You know, I did. Sorry, but for some reason I just did not see that post.
Honestly, though, I read it 3 times and I’m not certain I understand it. In particular, can you address the difference between “you made that up” and “you are trying to create a false narrative”? I don’t believe you addressed that at all in your earlier post. And, how can “you are trying” not satisfy the element of intent (one of the two elements you say is not satisfied)?
Note that tom’s moderation was pretty clear that when “you made that up” is directed at a specific statement, it will be moderated. In this case, the specific statement would clearly be that “Trump had wide, popular support”.
The 2nd element, intent to deceive, must have both intent and deception. Trying may convey intent, but a false narrative isn’t necessarily for the purpose of deception. I see the example in the OP synonymous with saying that the narrative being advanced is inaccurate. Not as an accusation of intent to deceive because it relies on the subjective judgment of both participants. Not an accusation of knowingly saying something untrue because reasonable people can disagree.
If Sophie Turner says the reason she’s gotten a certain acting role is because she has a greater social media following than other people who tried out for the role, and the casting director tells her, you’re trying to create a false narrative about the hiring process, the casting director isn’t saying that Ms. Turner is lying necessarily. The casting director could be saying that the interpretation that Ms. Turner is putting forward is not correct, or not accurate.
This isn’t to say that this phrasing couldn’t be employed in a way that would be equivalent to accusing someone of lying. I can probably come up with examples, but I’ll pass on doing so right now.
I agree that the claim of “trying to create a false narrative” can be read in two ways, one of which is permissible and one isn’t.
If you read the sentence as, effectively, “trying to create a narrative and that narrative happens to be false,” then I agree it isn’t a rules violation.
But, ISTM, the clearly more accurate reading in this context is “you are trying to create a narrative that you know to be false because the true narrative contradicts your position.” In that reading, I think it’s indistinguishable from an accusation of lying.
The question is just how “clear” that second interpretation is. I think it’s helpful to think about it in terms of applying two basic principles that are valued here – the principle of charitable interpretation, and the principle of attacking the argument not the poster. So as long as a comment has a plausible benign interpretation, trying to second-guess intent or focusing on minutiae like the phrase “you are trying” is unproductive.
This is why I keep getting back to the point that in my humble but very strong opinion the real purpose of the rule against lying is to avoid personal character attacks, not to provide moderators with ways of creatively re-interpreting arguments as possibly maybe being “an accusation of lying” even when no such accusation was intended. And I’m not sure that I agree with John that Tom’s statement was clear in saying that "when ‘you made that up’ is directed at a specific statement, it will be moderated. It might be directed at a specific statement and still not even remotely be an accusation of lying. Here is the exchange from my earlier link that still irks me:
Poster: “Kantian ethics permits retroactive abortion up to age 13.”
Me: “I want to see a credible cite for that.”
Poster: “No cites, just an argument.”
Me: “So, as I suspected, you just made it up.”
Poster: "I made it up but I think it follows from what Kant said. "
Moderator: “it is entirely against the rules to accuse another poster of lying. This includes telling someone ‘you made that up’.”
At no point was any accusation of “lying” being made. The claim was that the poster had been stating as fact something that was merely his own interpretation, and though he may sincerely believe it to be true, others may hold different interpretations of the same evidence. I think much the same applies to the case in the OP.
Again, I disagree with this. I feel there is an important distinction between accusing somebody of lying and accusing somebody of intentionally choosing to ignore facts that undermine his position.
You have left untouched the comment I made about why what you put in post #14 could be considered an accusation of deliberately telling a falsehood. And I asked you a specific question (admittedly partially rhetorical), which you have also failed to answer. Neither of these does your position any good here. Please note that my first post in this thread was a statement tending to exonerate you of culpability, so it’s not like I have some personal grievance about this.
