Posted on 06/02/2014 3:57:36 AM PDT by Kaslin
Non-lawyers often ask me, “What is the best way to argue with a liberal?” This is silly, because there is no best way to argue with a liberal. They're beyond argument. You might as well argue with your terrier. Take it from someone who argues with his hideous terrier all the time.
But if you do choose to argue with a liberal, understand that your purpose should never be to change the liberal’s mind. You're not going to change the liberal’s mind. Instead, if you choose to argue with a liberal, you should do it for one of two reasons – to either win over people who have not yet made up their minds, or to support people who already have begun to understand the truth.
The truth is that conservatism is an ideology that is in accord with natural law and basic human decency, while liberalism is merely the summit of a slippery slope leading down to the hellish depths of collectivist misery.
Liberals aren’t going to like to hear this manifest and demonstrable truth. So you’re going to get called “racist,” “sexist” and “homophobic,” even if you’re a conservative black lesbian.
What you are not going to get is an argument. An argument is a collected series of statements designed to establish a definite proposition. Arguments involve the presentation of facts and evidence from which one draws a conclusion. Implied within the concept of an argument is the potential that one might change his conclusion. But liberals start with the conclusion.
They don’t change their conclusions based on the facts and evidence; they change the facts and evidence based on the conclusion they want. This is why a 105 degree day is irrefutable proof of global warming, while a 60 degree day is irrefutable proof of global warming. As is a -20 degree day.
Liberals are only concerned with argument, or what superficially appears to be argument, as a rhetorical bludgeon designed to beat you into submission. They aren’t trying to change your mind. They don’t expect you to agree with them. They don’t even care whether or not you grow to love Big Brother.
They just want you to shut up and let them run rampant. If you understand that, you'll be fine.
There are two basic tactics to choose from when responding to a liberal pseudo-argument, defense and counterattack. Without getting too detailed and infantry-nerdy on you, think of defense as simply preventing a loss. You're holding your ground. The counterattack, however, lashes out to seize the initiative and defeat your enemy.
Both have their uses. When you defend, you are generally responding to the pseudo-argument the liberal is making. A liberal will start advocating some nonsense and you reply to what he says. You may choose to use examples of liberalism's many failures to illustrate how collectivism is a prescription for disaster. For example, some pinko starts crowing about how eight million suckers signed up for Obamacare. A good defense might involve raising the question of how many of those eight million have actually paid for it.
But the problem with defense is that it treats a liberal "argument” with a respect it doesn't deserve. You dignify liberal silliness with a response when all it deserves is mockery and contempt.
This is why I prefer to counterattack. When you counterattack, you ignore the proposition offered by the liberal and refuse to respond on the liberal’s preferred terms. In fact, you don’t even need to address the same subject the liberal is talking about. Your goal is not to undercut the liberal’s assertion. You're going to counterattack to undercut the liberal himself.
There are many good reasons to choose the approach of treating the liberal like he is a terrible person with terrible ideas who seeks to impose a quasi-fascist police state upon America, including the fact that it's all true.
Let’s try a counterattack battle drill. Some doofus with a “Capitalism Is a Patriarchal, Cisnormative Hate Crime” t-shirt starts babbling about “privilege.” The undecideds start listening, their jaws drooping slightly. Some of the more conservative ones are silent, not wanting to be labeled racist by some geek whose grandfather came from Oslo. You need to act. So you causally inject the question, “Hey, why are you an eager and active member of a political party that made a KKK kleagle a beloved Senate Majority Leader?”
Then you mention that you’re a member of the party that fought slavery and didn’t turn hoses on civil rights marchers. Then you finish by announcing, “Well, I’m going to stand with Dr. King and judge people by the content of their character.” It’s optional whether you then get up, scream that the liberal should have issued you a trigger warning about his racism, and leave.
But be careful – the liberal may totally spit in the next latte he sells you.
Some people might question whether this kind of Alinsky-esque tactic means we are stooping to the liberals’ level. Except the liberals’ level is six feet underground, where the victims of collectivism lie buried. Anyone not willing to take the fight to them simply empowers their liberal fascist fantasies.
If you're trying to win an Oxford Union debate with a liberal, you’ve missed the point. This isn't about the Marquess of Queensberry’s fussy little rules. This isn't about some sort of extended-pinky exchange of ideas over a fine glass of port. This is about fighting for our way of life and our fundamental rights against the intellectual heirs of Stalin, Mao and Hitler.
