Accusations of JAQing off...wrong or not?

About This Message Board
21

Well, no, because you’re missing my point.

The goal in pointing out bad faith is not necessarily to make the thread go back on track. As you say, the thread may be unsalvageable. If the thread was bad faith from the OP, it probably is. But that doesn’t mean that the acknowledgement does nothing. Threads don’t exist in isolation.

The point in pointing out bad faith is is to discourage such discussions, not necessarily to salvage the original While it’s great if the thread goes back on track (if it ever had a track to begin with), it need not do so, and likely won’t unless the person arguing disingenuously actually has a real argument.

And I do have experience with success with the way I deal with such arguments. Sure, sometimes I just get ignored. But I’ve also seen the people I allege arguing poorly stop arguing in a disingenuous manner. And I’ve seen them stop arguing altogether. I’ve seen people who were arguing in good faith with them stop wasting their time, realizing it’s pointless. Sure, the threads often continue with a few posters bickering back and forth, but the thread ends.

I have specifically noticed certain disingenuous arguments decrease. No more “people have different opinions” arguments without actually defending the opposite opinion. I see fewer attempts to let sarcasm be a substitute for an argument. And I see fewer instances of people just telling me to shut up or imply that I’m stupid (when they can’t say it directly) instead of actually arguing that I’m wrong.

I do know that nothing is accomplished by simply ignoring that an argument is disingenuous and arguing it anyways. All that does is allow them to control the narrative, and encourage more such arguments. And I know the mods are hesitant to call out any but the most egregious examples.

Hence my advice to use statements that don’t directly accuse them of bad faith arguing, but point out how their arguments are bad. When I say “sarcasm isn’t a substitute for an argument,” I am technically only saying “your argument is bad. Why not try arguing instead of mocking.” Or, more relevant to this situation, when I say “You seem to be asking a lot of questions. What is your view on this?” Or “You claimed to be neutral when you started, but now it seems you clearly have a side in this. Why not state it directly so we can have a proper debate?”

I do genuinely think these things help. If they don’t fix the thread, they at least show that we notice when people are trying to avoid direct argument, and thus encourage them to not continue doing so.

22

I am not persuaded by your point. Sometimes folks mistake that for not understanding their point.

You have a lot more faith in your ability to persuade people of your correctness than I do, and a lot more faith that telling people they’re engaging in masturbatory argument will make them shape up.

23

The accusation if that you were employing the “just asking questions” tactic. That has nothing to do with racism or political ideology.

24

Is a reasonable question still a reasonable question if it’s asked in bad faith?

I’m inclined to think that if a question is worth answering, it’s worth answering. If the same question could have been asked in all sincerity, by someone who was genuinely trying to understand, even if they were coming from a place of naivety or ignorance or misinformation, or by a person who was JAQing, my instinct and preference is to give the question the benefit of the doubt and try to answer it. Even if the asker wasn’t really looking for enlightenment, other people reading the thread might be.

The thread that prompted this one was about an incident that I had heard of but hadn’t read up on all the details; and it’s the kind of thing where I’m never sure if I’ve gotten the whole, unbiased story from the places I’d heard about it. I could have done my own research, but I do think the Dope, collectively, is a good source of information and analysis, and I did genuinely appreciate and learn from some of the contributions to that thread.

25

If UltraVires had just wanted to have a discussion about laws for citizen arrests and use of force and self-defense, he shouldn’t have used the names of real people and accused them of breaking laws.

26

I made that very point in the thread in question, but the OP and everyone else ignored it, so insert that shruggie emoji

27

I’m going to go even further and argue that JAQ-ing, even in bad faith, is a legit tactic and ought to be permitted. Perhaps not good for fostering good-spirited or good-willed debate, but it is perfectly legit, if indeed there is a legit question to be asked.

Someone who comes here and asks why the Twin Towers collapsed more quickly on 9/11 than he thought such buildings ought to, or whether something is off with Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit while he was on the Moon, is most likely pushing a conspiracy theory, but the question is still worth debunking for debunking’s sake. Accusing people of JAQ-ing is an attempt to squelch them.

28

Some forms of JAQing off really annoy me. What is productive about asking a question that has been answered a few(or many) times before…oft times by the same poster?

29

Seems like multiple posters in this thread are not using the accepted definition of JAQing off.

The JAQass brings up arguments to support a non-evidence based/offensive proposition using the false front of being intellectually curious. The JAQass thus hopes to avoid being personally criticized, having to marshal arguments in support of the proposition and in some instances to troll without it being too obvious. It’s essentially a debate-poisoning tactic which becomes increasingly recognizable the more often a poster uses it.

Looking at the OP in question, it seems to me that SOAT jumped the gun on JAQusation.

*I may start using the shorthand “JAQuse!” But probably not here. :slight_smile:

30

Then you personally are making a judgment that he’s trolling. You can decide to do whatever you do when you decide someone is trolling. There are a number of remedies including reporting it, ignoring it, putting the person on ignore, Pitting the person, etc.

This idea that a certain poster has a long history of doing a particular tactic can be a bit of a popularity contest, particularly for those with outsider views. There are a number of people on this board who I consider to have sleazy debate tactics, but they have good reputations here and most people wouldn’t consider them to have a long history of poor tactics because their ideas are mostly mainstream and they’re polite to the right people.

