I'm not sure if ending your article about how real-time conversations can end badly with an invitation to your adversaries to appear on your podcast is a king-size flex or the worst-placed advertisement ever.
While I agree Tim Pool for sure "owned" Lance, really the question was so obvious, and even the bits leading up to it were, that Lance really just owned himself. You could see this coming from a mile away, it was like Lance had never had a conversation with someone on the subject before.
Also I've come to appreciate some of Destiny's style. I saw a snip of him talking to a Christian pro life guy recently, and he started by focusing in on precisely what the guy had issue with and what should be done about it.
There's this practice in street epistemology called the "real reason" check, where you take a person's stated reason for a belief, ask them if they were satisfied that it didn't apply in the situation or was otherwise not a factor would they still have the same confidence in the belief / claim. It helps when people aren't being 100% upfront and presenting more palatable reasons for a belief, but when a person is being honest, sometimes will reveal to a person things about themselves they didn't even know. (usually when a belief hasn't been interrogated before)
Loved the examples here, but man Meghan is taking a beating here :)
> You could see this coming from a mile away, it was like Lance had never had a conversation with someone on the subject before.
I agree with your interpretation, and that's likely another benefit to real-time conversations in showcasing someone's isolation. But even for someone in Lance's position, it would've been honest and honorable to just admit "I hadn't considered that before". I get that his aim in this particular role was likely to put up a confident performance, but the bluff just backfired.
Fantastic article but I have to disagree with regards to Murphy. You make the claim she has “hidden beliefs” about what makes paying for sex unethical. However, I don’t think the example you use supports that.
Murphy is concerned with women in the sex trade as they are the primary victims. In the course of questioning she reiterates that her concern is for women, twice.
As per the clip you provide, one of the main reasons she argues that paying a women for sex is unethical, is because of the physical vulnerability of women during sex and the potential to become pregnant. Destiny also concedes that women are at a physical disadvantage during sex.
Destiny goes on to question Murphy with regards to men in the sex trade. In doing so he implies two points. One, that Megan believes the only thing that makes the sex trade unethical is the potential for physical harm. And two, that in order for physical harm to be a valid ethical objection it must apply equally across the sexes.
When she replies that she believes it is unethical to pay men for sex, he responds, “Okay. Then the vulnerability and the penetration part don't matter then. I don't know why you bring that up if a guy can’t even sell his body for sex then”
I find this argument to be incredibly underhanded. While he is right that she must have a different reason to object to male prostitution other than direct physical harm, that does not automatically mean she is not genuinely concerned about the physical vulnerability of female prostitutes.
Women do make up the majority of the sex trade. That men are not as vulnerable as women does not mean that the violence female sex workers face is not a very good reason to be opposed to prostitution.
The lead up to this particular exchange is relevant because Murphy was first arguing that sex work is bad because it's coercive, and it's by definition coercive because it involves someone having sex they wouldn't otherwise have were it not for the money offered. Destiny offers the obvious rejoinder that if you accept that premise, then ALL jobs are also "by definition coercive" as well. There's some anti-capitalists that actually agree with this premise but Murphy doesn't and so she finds herself having to add yet another qualifier to her argument, this time about how women are much more vulnerable during sex. Similarly, there are radical feminists that actually believe that ALL heterosexual sex is "by definition coercive" because it's penetrative and occurs within a patriarchal system where consent is impossible. Murphy has to be aware of these arguments, but as an unapologetic heterosexual woman, she doesn't want to concede that. At this point my impression is she quit because she ran out of pivots.
There's a pattern here. She just moves on to another, then another, then another etc. all without any acknowledgement. It's hard to tell what she *actually* believes in because she just keeps mechanistically cycling through her repertoire! The "coercive because money" argument got immediately thrown out without any acknowledgement and never made a re-appearance, and that's because Murphy knew she'd have to admit that all jobs are coercive. We didn't get much of an epilogue for the "coercive because sex" argument, but I'm guessing she realized she'd have to admit that hetero sex is at least somewhat rapey. I also gather that after already confirming she believes males engaging in sex work is also unethical, she realized she wouldn't be able to offer a reason for that position (I can't think of one based on what she said, but maybe you can?).
