So this really is, as someone opined earlier, your attempt to redefine Board culture? Or institute a means to punish what you see as systemic transgressions?
Does it really require “blame”? Perhaps what you say is true, although that is something of which I’m not yet convinced. But surely other liberals will come to judge me a fool or worse even if they don’t specifically call me out. People will engage with me – or ignore me – as they do other posters who have made themselves the butt of jokes or disdain. I repeat, that *should *be enough.
Bricker and Mods, I’m not trying to draw you/him into a violation. I hope this is a legitimate discussion.
Not at all. You should strive to have a clear, productive conversation. A clarifying statement–“Just to be clear, do you agree with me that substantive differences between OH’s and VA’s laws mean that OH’s example can’t give us total confidence that similar events will occur in VA?”–will lead to such a conversation. A bragging, in-your-face statement–[paraphrased] “I bet you whatever you want that you won’t see that effect you mentioned awhile back, and if you don’t be me I’ll imply that you don’t even believe it yourself”–will not lead to such a conversation.
This thread is my cite.
I say this as someone who regularly calls out leftists for making bad arguments. I think it’s vital for that to happen, especially when they’re made putatively in support of a position I hold. I don’t think that calling them out in an ineffective fashion is effective.
The decision to bet or not is wholly separable from believing whether one’s statements hold up or not. I generally stand behind my claims until proven wrong (or try to, at any rate); but I would not ever enter into any bet regarding them. The information on their position you gain by the party being offered the bet declining is marginal at best, and unreliable at any rate.
I stand by my claim: if the idea is honestly to resolve matters in an unambiguous way, then that idea is as well served by a privately proposed bet as by an open one, while avoiding the accusations of ad hominem attack and possible thread hijacks. The noise generated by the open bet proposal by far outweighs any signal.
It doesn’t require blame. But it does (in my view) require an unambiguous admission of error, or more to the point an unambiguous admission of the accurate set of facts in play.
Again let me offer up the example of Sylvia Browne. Let’s imagine her posting here, saying that she had a vision of kidnapped California teen Hannah Anderson being held by a man and a woman, near tall buildings. Later, after the rescue, she points out the accuracy of her prediction: Hannah was taken by a man, just as she saw.
Which posters here would counsel that we should simply allow social opprobrium to take its course – that other posters will come to judge her a fool or worse, and we shouldn’t highlight the distinction between her first claim and the current one? That this should be enough, without embarrassing the poor woman?
You have the option of declaring your triumph in whatever terms you choose – that would also suffice for combating ignorance – you could even call out their failure to admit that they had been proven wrong. You are able to proclaim your rightness and point out their wrongness. All that can be done without the betting nonsense. Being proven wrong in front of the boards is enough, isn’t it? But you want some extra punishment of some kind.
It would be reasonable to confine wagers to a single forum to prevent hijacking. Personal beefs are settled in the Pit. so why not bets? A simple link to a wager offer could be made and the discussion could move on.
All this talk of gambling is kind of exciting. Hey Bricker, challenge me to a bet. I promise to take the liberal position (unless it’s about national security).
Because she’s commenting on your wagering, which is the subject of the thread and which you are defending. You were characterizing the views of other people. I am saying that it’s fine to discuss the idea of betting on statements or outcomes, but this isn’t GD and doesn’t need to be a liberals vs. conservatives issue beyond the fact that you feel this is a corrective to posts made by liberals.
Are you under the impression I arrive at their homes and physically force them to bet, somehow?
No one has to agree. But what I am trying to do in part is destroy the months or years it takes between the untenable claim and the resolution. Sure, when I win, I am able to proclaim my rightness and point out their wrongness. But as long as my rightness was in support of a conservative position, and their wrongness was in support of a liberal position, the general reaction a year later is:
[ul]
[li]“…it’s a bit unsettling that Bricker has been nursing this minor grudge for an entire year. I think the rest of us would have forgotten about it the day after it happened.” [/li][li]“Jesus, Bricker! Can’t a person be, you know…wrong, without you jumping their shit?”[/li][li]“Christ on a cracker–let it go. It’s been a year. You’re the only one who is bothered by this now. To seek a concession this far after the disagreement strikes me as a bit petty. You really need this “win”? Why?”[/li][li]“My god, you are a dick.”[/li][li]“It’s okay for someone to be wrong on the Internet. Obsessing over past fish that got away, posting about it (twice!) is beyond over the top.”[/li][li]“Bricker is certainly the single most impressive multiple-year-grudge-holding poster to an internet message board I’ve ever seen.”[/li][li]“Maybe, one day, you will realize why it is people on this message board hate you for being a nitpicking, must-be-right-at-all-costs tightass. It’s mainly because you are a nitpicking, must-be-right-at-all-costs tightass. Fuck, you should work for De Beers, because you probably shit diamonds.”[/li][/ul]
That list of complaints makes clear the feeling that for certain kinds of correctness, it’s more noble to be wrong.