I disagree. All OPs have a point of view. An OP can’t stifle reasonable discussion before reasonable discussion is attempted.

31

In my view, the important part of Just Asking Questions is the “Just” part.

Someone who is JAQing is not putting out their own position, they are not answering questions asked of them, and they are not actually interested in the answers to the irrelevant questions that they ask.

The point is to derail and distract. To not take a position to defend, but to only prevent others from progressing with a discussion.

I was recently accused of JAQing in the thread about homeschooling. This was in a thread that I had participated, made my opinions and positions known, and answered any questions directed at me. The question was relevant, in that it was asking for the opinion of someone with firsthand experience with the subject on a subject of central importance of the thread. Rather than answer, I was accused of JAQing off, which really poisoned the discussion, as being told that one is not debating in good faith, and is in fact just trolling, does not comport with continuing a pleasant conversation. IMHO, the accusation of JAQing is itself an attempt to derail and distract. It is, at the very least, a way of dodging the question while also trying to put the other poster down.

As far as the OP in question, I have my reasons to believe that it was not necessarily posted in entirely in good faith effort to have a debate, that it was intended as a means of creating doubt about the story that we have been talking about, but it was still not JAQing. Ultravires did put forth a proposition and came back to answer questions and defend it. He also clarified that he was talking hypothetically, and was interested in the rights of those involved, accuser and the accused. The question in the OP, “What exactly happened here?” was vague and problematic, and would have been much better couched in hypothetical, as well as a clear reason for the OP.

The first two lines (and quote) of the OP are fine, they are setting up scenario. If he had continued on with “Let’s say, hypothetically, the two men had just witnessed him commit a felony, then what rights would they have, what rights would the accused have?” that sets up a very interesting question, one that I’d actually love to know the answer to myself. Instead, the last two lines were questions that asks the respondent to come up with defenses for the individuals in question.

So, very poorly worded, and possibly not posted with clear intentions, but still not JAQing.

IMHO, going forward, I would side with the idea that accusations of JAQing are exactly the same as accusations of trolling. I spent a bit of time away from the board, but it seems as though accusations of sealioning ended up being considered the same, didn’t they? If that is the case, then it seems a natural extension.
For an example of what I would consider to be JAQing off, consider this.

https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22308199&postcount=192

32

There’s usually an inherent bias involved when someone accuses someone else of JAQing off. The bias is that “My view is the established and correct view, and if you ask a question that doesn’t align with that view, it must be done with bad motives.”

33

Which ties into the basic part of the GD ruleset of ‘Someone disagreeing with you does not necessarily indicate they are trolling’ or words to that effect.

We have many, many posters - on ALL sides of the political spectrum (there’s more than two!) - who clearly don’t agree with that rule and report disagreement as trolling pretty frequently.

Still, I’d rather they report such rather than make the accusation in the thread. There’s a decent argument that accusations of trolling or JAQ ends the usefulness of the thread right there. I’d prefer that not to occur.

34

That is my view as well. I don’t think it’s up to posters to try to get a thread back on track by criticizing other posters. It’s junior modding, and in my experience, it just details the thread even more.

Especially in GD, it’s the role of moderators to moderate the debate, not posters. Accusations of jAQ are just the same as accusations of trolling. It’s attacking the poster, not the post.

35

I’ve heard one plausible explanation of the killing: “Ahmaud Arbery was murdered by racists, because racism.” You seem to be promoting an alternative explanation, namely, “This was a justified attempt to make a citizens arrest, that went wrong due to the actions of Ahmaud Arbery himself.” But, you didn’t offer any reason why you would believe this, instead phrasing it as a question.

I’m not saying you “know what happened”, but I do think it appears that you (for whatever reason) are rejecting the explanation of “this was a race-motivated murder” without putting your cards on the table and explaining why you believe otherwise.

If your intent was just to get more factual details about the case, why was your question so focused on the “citizens arrest” theory? If your intent was to learn more about the legal requirements for a valid citizens arrest in Georgia, why didn’t you post a question about that in GQ, without making it about this specific case?

36

Those two explanations are not mutually exclusive.
In other words, they thought they were justified in pursuing him and making a citizen’s arrest, and racism affected their perception of the situation and contributed to their decision making.

Also, your statements are flawed. Sure, you said they were justified, which isn’t established, but your first statement is equally flawed. I have yet to see evidence these guys thought “Hey, there’s a black man in our neighborhood. Let’s go kill him.”

None of which seems to contribute to whether accusing someone of JAQing off contributes to our derails a discussion.

I think there are other ways of calling out a poster’s motivations and well poisoning. For instance, your last paragraph in your post above.

37

That does not mean they *were *justified, and the two explanations remain mutually exclusive.

38

I think the idea is to avoid “vigilante moderating” because it is easy to see how that could snowball and get out of hand. Ironically, the Arbury injustice/tragedy itself was a product of vigilante behavior. It usually doesn’t end well regardless of the venue.

If we want to make the effort, we can send someone down in flames with debate much more effectively than an accusation or insult ever could. When I think back on the warnings/punishment I received, they were well-deserved because this place is set up in a way where one can say pretty much anything if done in the right way and by using the system properly.