[Kätzchen]

Chapter 1 - "Fighting for Our Lives"

"the argument culture urges us to approach the world - and the people in it- in an adversarial from of mind. It rests on the assumption that opposition is the best way to get anything done..." (p. 3)


"we hoped to do our part to ameliorate the conflict by focusing on commonalities (in response to a flawed PR campaign) [...] The promise of controversy seems an easy and natural way to rouse interest. But serious consequences are often intended: Stirring up animosities to get a rise out of people, though easy and "provocative," can open old wounds or create new ones that are hard to heal. This is one of many dangers inherent in the argument culture..." (p. 7)

"our determination to pursue truth by setting up a fight between two sides leads us to believe that every issues has two sides - no more, no less: If both sides are given a forum to confront each other, all the relevant information will emerge, and the best case will be made for each side. BUT, opposition does not lead to truth when an issue is not composed of two opposing sides but is a crystal of many sides. Often the truth is in the complex middle, not the over-simplified extremes..." (p. 10)

"What does it matter that our public discourse is filled with military metaphors? Aren't they just words? Why not talk about something that matters - like actions? Because words matter. When we think we are using language, language is using us. As linguist Dwight Bolinger put it (employing a military metaphor), language is like a loaded gun: It can be fired intentionally, but it can wound or kill just as surely when fired accidentally. The terms in which we talk about something shape the way we think about it - and even what we see..." (p. 14)

"it's as if we value a fight for its own sake, not for its effectiveness in resolving disputes. This ethic shows up in many contexts. In a review of a contentious book, for example, a reviewer wrote, "Always provocative, sometimes infuriating, this collection reminds us that the purpose of art s not to confirm and coddle but to provoke and confront." This false dichotomy encapsulates the belief that if you are not provoking and confronting, then you are confirming and coddling - as if there weren't a myriad of other ways to question and learn. What about exploring, exposing, delving, analyzing, understanding, moving, connecting, integrating, illuminating... or any of innumerable verbs that capture other aspects of what art can do?" (p. 23-24)

and finally:

"Philospher JOhn Dewey said, on his ninetieth birthday, "Democracy begins in conversation." In conversation we form the interpersonal ties that bind individuals into a community. In conversation we exchange the many types of information that citizens in a democracy need in order to decide how to vote [...] Of course, it is the responsibility of intellectuals to explore potential weaknesses in others' arguments, and of journalists to represent serious opposition when it exists. BUT, when opposition becomes the overwhelming avenue of inquiry - a formula that requires another side to be found or a criticism to be voiced; when the lust for opposition privileges extreme views and obscures complexity; when our eagerness to find weaknesses blinds us to strengths; when the atmosphere of animosity precludes respect and poisons our relations with one another; then the argument culture is doing more damage than good" (p. 25)


Reference:

Tannen, Deborah. (1998).Fighting for Our Lives. In, The Argument Culture (pp. 3-26). New York, NY: Ballantine Books Publishers.