> It is usually more honest to say 'I don't want you to convince me or the audiance otherwise'

i’m not trying to be mean but this is just wild. i’ve walked away from “debates” with people many times, not because i “don’t want to be convinced” it’s because too often i just genuinely don’t care what the person thinks about $ISSUE.

i mean, most of us went to university and many of us took those classes, many of us have been online for long enough to have seen every argument and every sophist angle countless times. i learned quick enough that many of these issues have no ‘correct’ answer, they’re personal beliefs with deep foundations.

we also learned early on that debates are silly unless there are actual subject experts (like recognized-by-their-peers-experts), strict moderators, and rules in place. randoms “debating” incredibly complex nuanced topics without actual experts is just… i mean…

…without those things it’s just rhetoric and sophistry. for the debateBros it’s about “winning” rather than coming closer to a truth. other than a few loud debateBros most people discovered these things in like sophomore year.

even more important, and this is just a personal opinion, but i find debateBros super weird and not in the good way. far too often their antisocialness just kills conversations. if someone is a grown adult and can’t tell the difference between a conversation and a debate they almost universally just end up making the entire atmosphere awkward. i learned pretty quickly when out with friends to spot randoms shifting into "debate mode" and we drag the conversation in a totally different direction to stave it off.

unless i know someone irl and enjoy them on a personal level theres almost unlimited things id rather do than spend my time "debating" with them. it boggles my mind how they just repeatedly fail to understand that adversarial debate is not at all normal conversation.

while i absolutely do enjoy passionate discussions of politics with a few family members (cousins, aunts, etc…) and a few friends, but with randoms? almost never. randoms "debating" outside of actual experts? nah, not a chance.

and it’s super important to understand that most of the current divisive topics don’t have “one” correct answer. often they don’t even have a correct answer at all, but rather many valid ways to approach and from multiple foundational beliefs.