House of Eratosthenes

Well, in the real world it turns out there are a lot of problems with that. If the liberal is mouthing off, at that particular moment the liberal doesn’t have any work to do. Maybe you’re doing his work for him, in which case the problem is solved: Adhere to the classic advice, shut your mouth and do the liberal’s work for him.

But if you’re gathered ’round the water cooler, so to speak, I’ve found that this isn’t terribly good advice. Contrary to what middle- and upper-management may think they know about human behavior, or pretend to think they know about it, people are not naturally inclined to want to work together on things. At all layers of the organizational structure we babble away about “diversity” and “tolerance for different points of view” but that’s pretty much a load of crap people say to keep from being fired.

People are molded and shaped by scores of thousands of years of social evolution, to live in tribes. It’s just a fact.

Sure, in a modern environment we’ll work with people in other tribes. But still — we want to know where the other fellow’s coming from. So we talk this stuff out. It’s healthy. It’s part of respecting him, in a way. If you’re going to communicate with him generically, in a way that remains politely agnostic about his background and beliefs as a person, you’re going to be working with him in a manner that is very, very cold. Distant. Some might even say, with more than a hint of legitimacy, rude.

And so we talk about politics…in addition to religion and family.

And then if that doesn’t hammer home the point to the classic “Don’t” people, there are the questions. If you know something, even if people understand they don’t agree with your slant on it they’re still going to come to you with questions when their own knowledge-base is lacking. That’s what people are supposed to do; they’re certainly expected to do that with work. And some of these questions are of the nature that there is no polite way to decline them. Anybody who says this is possible, hasn’t been put in the position. They probably haven’t been put in the position because they aren’t known for being approachable with such questions, or for having an information store that would make the questioning worthwhile.

And it should be noted — a lot of the folks who say don’t discuss politics at work, are liberals who freely discuss politics at work. They want an echo chamber.

Outside of work, it isn’t all free-reign either. Family reunions, bridge parties, whatever. It’s up to the conservatives to keep things cool, because the liberals are just there to talk down to people, quote the inane drivel they’ve heard from The Daily Show, and make sure they’re seen interrupting.

Well, here’s my list of advice if you want to keep things peaceful.

1. Let the liberal call a stop to it.

Bear in mind “I don’t want to talk about this anymore” isn’t something you’re going to hear a lot. You have to read the code.

“We’re not going to agree on this” is something used by the rare mature, tactful liberal.

If you find yourself interrupted twice in a row, that means the liberal knows he can’t “win” if you’re actually allowed to get an entire sentence out. By then, you’ve made all the points you’re going to make.

A lot of disagreements boil down to one’s perception of human nature. I’ve always thought of that as an exit point. “If you subsidize something you get more of it, if you tax something you get less of it.” “That’s bullshit!” Okay…you understand human behavior, the liberal doesn’t. You won’t educate him in this exchange. Move on.

Sarcasm is used by nervous people. The right response is to back away, although the temptation is to clarify your position because it’s being misstated. “Taking Saddam Hussein down just made sense.” “Oh RIGHT, because of those Weapons of Mass Destruction, and everybody KNOWS he personally ordered the September 11 attacks.” You’re dealing with a nervous person. Just mutter something like “well, that’s not what I said” and move on.

2. Use rhetorical questions.

Be respectful. But keep in mind you’ve reached a point of agreement here, that it is mutually beneficial to each of you to explore the mindset of the other. This is valuable; orient your rhetorical questions toward that. “Does war ever have a purpose?” “Could it ever be hazardous and self-defeating to try to avoid war?”

3. Concede the points where it makes sense to do so.

Acknowledge the validity of the sub-bullshit, which is a true and verifiable statement tossed in so that a big ol’ plate of garbage can be sold right afterward. “Well, certainly there was bad juju going down at Enron.” “Well, like any other country with a history, the United States has some moments where it’s a little tough to be proud.”

