I describe what I see and think and feel.
It would be better for those too sensitive for the marketplace of contending ideas to remove themselves from it.
I do not make ad hominem attacks, or try not to. If I slip, I am ashamed.
If my description of my ideas and categories and standards discomfits someone by its implication to them, I don't consider that a bad thing.
I think those who think abortion is murder have a right to say so, and would think so even if I had had an abortion myself, and was, thus, being "called" by them a murderer. On the other hand, if they shouted at me "Murderer! Murderer!," or even said, calmly, "E, you are a vicious criminal and murderer, a fool, a creep, you baby-killer," I would consider that ad hominem, here.
I make that same distinction in other arguments. If someone "feels put down," it is an intrinsic part of the process of persuasion and argumentation, sometimes. At least if it's good argument. Maybe argument is something like what Woody Allen said about sex, when asked if he thought of sex as "dirty." "Only when it's good," he answered.
Maybe an argument makes some people feel "put down" if it's a good argument, a lively and heated and passionate one.
I realize I've talked about this already. I am officially asleep, too, it being almost 3 am, so forgive the fuzziness of this post.
This one was less fuzzy:
Message 11481087 |
