do write or say. In hindsight, many of them seem obvious and therefore unnecessary. Others I regret because my opinion has changed. But occasionally I'll look at something I wrote and feel glad, because I was right. Whether it's because I predicted something, I made someone else agree; or it's something I wrote when I was much younger, and despite having far more experience, my opinion hasn't changed at all.
Here are some reasons why you should argue for your beliefs:
To convince yourself: people aren't perfectly rational, we form beliefs for illogical reasons (e.g. because we heard them from friends or family), and we hold beliefs without understanding why. When you argue for such a belief, you create the argument on the fly. If it's a "justifiable" belief (i.e. aligns with your other beliefs), the argument can reinforce your confidence in it later; or if it's not, you may start writing, realize you can't find a good argument, then change your belief for the better (happens to me).
Because it may convince some people: the vast majority probably approach your argument firmly holding their own conclusions, but perhaps one or two are unsure, and your argument moves them to your side. I believe this happens, everyone has some concepts they don't hold a firm opinion on and can be persuaded either way. If your giant wall of text convinces just one or two people, was it worth writing? That's up for you to decide, but note that enough "one or two people"s can sway an election.
Because it appeases people who already agree with you: It makes me happy to read and hear nuanced opinions similar to mine among a sea of surface-level takes. I appreciate them even though I already agree with them. It makes me more confident, because it signals there are more people like me in this world, and that my worldview may not be "wrong" because others hold it. If the opinion is backed with evidence, I can use it if/when I restate the opinion in my own social spaces. Thus, even if everyone that reads your post agrees, it may still have positive consequences.
Because it appeases people who don't agree with you (if you care about people in general): I like reading some nuanced opinions that I strongly disagree with, because they make me think. As much as I dislike some parts of society, I wouldn't want everyone to think exactly like me, because it would be much more boring.
Because of pride, and/or because you want to for some other reason: people aren't perfectly rational, we can't control what we want. If posting makes you feel better about yourself, or feel like you accomplished something, then even if there's no other reason I believe it's worth it. Scott Alexander has written a lot, he's written that people have said (paraphrasing) "wow, you write so much. How do you do it? Isn't it hard?"; and he replied, he just really likes to write, for him it's not work, it's relaxation.
To elaborate on "because you want to" and expand on "why bother": why bother with anything? I have a dog, and dogs seem to live meaningless lives: they sleep, eat, go for walks mostly around the same places, play a repetitive game (fetch), get pet, and occasionally meet people who are invited over. People live much more meaningfully: we travel, build things, lead corporations and governments, go into space, etc. But those things are only more meaningful because we feel they are; for depressed nihilistic people they aren't meaningful at all. Likewise, I think a post is intrinsically "meaningful" if the author feels it is, even if there's no other reason...
...I don't know, I guess I "bothered" to write that last part, and this whole post.
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