If I had to construct an honest form of the basic tenets of her argument, it might be something like this:
"Wage work has an element of coercion, because you're doing work you would otherwise refuse to do freely. Sex also has an element of violence and coercion for women in particular, given how much more vulnerable they are. Taken individually, neither is necessarily a problem because of [reasons]. But there's a symbiotic magnification of the harms that occurs when these two aspects are combined together into what we know as the sex trade. This crosses a line over what we should deem as ethical and acceptable behavior."
I may not agree with the conclusion but I think the argument is perfectly reasonable! If I had to guess, the reason Murphy doesn't adopt this framework is because it would necessarily require her to curtail some of her overall position. For example it would require her to concede at least *some* scenarios where the sex trade is not unethical (e.g. male prostitutes, OF model playing with toys, etc.).
"Murphy’s responses make a lot more sense if you assume that her true objections to the sex industry are really borne out of an aesthetic or disgust aversion, and specifically only when men are the patrons. "
Mostly, what we discover from this exploration of human hypocrisy is that much of human belief and ideology are largely a matter of aesthetics, class/tribal signaling, and mimetics.
Cats, and certainly feral cats, cannot afford such luxury beliefs. "Freedom is just another word for 'nothing left to lose!".
Also, great article on some tactics used for cross examination. Would be great if you wrote more on this subject both as the examiner and the witness. What strategies are best?
If anything, this article made me more pessimistic about the value of real-time debate as opposed to written debate. All your examples are "gotchas" that are lauded for exposing a supposed double-standard in real time. But I doubt that's how the individuals on the receiving end felt it. They probably felt it was a cheap trick that made them look bad, but didn't really expose anything other than their own unpreparedness.
If there are genuine contradictions, asking them in writing works just fine. It's not like writing gives some shield from this type of thing, it merely gives the person time to form the best answer they can come up with. This doesn't give as many lurid soundbytes of "owning the libs" or whatnot, but it's better at getting at the truth.
I wouldn't claim that either format is comprehensively better than the other, it really depends on the application. I also figured there would be a fair amount of disagreement about the specific examples I picked, and because I said my interpretations involve some element of mind-reaading, I don't think those who disagree are being unreasonable.
This is where it's helpful to shift back to generalized principles rather than get mired into each particular issue. So for each example I outlined, I tried to contemplate a scenario where the behavior I'm shining a spotlight on would not be objectionable, and I couldn't think of any. Behaviors that are red flags for me are expending a lot of energy to dodge a question, refusing to engage in hypotheticals, or substituting failed arguments without acknowledging so. All three of those are *much* easier to do and get away with in writing when you don't have someone redirecting you in real-time.
>red flags for me are expending a lot of energy to dodge a question, refusing to engage in hypotheticals, or substituting failed arguments without acknowledging so. All three of those are *much* easier to do and get away with in writing when you don't have someone redirecting you in real-time.
It's really not clear to me how these are easier in real-time, especially in a way that proves a substantive issue with someone's position. You can startle people with novel arguments that seem like contradictions on the surface, and their flustered state might *look* like "they see their worldview crashing around them" or something dramatic, but none of it's real. It's just deer-in-the-headlights behavior that could probably be addressed by having a few minutes to think about things. But you don't have that time in a live debate.
It's very similar to a perennial issue politicians face when reporters try to trip them up with random trivia. "Oh, you think you're knowledgeable about the Middle East? Well then, what's the capital of Jordan?"
I concede that someone could be genuinely tripped up when encountering a novel argument they've never come across before, and I would agree that not having an immediate answer should never be a negative mark. Where I'd differ is that I think this is a very rare scenario, and I don't believe this applies to any of the examples I outlined. I find the practice of trying to trip people up over random trivia to be extremely annoying but that's not the same as what I've described.
I wouldn't ask you to go and look for an example, but if you already have examples in mind where my red flag criteria does not serve as a reliable indicator of dodgy behavior I would be curious to see them.