You don’t address the portion of his statement where he says I was “trying” to create a false narrative. To try means to intend to create a false narrative. That means that he views that I was intending to put forth a falsehood, in the form of a “narrative” that includes what I want and excludes what I don’t want.
Example:
I ran a red light. In my defense I say, “The light was not red when I entered the intersection.” Falsehood. If delivered intentionally (I know that the light was, indeed, red when I entered the intersection), then it is a lie.
I ran a red light. in my defense I say, “The light was green when I looked at it down the road approaching it. I then saw it turn yellow. I looked to the sides to determine what traffic might be approaching the intersection at 90 degrees to me. As I passed through the intersection, the lights for the traffic to my right were still red. Therefore, the light was not red when I entered the intersection.” But I am ignoring the fact that there must have been a delay built in, because in fact, the light turned red before I entered the intersection. This, then, is a false narrative, because it excludes an important piece of evidence. If I exclude it because I intentionally choose to do so (I did, indeed, see the light turn red, say), then I am intentionally creating a falsehood. There is very little to distinguish this from the meaning of the word “lie”.
And, yes, that’s the sort of distinction I used to make a living on.
Maybe so, but in the same spirit one could say that there is very little to distinguish such an apparent attack on the speaker or poster from an attack on the argument itself, and yet such a distinction is one of the most basic criteria for how this board is run.
How to resolve this? This gets back to my earlier comments, namely whether the alleged accusation of lying rises to the level of a personal attack with little other interpretation possible. There is a world of difference between statements like “your argument is deceptive” or “your argument presents the facts unfairly” and “you are a lying cretin and so is your mother”. A bit of hyperbole, there, I know, but ISTM that it’s shaded variants of the latter that we’re really trying to avoid, rather than deep linguistic analysis of whether or not something truly implies “lying” in some interpretation of underlying meaning, which as in my example in the previous post can lead to really unfair moderation judgments.
I think the sticking point may be the word “false”. In conversational usage, depending on what is being described, falsity can be a matter of fact, or it can be a matter of interpretation. It’s like another way of saying, “you’re wrong, the way you’re interpreting the information is wrong, the relative value you put on different pieces of information is wrong, and the conclusions you’re drawing are wrong”.
This is pretty much how I’m interpreting it. I grant reasonable people can disagree.
Of course, in this case the poster was lumping the other poster in with all the “people trying to create a false narrative”. Seems odd to assume that all of those people are trying to create this false narrative with no intent to deceive. But whatever. And I guess we will not be addressing the comparison to “you made that up” after all.
I’m not really interested in re-adjudicating a 2 year old decision made based on the context at the time. If the question is, is “you made that up” equivalent to “you made that up knowing it was false with the intent to deceive”, then I would say that it depends on context.
I want to clarify an issue that was raised in this thread. The original post in this thread states that I accused another poster of creating a false narrative. That is not what I wrote. I wrote that some people are trying to create a false narrative. I did not say that you were trying to create a false narrative or Starving Artist was trying to create a false narrative or John Mace was trying to create a false narrative.
I said the maps you linked to were an example of people trying to create a false narrative. But I’m assuming you did not make those maps.
You’re saying I left untouched the comment you made and failed to answer the question you asked. But I did respond and posted my answer in Post #17 (which you then quoted in your post). It may not have been the answer you wanted from me but it is my answer.
I’m in an awkward position here. If I point out inaccuracies like this in other people’s posts will I be accusing of calling those people liars? It’s tough to discuss an issue with people when you’re not allowed to suggest that anything they say might be incorrect.
The maps are just data. They don’t “create” any narrative. They are created for every election. To say that the people who made those maps are somehow trying to creating some sort of a partisan narrative is nonsense.
A bit of hyperbole, there, I know, but ISTM that it’s shaded variants of the latter that we’re really trying to avoid, rather than deep linguistic analysis of whether or not something truly implies “lying” in some interpretation of underlying meaning, which as in my example in the previous post can lead to really unfair moderation judgments.