For other kinds, though, the glee at seeing someone wrong is palpable.
Note that I don’t object to that second thread in the least. It’s absolutely appropriate and deserved.
I apologize for being dense, but I don’t understand this. She can call my wagering disgusting classist, because it’s the subject of the thread, but other posts (which are also related to the subject of the thread) cannot be called plaintive, because they’re about other people and not me?
So… the effect of this ruling would appear to be that shots taken at me or my practice of wagering are fine, but return shots taken by me are off-limits.
I feel like a bear in a cage now.
Does anyone else see this as a bit one-sided, or am I just acting the martyr for no solid reason?
As Acsenray said, you are free to crow all you want when you are demonstrably right, including up to the point of embarrassing your opponent. I have no problem with that. As for your example, perhaps Sylvia might be given some leeway for a single prediction, but I’m rather sure that opprobrium will ensue after her second or third stupidity.
What you are asking though, as you have outlined it above, is a system that “levels the playing field” of social condemnation by giving a poster – you – the power to demand a duel to the death, “an unambiguous admission of error”, simply because you feel an insufficient amount of condemnation accrues to “liberals”. We do outnumber you, and our ‘culture’ may indeed impinge upon conservative sensibilities, but that’s just how SDMB rolls. You cannot wish that away, nor can you be granted some superior power to call out and humble your adversaries. To do so will have a chilling effect that will diminish discussion of contentious issues.
OK, then let’s return to the subject of wagers. How about my earlier suggestion, about one bet offer per thread? Then the mods (if the bet post is reported) can add a Mod Note telling whoever to not mention the bet again, and all is well until the next thread.
The mods have already decided that one hijack per thread is not disruptive enough to trigger board discipline, even if the same poster does so repeatedly. Therefore one bet per thread ought not to be any more disruptive. And it isn’t any more insulting to suggest a bet than to say, for example, that Republicans want most poor people to starve to death and then to shoot the rest with machine guns.
So, if minor disruptions (like bets, and/or accusing your opponents of intending mass murder) are to be tolerated, then why not tolerate Bricker’s occasional bet offers?
Unless the idea is that offering a wager is more disruptive than accusations of mass murder, and that doesn’t really hold water.
I don’t regard it as unfair. Instead, I see the practice as forcing people to examine their claims, which they otherwise are quite willing to make knowing that there are no consequences for being wrong. Steve MB argued that Virginia should not adopt the same-sex marriage amendment because it would injure the ability of domestic violence victims to get help. He didn’t care that the claim was utterly without reasonable or factual support. Challenging him to a bet did not unfairly tilt the debate in my favor – it forced him to confront a consequence for advancing an untenable claim.
But I haven’t asked for, nor have I been granted, any “superior power,” have I?
Unless you believe that following conservative principles of reasoning more often leads me to a factually correct conclusion, in which case – yeah, you got me.
No, what I have is the same power any poster has – the power to discuss things. And those things can include wagers. If you don’t wish to engage that discussion, you don’t have to.
But from here, it looks like, in addition to the awesome advantage gained by your outnumbering me, you’d like to stomp on a very effective means of adding a consequence to an untenable opinion.
That’s not a chilling effect – separating the untenable from the tenable is exactly what GD and GQ are for.
IMHO, now – there’s a forum for you! You can say what you please, and if asked to defend it, can simply respond, “Hey, it’s my opinion!”
Is my practice of offering to bet someone that what they say is correct more disruptive than a claim that Republicans want most poor people to starve to death and then to shoot the rest with machine guns? If it is, why?
It doesn’t, really. You can define the outcome of a refused wager as lack of confidence, if you choose, but that’s affirming the consequent as I described earlier.
“If you really believed your claim, you’d dance the hokey-pokey …[later]… Since you didn’t dance the hokey-pokey, you obviously don’t believe your claim.”
You can use arguments to force people to examine their claims, just like anybody else. Of course, that won’t necessarily have the same effect, and even if people do change their minds, you won’t get any badge of honor (other than perhaps persuading other people participating in the discussion); but the thing is, what you can’t do is implicitly questioning their honesty by forcing them into an inherently inferior position. The inference ‘does not want to put his money where his mouth is’ -> ‘does not truly believe his opinion’ is simply fallacious, but putting this out in the open like that invites other people to draw it. It’s an attack on the person, not on the opinion, or arguments offered.
Again, I’m not opposed to bets—I think they’re a bit silly and childish, but to each their own—, but I don’t see what is served by their open proposal that could not be served just as well by offering them privately.