Poll of the Day > Why are political and arguments about social issues...

(+) Yeah! (+)

...the most likely subject to prompt a "Okay, I think we're done here, thank you for your input," followed by an abrupt end to all further conversation.

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Because they're the most likely issues to present irreconcilable differences.

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Yes but it's very inconsiderate and intolerant to a degree.

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Probably because social issues are typically harder to defend given that they're largely based on feelings and opinions? Take for example the question whether it's wrong for a society to eat meat. Obviously meat consumption leads to harming animals, but feelings there range from "it's okay to harvest animals for our consumption" to "it's okay to humanely harvest animals for our consumption" to "it's not okay at all to harvest animals for consumption." None of the stances are based on anything truly objective. You can't point to any facts or figures on that ground. However, you *can* make side arguments -- the anti-vegetarian side will claim that it's an important part of the human diet and pleasurable while vegetarians will claim that you can get the same nutrition from non-animal products, animal substitutes taste just as good, and it's a far more efficient use of resources (that last point is indisputable -- raising animals is undeniably less efficient... although that brings us to the question of *why* any such efficiency matters)

For something that pretends to use statistics, we have BLM. The BLM movement is built upon not just outrage and indignation surrounding officer-involved incidents (which is the feelings side), but also a large number of outright falsehoods and spin (part of which, as we later learned from the FBI, was orchestrated by Russia -- which shouldn't surprise anybody since Russia, the US, and European nations have used similar tactics in an attempt to undermine countries). Many of the incidents STILL invoked by the group have been definitely debunked, such as the Mike Brown shooting where even Obama's justice department finally conceded that he had gone for the officer's gun. However, some people who feel that any deaths are unwarranted -- even when an officer kills a suspect in self-defense -- so it's an irreconcilable difference in opinion since it's based on feelings. (There's also the issue of BLM's overt racism where it *only* cares about officer-involved deaths regarding one minority group and protestors have gone out of their way to shout, "Do all lives matter? Just black lives!", even when -- hilariously enough -- the entire fucking group doesn't have a single black person there.)

When it comes to most social issues, statistics are just window dressing. There are core underlying feelings and opinions which people hold -- based largely on their subjective experiences -- and then they tend to look for facts that support those feelings while finding reasons to reject the facts that contradict it. And on the vast majority of issues, people on opposing sides are generally closer on many issues than they assume.

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You ever heard of someone plugging their ears and go lalalala. That's that argument tactic but in adult form.

Solid Sonic posted...

...the most likely subject to prompt a "Okay, I think we're done here, thank you for your input," followed by an abrupt end to all further conversation.

There are people who want mutually exclusive things that can't be compromised on or productively talked out. Everyone is going to feel like their pet issue is one such thing. There's no compromise between, say, neo-nazis who want to exterminate or enslave anyone not from their approved master-race, and civil rights for all regardless of race or creed.

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Zeus posted...

Probably because social issues are typically harder to defend given that they're largely based on feelings and opinions?

Or what used to be called "values", "ethics", or "morals". You can weight an argument with quantitative data all you like; but ultimately, the question is going to boil down to if or why something should, or should not, be so. "All right, but is that really a good thing?", "But why is that a bad thing?"

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Firewerx posted...

Or what used to be called "values", "ethics", or "morals".

You mean from the days before peoples' belief systems consisted of parroted memes? >_>

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Solid Sonic posted...

Why are political and arguments about social issues the most likely subject to prompt a "Okay, I think we're done here, thank you for your input," followed by an abrupt end to all further conversation.

Because most people tend to define themselves by political ideology and social issues to some degree, which means they internalize the sides in any given debate. At which point, you've effectively disengaged anything resembling logic or reason, and are now reducing every argument down to an "us or them" mentality, in which the goal is to score points on "the other side" while fanatically defending your own side, because criticism of the side you've chosen is tantamount to a personal attack on your sense of identity.

So conflict-avoidant types who don't want to spend their entire lives in meaningless, futile arguments that will literally never change a single thing tend to want to just shut them down before they even start, because they're tired of your shit. At best, they're trying for a "Well then, we'll just agree to disagree" scenario where you avoid the sensitive topic and focus on the things you DO have in common, or at worst they've just dismissed you as being a terrible person because you are clearly "THE ENEMY", and thus have nothing of value to say.

In normal life, I go out of my way to avoid political discussions with friends for precisely this reason. Even on PotD, I tend to avoid most blatant political topics because they're about 98% stupidity and mostly shit-flinging.

Religion is the other major shitstorm topic that tends to go exactly the same way, for exactly the same reasons, which is why I very rarely discuss religion with anyone outside of very specific contexts.
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Zeus posted...

You mean from the days before peoples' belief systems consisted of parroted memes? >_>

I preferred it when people nodded like dogs at good old-fashioned cliches and platitudes about "family values" and "God-fearing nation".

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Firewerx posted...

I preferred it when people nodded like dogs at good old-fashioned cliches and platitudes about "family values" and "God-fearing nation".

>Brings up values and morals
>Belittles the concept of values and morals

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People that do that are just too immature to duel with pistols at dawn like adults

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Blightzkrieg posted...

The punchline there being that they themselves only actually care about certain groups while simultaneously advantaging a disingenuous strawman >_>

Otherwise it's a good example of parroting memes rather than having any substantial, independent thoughts or opinions.

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Person A: "I think that gay people shouldn't be lynched. Heck, I even think they should be able to go out and live normal lives in public without being leered at like a danger to society!"

Person B: "I disagree."

What can you even say to Person B? There's no good to come out of trying to reason with such people.

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Usually there ends up being a fundamental incompatibility of morals and values. There's no use arguing about that.

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Zeus posted...

disingenuous strawman

The absolute fucking irony, y'all!

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As far as this site goes, it's because the mods will warn you for having the wrong opinion.

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dedbus posted...

You ever heard of someone plugging their ears and go lalalala. That's that argument tactic but in adult form.

No, adults do that too.... especially on Twitter.

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