I'm not sure if ending your article about how real-time conversations can end badly with an invitation to your adversaries to appear on your podcast is a king-size flex or the worst-placed advertisement ever.
👀
While I agree Tim Pool for sure "owned" Lance, really the question was so obvious, and even the bits leading up to it were, that Lance really just owned himself. You could see this coming from a mile away, it was like Lance had never had a conversation with someone on the subject before.
Also I've come to appreciate some of Destiny's style. I saw a snip of him talking to a Christian pro life guy recently, and he started by focusing in on precisely what the guy had issue with and what should be done about it.
There's this practice in street epistemology called the "real reason" check, where you take a person's stated reason for a belief, ask them if they were satisfied that it didn't apply in the situation or was otherwise not a factor would they still have the same confidence in the belief / claim. It helps when people aren't being 100% upfront and presenting more palatable reasons for a belief, but when a person is being honest, sometimes will reveal to a person things about themselves they didn't even know. (usually when a belief hasn't been interrogated before)
Loved the examples here, but man Meghan is taking a beating here :)
> You could see this coming from a mile away, it was like Lance had never had a conversation with someone on the subject before.
I agree with your interpretation, and that's likely another benefit to real-time conversations in showcasing someone's isolation. But even for someone in Lance's position, it would've been honest and honorable to just admit "I hadn't considered that before". I get that his aim in this particular role was likely to put up a confident performance, but the bluff just backfired.
Fantastic article but I have to disagree with regards to Murphy. You make the claim she has “hidden beliefs” about what makes paying for sex unethical. However, I don’t think the example you use supports that.
Murphy is concerned with women in the sex trade as they are the primary victims. In the course of questioning she reiterates that her concern is for women, twice.
As per the clip you provide, one of the main reasons she argues that paying a women for sex is unethical, is because of the physical vulnerability of women during sex and the potential to become pregnant. Destiny also concedes that women are at a physical disadvantage during sex.
Destiny goes on to question Murphy with regards to men in the sex trade. In doing so he implies two points. One, that Megan believes the only thing that makes the sex trade unethical is the potential for physical harm. And two, that in order for physical harm to be a valid ethical objection it must apply equally across the sexes.
When she replies that she believes it is unethical to pay men for sex, he responds, “Okay. Then the vulnerability and the penetration part don't matter then. I don't know why you bring that up if a guy can’t even sell his body for sex then”
I find this argument to be incredibly underhanded. While he is right that she must have a different reason to object to male prostitution other than direct physical harm, that does not automatically mean she is not genuinely concerned about the physical vulnerability of female prostitutes.
Women do make up the majority of the sex trade. That men are not as vulnerable as women does not mean that the violence female sex workers face is not a very good reason to be opposed to prostitution.
I should have made it clearer that the reason I believe Murphy to be dishonest wasn't based on just that one exchange, I was also incorporating many more examples from the longer post I linked: https://ymeskhout.substack.com/p/meghan-murphys-speedrun-guide-to
The lead up to this particular exchange is relevant because Murphy was first arguing that sex work is bad because it's coercive, and it's by definition coercive because it involves someone having sex they wouldn't otherwise have were it not for the money offered. Destiny offers the obvious rejoinder that if you accept that premise, then ALL jobs are also "by definition coercive" as well. There's some anti-capitalists that actually agree with this premise but Murphy doesn't and so she finds herself having to add yet another qualifier to her argument, this time about how women are much more vulnerable during sex. Similarly, there are radical feminists that actually believe that ALL heterosexual sex is "by definition coercive" because it's penetrative and occurs within a patriarchal system where consent is impossible. Murphy has to be aware of these arguments, but as an unapologetic heterosexual woman, she doesn't want to concede that. At this point my impression is she quit because she ran out of pivots.
