Let’s not vilify people asking for citations. With AI it’s more important than ever to verify what you’re reading.
Hidden panel: guy on left saying “google it yourself, don’t expect me to have to teach you anything”
I would just assume that anyone who needed a cite for really obvious stuff is just trolling.
Family Member: Russia needs to invade Ukraine because they need a shield against NATO.
Me: But NATO wasn’t going to attack them. It’s a defensive organization.
That’s what THEY want you to believe. (Was not able to clarify who “they” were during conversation, but got the impression it wasn’t nato)
Even if you believe Russia to be 100% in the wrong, the idea that NATO is a defensive organization is laughable. Not only has it historically been led by Nazis, the member-states are the most imperialist countries on the planet. It serves to protect an inherently violent status quo of brutal looting and exploitation of the Global South, and that’s without getting into aggressive operations from NATO.
It’s also hypocritical. NATO is willing to allow Ukraine to join, but not Russia:
The archives show irrefutably that the U.S. and German governments repeatedly promised to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev that NATO would not move “one inch eastward” when the Soviet Union disbanded the Warsaw Pact military alliance. Nonetheless, U.S. planning for NATO expansion began early in the 1990s, well before Vladimir Putin was Russia’s president. In 1997, national security expert Zbigniew Brzezinski spelled out the NATO expansion timeline with remarkable precision.
Yep. After the USSR was murdered and the State sliced up and sold for spare parts to the Imperialist bourgeoisie in the west, there was a nationalist bourgeoisie that regained control of the Russian Federation’s resources and industry, and the West never forgave them for that. That’s why Russia is a far-right dystopia in many ways, but unlike far-right dystopias allies to the US Empire, the Russian Federation is depicted in a negative light exclusively in western Media, unlike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Argentina, etc.
I never said Russia didn’t invade Ukraine, my point is specifically that calling NATO a “defensive alliance” despite it’s sole purpose being maintenance of Western Imperialism is laughable. People who understand ACAB but defend NATO as “purely defensive” have an inability to understand imperialism.
“Do you have a source?” means, “I already know you are wrong but you won’t believe me unless you find out for yourself.”
Or when you bring sources and they straight up ignore them entirely…
I understand not wanting to read or go through the entire Marxist-Leninist books I recommend, not everybody has the time for that, but a 5-20 minute article? You waste more time debating me after the fact than you would have just reading the article, at least do me the courtesy of skimming it and trying to engage with my points.
And their own sources are so heavily butchered or even lied about. I cannot count the amount of times people provided me with ‘sources’ that they claim were ironclad in their favor only for them to completely debunk their shit…
It’s called a “gish gallop” mixed with a disagreement about what this platform is, with a healthy mix of “ain’t nobody got time for that”. To some people this is a legitimate place of discussion, to others it’s a place to shit post. One thing that Reddit did get right was seperating the two groups from each other. Lemmy doesn’t do that as well unless you ask it to and for some people, they ain’t got time for that. That still leaves the people who are gish galloping but they’re not going anywhere so might as well adapt.
Perhaps peppering responses with links is counterproductive. Why not follow a more consistent strategy? Such an approach would for example summarize the opposition’s view in good faith, give a name to the fallacies in it, and respond not only by providing a link, but a short synopsis of what the link is and how it refutes those fallacies. This approach helps not only rebut the opponent, who may be unwilling to listen to reason, but everyone following the conversation in real time or in the future. For this reason it is also great to use archived versions of links, whenever you can.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, I generally offer specific reading recommendations and explanations for why, the only time I “pepper” is if it’s to add supporting evidence that might be immediately disregarded otherwise. I don’t usually send a large reading list, usually it’s one article or book with an explanation of why it’s relevant. You can see my comment history for examples if you want.
Certainly. I try to do the same, in fact I craft my comments so that they are immediately useful to others. Nonetheless, this might be not enough. Trolls are there for a reason, and you have to accept that our comment-section skirmishes do not add up to much, especially when you consider state-sponsored trolling and mega-corporate push of the far right agenda, across all media outlets, including social media.