Find the points of agreement first, then proceed from there to the points of disagreement. It could be there isn’t a point of disagreement. If that’s the case, it’s a win-win for both of you because you’ve demonstrated the maturity to work together on something, and in addition, you’ve had it demonstrated to you that the other person has this too.

4. Don’t tell people things they aren’t ready to be told.

A country has ten thousand starving kids. We send food and medicine. In another ten years that country has a hundred thousand starving kids. It’s true that it works that way, but to some people when you point this out, it has a flavoring of genocidal intent behind it even though that’s not where you’re going with it. That’s because they’ve been indoctrinated into thinking inaction is the same as mass murder.

It’s a booby trap. Maybe you can disarm it, maybe you can’t. If you can’t, do the smart thing and avoid it.

5. It’s a success if you inspire doubt.

Part of being a liberal in the first place, is to believe propaganda from the home office above the common sense of outsiders, so you’re not going to win a convert here. Liberalism being what it is, they’re probably going to work very hard to make you into a convert to their cause, so stick to politely explaining your problems with it.

6. Keep in mind who’s supposed to be convinced.

Corollary to #5. You know liberals don’t feel that good about what they believe, because a lot of these things start out with the liberal saying something like, as an example, “why do YOU THINK we went into Iraq?” So we’re having a conversation about what YOU think. And then as you present the case for taking down the Hussein regime, the liberal will use the talking points to shoot each one of those down…in so doing, swiveling the argument around into a (failed) attempt to convince him of something. This is actually pretty funny if you see it as the trap that it is, because people who feel secure in the things they believe don’t convert every single conversation into a failed attempt to convince themselves of something different. Just keep in mind how the argument started, and say “well, okay, but you asked what my opinion was, and that piece of evidence is good enough for me.”

7. Don’t debate feelings.

There’s some overlap here with #4. This post from “notaclue” is one of my favorites, and it speaks for itself:

Sometimes you don’t get argument, you get a restating of cliches. A few years ago I had this chat about gun control with a coworker at a volunteer agency:

SHE: We’ve got to do something about these guns.

ME (sitting there with a pistol in my pocket, savoring the irony): Actually, guns are used defensively much more often than offensively. Gary Kleck’s study, etc.

SHE: We’ve got to do something about these guns.

It’s just not worth trying sometimes.

In this situation, which comes up often, your opposition lacks an intellectual “motor” and probably knows it. A sailboat has right of way over a powerboat; back off and let the other vessel proceed. Like notaclue says, it’s not worth trying.

8. Stay away from what is deserved by who.

There is no discipline of science that has found a way to politely engage liberals on the subject of who deserves what — philosophy, psychology, neurology, phrenology. To the best experts have been able to determine, this simply isn’t possible with liberals.

So when a liberal comes up with a nifty way to help women, the very last thing to come out of your mouth should be “what about men?” You’re talking to someone who is convinced women deserve good things and men deserve bad things, and it simply isn’t up for discussion. That goes for working families as well. And ethnic groups.

This is the irony about liberals. They like to walk around using feel-good catchphrases like “for the benefit of all” or “for the good of everybody,” but, in fact, liberalism is opposed to seeing things that way. They want different groups of people to enjoy different standards of living; that’s what it is all about. And the funny thing is, even in environments in which we’re supposed to honestly respect the truth, we have to let them get away with it because their feelings (see #7, above) are so incredibly enmeshed in this, it simply doesn’t make sense to challenge them on it.

So the timeless question “how many paychecks have you ever received from a poor person?”, as wonderful as it is, should be just kept off the table. They can’t handle it; they’re too fragile. Instead, ask where lines are drawn with regard to “progressive” policies. Should the highest marginal tax rate be eighty percent? Why or why not? Should the minimum wage be raised to sixty bucks an hour? Why or why not?

Cross-posted at Cassy’s.

Morgan, this is about the most useful post I’ve ever read anywhere about anything.

Thank you.
- philmon | 08/02/2008 @ 16:56

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It Takes a Village to Talk to a Liberal
Saturday, August 2nd, 2008