Lying for rhetorical purposes?

[Sevastopol]

Let’s imagine bricker meant to make a rhetorical point in Great Debates and stated:

Bush didn’t lie. Period

The point he is making is that using the standard of proof he would have us believe he critiques, this assertion can be made with as much force as the contrary position.

Follow me so far, cos the last sentences was a little complex?

bricker wouldn’t be asserting the truth of the statement on the face of it. Rather he’d be attempting to make a rhetorical point about the qualities of reasonable argument and assertion.

Now I think that is a legitimate rhetorical technique. Contrariwise numerous people are Irony-blind and would miss it. For sure.

Furthermore it is, on the face of it, against the rules. things you should know are not true… or somesuch.

Further, at the other extreme the notorious December was ultimately banned for just such a stunt, IIRC. Rightly so, in my view.

So where does the board stand on this? Is there some permutation of the ‘jerk’ rule at work, or something a little more hard and fast? My personal preference is for outright disallowal. An all or nothing approach.

My motives are entirely innocent and do not amount to any sort of admission.

[Squink]

@Sevastopol

Furthermore it is, on the face of it, against the rules. things you should know are not true… or somesuch.

The current phrasing is:

You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use the SDMB to post any material that you know or should know is false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, threatening, invasive of a person’s privacy, or violative of U.S. law. You agree not to post material that in our opinion fosters or promotes activity that is illegal in the U.S.

While this is incrfedibly broad, and could be used to ban your hypothetical bricker, I think the new verbiage needs to be looked at as a deliniation of the already broad proscription against being a jerk. As far as I can tell, the powers that be have always used discretion in applying the jerk rule, and will likely contimue to do so now that it’s a little better defined. Of course, this bit also appears in the registration agreement: “Do not pester us for hypothetical examples of what does or does not constitute a violation”, so I look forward to seeing the word BANNED appear under your username, Sevastopol.