Attack. This is about winning. First prize is freedom. Second prize is tyranny.
You waste time arguing with people who have been brainwashed by Communist professors and the state-run media. Life is too short to waste on fools.
I 100% agree. It’s amazing how your words get twisted when you try.
I don’t argue with them. I simply ask them questions that they can’t answer, questions like “Can you give me an example of where a monopoly has provided better service at lower cost than a fully competitive health care market?” Or, “Can you name a single country that has a higher opinion of the United States today than they did six years ago?” When faced with questions like that, liberals discover that they don’t know jack. I then follow it with something like, “Since it is clear you weren’t able to think up these opinions all on your own, where did you really get them from?”
Well they have to learn the hard way.
“You waste time arguing with people who have been brainwashed by Communist professors and the state-run media. Life is too short to waste on fools.”
You’re right; we are way past dialogue with the left.
Just because we have freedom of speech, that doesn’t mean that I have to listen to them. So I just ignore or mute them
Bookmarking
All agreed except also the failure to fight liberals has led to more people believing in something which is really quite despicable. There has to be an effort to win people back over.
Simple example, more people actually believing it’s OK to do nothing and live off others, rather than realizing that is shameful.
I have several lib/leftist acquaintances. Their thinking is SO warped that you cannot have an intelligent, rational, reasonable discussion/conversation with them on anything but the most mundane, nonpolitical topics. Even the weather is off limits because they’ll turn it into a tirade about “climate change”. I quit trying to influence their thinking a long time ago after learning this the hard way. The only thing I will do is stand up for what I believe if they get personal and attack, which they often do since they can’t seem to see there are two sides/differing opinions. There is no “live and let live” - if you don’t embrace their views, you’re racist, bigoted, intolerant, and whatever other terms they want to call you; however, they are perfectly oblivious to the fact that this very intolerance and refusal to acknowledge basic freedoms and liberty (especially religious) is bigoted, ignorant ... whatever.
Tried that on a couple of young Obamabots in the 2008 election. I asked them to name a successful, efficent government run agency. Their answer...USPS.
Pointing out how much money it was losing they said the problem was taxes that were too low and unfair competition from the private sector.
I learned my lesson long ago with Liberals.
So now, I just treat them the way I would a child, a drunk or a mentally challenged person.
They will never recognize logic... and politics aside, how do you communicate with a person who doesn’t recognize logic?
Classic liberal idiocy.
I love it, you could say there there little one, you’ll understand some day and walk away
I can be pretty persuasive in prose form. but face to face argument with a leftist or anyone else for that matter can be daunting....
as a wag once said, “I don’t argue too well, extemporaneously, off the top of my head” oh wait that wag was me.
so when the leftist at the cocktail party(or kegger or labor day bbq) tells me something, oh, let say. “Handguns, shouldn’t be legal as they could never make a dent in a standing army”...my sluggish gray cells begin to remember that one uses a handgun to get to a rifle. It recalls the story of the ‘liberator’ .45ACP single shot pistol dropped to the partisans in parts of Europe during WWII, so that Mr or Mrs partisan goes up to a german sentry with an offer of a cigarette and asks for a light and while Fritz is fumbling for his Ronson(or Krupp clone of same)the patriot launches a single smooth bore projectile through the brain of the Hun and takes his MP-38 and magazine belt for future fun and frolic......
then I stop daydreaming and Mr. Ponytail has left and starts his argument with the next person at the party....
so knowing that time keeps slipping slipping,into the future, sometimes I just argue something like “ Oh YEAH...well F*** you, that’s what...”
“Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.”
Mark Twain
Arguing with a liberal is like wrestling a pig. You’ll both get dirty and the pig loves it.
Too many cowardly conservatives are that way because they've been convinced by pop culture and the Leftist news media that they're the minority. They never hear anyone arguing the positions they agree with, so they stay silent. I've actually had bystanders approach me after a public argument and say they agreed 100%, but they never heard anyone else say what I'd said.
When you're arguing in public, you're on stage...make it your best performance ever. True, you'll never sway a Leftist, but you may encourage an audience member to nut up and come forward.
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
Ping for later
It is never too late to learn!
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