Get Offended More (2020)

> If you haven’t read the memo yourself, give it a read. Are you disagreeing, or are you offended?

Damore's memo made very flimsy scientific arguments, supported uncritically by a couple of studies at best, from a field which is currently undergoing a replication crisis, to make sweeping criticism of a policy widely regarded as beneficial. The disagreement is obvious. The offense is that he would, apparently in good faith, expect people to be convinced by such paltry evidence.

With the author's hunting example, the author has no evidence that 'offence comes first', or even that offence exists at all for the friend in question now that they're an adult.

With the Galileo example, there was no "pretence at disagreement". The church straight-up tried him for heresy. That's nothing to do with offense OR disagreement: it's the church maintaining its authority.

The reason the examples are so weak is because there is no strong dividing line between disagreement and offence. Trying to find one is to pretend people are rational beings when they're not. You can make a pretty good case for "what caused what" (disagreement) or for "self conception and identity" (offence) for each of these, and to attempt to shoehorn them into one or the other position is simply to argue for your own preferences -- but to do so from an imaginary position of scientific legitimacy.

That’s an interesting take, and you have a point, thank you!

I'd be surprised if even 10% of people--Americans at least--are capable of regular introspection. It is not a trait I have been able to identify in many others.

Interestingly, this posts headline offended me. I'm glad I read it in its entirety, but the entire way through I was struggling with dismissing the article because of a similar opinion to your own.

I agree that offense is often used as an instrument to silence debate. We don't teach people to reason at school or university anymore. We don't instill the ethos of legitimate discussion, or even regard sophistry and attempts at vicious emotional manipulation as shameful. People don't even know what constituted a legitimate argument. The trivium made logic and rhetoric a foundation for all other learning and communication in this respect. Our "education" systems today neglect these horribly, producing "credentialed" savages who falsely believe they amount to something intellectually.

The author, however, confuses some concerns. First, I think that during debate, we simply must put aside matters of offense. We should focus exclusively on the matter at hand and offer counterarguments with substance. The only concern is whether some claim is true or false. That's it. Arguments should be considered apart from the real or imagined motives of the other party. A view may indeed be objectively offensive, whether we take offense or not, but while we can argue and show why something is wrong or gravely immoral, for example, there's nothing you can do with someone's taking of offense. What am I supposed to do with that? I can't argue with it, as it is merely their subjective reaction to a situation, not an argument I can respond to. It has no place in a debate. It has no relevance. It contributes nothing. It is often manipulative. If we are having a debate, and we don't always need to and we cannot always have one, we should either ignore such vacuous reactions, or remark that no reason for the offense was given. That's it. Don't feed the offense monster.

And as always, a debate per se is not a final arbiter of truth. A truth may be revealed, or someone may have the strongest available arguments, but let's avoid this juvenile YouTube attitude of "Watch this guy DESTROY this other guy!". It's stupid.

(Secondary remark as this annoys me whenever I read it:

"The heresy trial of Galileo. The 17th century astronomer wrote a note defending his view that the Earth revolved around the Sun, not the other way around. A shitstorm ensued, the Church got shutdown-offended, and Galileo spent the rest of his life under house arrest."

That's actually not how it happened. "The Church" wasn't offended. "The Church" is made up of billions (then millions) of people, and many clergy with diverse concerns and functions and roles and things they do. "The Church" doesn't care which sphere revolves around which other sphere as the Church. This is such a theologically uninteresting question, that making this claim is a pretty good litmus test for basic ignorance about the subject. The Church has never taught geocentrism or anything about astronomy. It has one mission: to lead souls to salvation. This entails moral leadership and authority, but astronomy trivia like this has no moral import here. It is not a matter of doctrine and it would be a preposterous thing to make a matter of doctrine. Those who make a big deal out of the common language about the sun rising or setting in the Bible need to ask themselves why they themselves continue to use that language in everyday life having accepted heliocentrism. Geocentrism simply was, at the time, merely the common and accepted view, one held by most academics (Copernicus feared them, not the Church, when publishing his magnum opus), not a teaching of the Church. The reason Galileo was put under house arrest, overlooking the Vatican garden (a rather gentle punishment for the time), was political. The Galileo "affair" spanned decades and had much to do with Galileo's tendency to insult and badger his patrons and those in power. He had a foolish knack for pointlessly making powerful enemies, including those who were once his friends. If anything, anything to do with geocentrism was a pretext on the part of his enemies to attack him. That's it. I know the Galileo "affair" has become a founding myth of scientism, but it's false. Don't get offended at that, have the courage to face the boring truth of it.)

Author here, thanks for writing this thoughtful comment.

1. I agree, during debate, put the offense monster to the side.

2. In an effort to spare words, I compressed the Galileo story into something that missed important details. My bad. My understanding of the saga was that many members of the Church did engage with good faith in the emerging science of the time. What happened was mostly a political spat (though I still think there was an element of "offense" involved).