How do you actually engage and assess views that oppose your own?

[Zashaiba]

Suppose you believe one thing, but you suspect that the other side has some fair points too. Where do you go for discussion to evaluate whether you are making sense? Who are you supposed to speak to? I don’t recall a time before the internet so most of the “debates” I’ve been in have been with internet users who have very strong opinions and won’t concede anything, and I’m guilty of it too. Threads get split so people have their own echo chambers and I admit I usually stay in one and don’t breach containment.

Surely this isn’t the healthiest way to form a world view. An example would be troons. Were they not influenced by internet chat rooms and heavily invested in them to the point of exclusion from other, arguably saner opinions, they won’t have gone for self-mutilation. So how would one know, or glean from good discussion, whether their ideas are sane or not? Should one take things offline and speak to people face-to-face to avoid the shit-flinging flame wars? I would like to ask older users especially, who lived before widespread internet access, how people used to talk. Not idealising the past; it just seemed to be more sane.

 

[Seymour Duncan]

Dig a trench to cower in, screech and fling shit until the other party gives up.

Seriously though, gamified social media has been an unmitigated disaster for speech in general. Talking things out in real life does still help as you're actually talking to a human being with thoughts and feelings instead of blindly blasting away at an abstract icky idea to gain brownie points from Your Camp which is always the correct one, but it's becoming more difficult as well because some retards are intentionally bringing online vitriol into the real life as well by conditioning themselves that the opposite side isn't actually human beings, but instead concentrated Hitler, Stalin, Antichrist and/or some other form of literal evil pressed into a humanoid shape to project evil unto the world.

 

[slavamonolitu]

Cognitive empathy?

Fundamentally, such a question doesn't really matter because online debates are irrelevant and lead to nothing but shitflinging and screeching as Seymour above said. Under the assumption that you are acting in good faith with some moron on the internet, its basically just a matter of being able to play devil's advocate against yourself, and then arguing with that, which works best on my end. The other person is just a vessel for the thought to begin on it's own, not necessarily to be treated as anything other than a prompt.

It just depends, as well, on the intelligence of the opposing side. Read more.

 

[The Last Stand]

I would try to ask questions to understand and refute my points. The reality is that I have no earthly idea how to talk to people.

 

[BrodyDaMan]

I find the most well liked youtuber through the twitter sphere of the people whose ideas I want to consider, and then watch the edited videos where they explain the idea seriously. If that doesn't exist, I read any book recommended heavily. Videos or substack essays are preferred though, since most political people recommending books don't really read those and it turns out the book isn't really related to the view I was trying to understand.

 

[Spud]

I don't. My view is always the right one and quantum mechanics proves it.

 

[TheLostMarxBrotherFucko]

With myself, in my head mostly or nowadays my wife. I have grown as a person, so I just conjure up my past self and abstractly shit on him. I went from "Systemic racism" to "Ok Ok let us not free them."

 

[We Are The Witches]

The first thing to assess is if the purpose of the conversation is worth pursuing in the first place. So for example, you may want to have a conversation with someone because you're open to changing your ideas and want new information, or you want to see opposing views and explore them so that you can refute them better later on, maybe it's just to try to make a fool out of someone, or maybe it's to change their ideas (likely you won't).

However it may not be worth pursuing if the other person is extremely close-minded, or is being a retard, if it's devolving into a slap fight, if the other person literally does not understand what you're saying, etc.

It depends on a case by case basis, but "generally" on the Internet it's a waste of time (specially if on Twitter or Reddit from my experience, Twitter is not even designed to have deep conversations anyways).

Maybe the best place you can go to challenge your and others ideas is something like a public Discord server that is centered around philosophy for example. I've been in a couple, slap fights were discouraged by the rules, there was coverage of a lot of topics (including transgenderism since you mention that), and regulars there at least tried to make proper arguments instead of stuff you see on Xitter.

You're still going to get people ultra-sensitive when in regards to "gender/trans" topics, and unreasonable pedantic assholes that think too high of themselves because they have a degree in philosophy.

---

I'd say in general approach topics with skepticism and be honest with yourself. That means that you should identify if you have bias towards some conclusion and why, and if truth matters less than what you want it to be.

But everything can be questioned and things don't have to be black or white, so get acquainted with logical reasoning and fallacies, so that your questioning can have solid grounds.

 

[Kujo Jotaro]

A loooooooooooooot of seething, with some mild coping on the side.

 

[The Gene Genie]

I don’t. The people who disagree with me are wrong on a physical and spiritual level and should not be allowed to speak.

 

[Agamemnon Busmalis]

There's always the possibility I don't know all the facts and may very well be wrong about whatever it is. Sometimes I am.

 

[Brenda Holiday]

I find the most well liked youtuber through the twitter sphere of the people whose ideas I want to consider, and then watch the edited videos where they explain the idea seriously.

This

With myself, in my head mostly

Absolutely this
I already enjoy watching or reading opinions that disagree with mine more than hearing people confirm my beliefs. If you truly believe in your opinions you don't fear hearing opposing thoughts. Its win win no matter what. Echo chambers are the absolute worst. If someone has made an unconvincing argument then my own beliefs just got stronger, and now I understand a little more the other side.
I don't really waste my time actually arguing with people. Not anymore.
If you are prudent then bouncing thoughts around in your head and thinking "why is this" "what about this" is excellent.

