Humans are rationalizing creatures, much more than rational ones. Our first gut reaction is trying to make sense of why we think what we think and why we behave how we behave, rather than trying to figure out if it does actually make sense. If this natural tendency could be changed, the world would be far less of a shithole.
We’re also to some extent innately combative creatures. People will say “Oh, I showed people the facts and they still didn’t change their mind. They’re just idiots stuck in their ways.” Okay, cool. When you tried to present these facts, did you do it in such a way as to treat them courteously or as an equal, or did you do it in such a way that you got to feel like you were dunking on them rhetorically? Because it’s not as simple as presenting someone with facts. It’s doing so in a way that doesn’t make it feel like you’re trying to establish some kind of superiority over them. Because then they’re not presenting facts to you, they’re just attacking you and your position. And these are very different things, conceptually and emotionally.
This is why, rather than slapping people in the face with a mountain of research, I try to ask them questions that lead them to the conclusion I want them to reach. Oh we discuss along the way, but you get a lot less of the black and white thinking bold statements that someone entrenched in their beliefs tends to make
The research backs up your statement. Especially if you yourself are genuinely interested in the conversation, and also willing to update your own thinking, along with helping get everyone in the conversation to start understanding the real answers.
In case you haven’t listened to it, the You Are Not So Smart podcast covers the topic of how to get people to change on a pretty regular basis. It’s a great podcast that talks a lot about conspiracies, misinformation, and how to combat them.
https://youarenotsosmart.com/podcast/
My favorite part of this podcast is that if you listen to it from the start (nearly 300 episodes at this point), you can hear him slowly become very jaded and pessimistic, but then as the podcast goes on, he starts turning around his opinion and gets exited and optimistic about all the progress that is made. It’s a really great podcast and makes me excited for the future.
I try real hard to not only change my mind but vocally (typographically) acknowledge when I was wrong because it’s so goddamnit rare and infuriating.
Same here. I work in tech and you’d be amazed how many people are so much less on guard around me because of this.
same here, even when someone hasn’t changed my mind 100% I’ll often acknowledge if any of their arguments made me want to delve deeper into a topic and think more about my opinion on it
These comments are quite devoid of meme energy
Lemmy is too political
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A shit post about Chad farquad saying “E” after being asked what’s the second vowel is political?
Careful, you’ll get banned from blahaj zone for talk like that
An oft-repeated phrase between my friends an I in high school was when a dumb redneck kid told a friend of mine in class, “my opinions is facts.”
If there’s one I’ve learned after being on the internet for 17 years, it’s this; you can throw an entire mountain of evidence at a conspiracy theorist and they STILL won’t believe you.