 

[glow]

You can only really truly have a disagreement with someone in real life, or via a phone call or video call or some other way they can get extra information on your emotional state, so they can see you genuinely want to understand their point of view. Text just doesn't have enough data and people assume you're being a shitlord. Also, I think a lot of people skim-read half of what is written to see if they agree with it, and they often selectively quote something they spotted which confirms their bias that you are indeed a wrongthinking word ending in ist.

One of the last times I interacted with social media I got hundreds of downvotes for explaining actual objective technical reasons why my company chose a specific piece of database software the thread was hating on. There's just no point in engaging with a community of people who will do something like that, they aren't worth your time.

 

[GunCar Gary]

it’s easy

step 1: listen carefully to their opinion

step 2: laugh at them for how wrong it is

don’t be ignorant. put hard work and research into your prejudices to make your opinion even more correct with every conversation

 

[Farsided]

It's always a good idea to spot flaws in your logic by poking holes in your own belief system.
If you do talk to other people, just disengage when the talk devolves into a semi prepared speech with talking points. And it won't do you any good to try to engage with people online, especially the most vocal, zealots only become more steadfast when faced with opposition. You'll just waste your time.

I found that writing stories in another POV can helps ease into someone else's shoes.

don’t be ignorant. put hard work and research into your prejudices to make your opinion even more correct with every conversation

Being so esoterically racist you wind up offending no one as they haven't got a clue.

 

[Whoopsie Daisy]

On the surface, Smile and nod. I find my views are so retarded/autist/super-genius that no-one I've ever met has agreed with them. I piss off the right and left in equal measure because I believe it's all bullshit.
I've learned to just smile and nod, feign ignorance and let the other side explain their NPC points of view, then go about my day.


Deep down inside my own mind, I find listening to people's opinions is the mental equivalent of picking lint off of a shirt I'm wearing. It's nothing and I don't care. I don't care what they have to say, so what they say is meaningless. If I'm pushed to giving my stance, it's always "I don't care" followed by autistic screeching.
I don't care about ukraine, palestine, israel, russia, trump, labour, taylor swift, strictly come dancing...I don't care.

The farms is different because none of this is real and none of my thoughts on here are by extension real. so it doesn't nigger matter faggot what cunt I say. Hitler was right about juice.

 

[FATTESTCUNT 2.0]

I would like to ask older users especially, who lived before widespread internet access, how people used to talk. Not idealising the past; it just seemed to be more sane.

Once I was out of education I don't recall having any deep discussions/debates about things like politics or religion before the internet became a thing. I think that made it feel like people were more sane in general, when that almost certainly wasn't the case.

I think most internet debates are pointless because people are often more concerned about their ego getting bruised than they are about a debate being a learning opportunity.

Regarding your example with troons, echo chambers are a huge problem IMO, but obviously that can affect anyone. When everyone you're spending your time talking to is saying X is right and Y is wrong, it can be easy to just start believing that regardless of the merit of those arguments, especially if you will get excluded from the community for disagreement, which is one of the worst parts of echo chambers.

A lot of people don't really understand basic logic and reason, never mind critical thinking. What are the key arguments against a position you hold? What merit is there to them? What are the counter-points? Do you examine your own potential biases? Arrogance and ignorance often go hand in hand and people can be convinced that they are right about a subject that they actually know very little about, and they hold a position they can't robustly defend.

 

[Not Really Here]

Surely this isn’t the healthiest way to form a world view. An example would be troons. Were they not influenced by internet chat rooms and heavily invested in them to the point of exclusion from other, arguably saner opinions, they won’t have gone for self-mutilation. So how would one know, or glean from good discussion, whether their ideas are sane or not? Should one take things offline and speak to people face-to-face to avoid the shit-flinging flame wars? I would like to ask older users especially, who lived before widespread internet access, how people used to talk. Not idealising the past; it just seemed to be more sane.

I was pissed off that they interrupted X-Men the animated series, to broadcast hearings where a black woman tried to prevent Clarence Thomas from being a Supreme Court justice.

We didn't have conversations with these people, we attempted to get away from them as quickly as possible. But that was a time when people understood the government couldn't protect them from crazies. It was also a time when you had to go through a years long process to start medical transition, because it was recognized there would be no going back from voluntary sterilization, and we had just ended mandatory eugenics laws in the US.

You can't really reason with a person who thinks god is literally telling them to kill someone, you medicate them, and keep them away from unarmed individuals. Mental illness that contradicts reality is extremely dangerous, avoid it as much as possible.

 

[Meriasek]

I try to understand where they're coming from, understanding their arguments from their sources, identifying biases in theirs and mine.

 

[Penis Drager 2.0]

Step 1. Don't be a fag and pretend you're "unbiased." You're not.
Understand and accept your biases. When doing independent research, do so convinced you are right. Read into why you're right so you have a thorough understanding of all the reasons you are right. Then start branching out and looking into the other side. If an argument comes up that you can't instantly refute despite your research, look up specifically that argument and common rebuttals against it. If your side stops making sense, then maybe adjust your biases. Over time your biases will shift closer to reality

You can't rationally "choose" to be convinced of anything. Either you're exposed to convincing information or you're not.