There's a pattern here. She just moves on to another, then another, then another etc. all without any acknowledgement. It's hard to tell what she *actually* believes in because she just keeps mechanistically cycling through her repertoire! The "coercive because money" argument got immediately thrown out without any acknowledgement and never made a re-appearance, and that's because Murphy knew she'd have to admit that all jobs are coercive. We didn't get much of an epilogue for the "coercive because sex" argument, but I'm guessing she realized she'd have to admit that hetero sex is at least somewhat rapey. I also gather that after already confirming she believes males engaging in sex work is also unethical, she realized she wouldn't be able to offer a reason for that position (I can't think of one based on what she said, but maybe you can?).
If I had to construct an honest form of the basic tenets of her argument, it might be something like this:
"Wage work has an element of coercion, because you're doing work you would otherwise refuse to do freely. Sex also has an element of violence and coercion for women in particular, given how much more vulnerable they are. Taken individually, neither is necessarily a problem because of [reasons]. But there's a symbiotic magnification of the harms that occurs when these two aspects are combined together into what we know as the sex trade. This crosses a line over what we should deem as ethical and acceptable behavior."
I may not agree with the conclusion but I think the argument is perfectly reasonable! If I had to guess, the reason Murphy doesn't adopt this framework is because it would necessarily require her to curtail some of her overall position. For example it would require her to concede at least *some* scenarios where the sex trade is not unethical (e.g. male prostitutes, OF model playing with toys, etc.).
"Murphy’s responses make a lot more sense if you assume that her true objections to the sex industry are really borne out of an aesthetic or disgust aversion, and specifically only when men are the patrons. "
Mostly, what we discover from this exploration of human hypocrisy is that much of human belief and ideology are largely a matter of aesthetics, class/tribal signaling, and mimetics.
Cats, and certainly feral cats, cannot afford such luxury beliefs. "Freedom is just another word for 'nothing left to lose!".
"[pregnant pause]" is that pun intended?
Also, great article on some tactics used for cross examination. Would be great if you wrote more on this subject both as the examiner and the witness. What strategies are best?
If you give away the milk for free who would buy the cow?
People that want steak.
If anything, this article made me more pessimistic about the value of real-time debate as opposed to written debate. All your examples are "gotchas" that are lauded for exposing a supposed double-standard in real time. But I doubt that's how the individuals on the receiving end felt it. They probably felt it was a cheap trick that made them look bad, but didn't really expose anything other than their own unpreparedness.
If there are genuine contradictions, asking them in writing works just fine. It's not like writing gives some shield from this type of thing, it merely gives the person time to form the best answer they can come up with. This doesn't give as many lurid soundbytes of "owning the libs" or whatnot, but it's better at getting at the truth.
I wouldn't claim that either format is comprehensively better than the other, it really depends on the application. I also figured there would be a fair amount of disagreement about the specific examples I picked, and because I said my interpretations involve some element of mind-reaading, I don't think those who disagree are being unreasonable.
This is where it's helpful to shift back to generalized principles rather than get mired into each particular issue. So for each example I outlined, I tried to contemplate a scenario where the behavior I'm shining a spotlight on would not be objectionable, and I couldn't think of any. Behaviors that are red flags for me are expending a lot of energy to dodge a question, refusing to engage in hypotheticals, or substituting failed arguments without acknowledging so. All three of those are *much* easier to do and get away with in writing when you don't have someone redirecting you in real-time.
>red flags for me are expending a lot of energy to dodge a question, refusing to engage in hypotheticals, or substituting failed arguments without acknowledging so. All three of those are *much* easier to do and get away with in writing when you don't have someone redirecting you in real-time.
It's really not clear to me how these are easier in real-time, especially in a way that proves a substantive issue with someone's position. You can startle people with novel arguments that seem like contradictions on the surface, and their flustered state might *look* like "they see their worldview crashing around them" or something dramatic, but none of it's real. It's just deer-in-the-headlights behavior that could probably be addressed by having a few minutes to think about things. But you don't have that time in a live debate.
It's very similar to a perennial issue politicians face when reporters try to trip them up with random trivia. "Oh, you think you're knowledgeable about the Middle East? Well then, what's the capital of Jordan?"
I concede that someone could be genuinely tripped up when encountering a novel argument they've never come across before, and I would agree that not having an immediate answer should never be a negative mark. Where I'd differ is that I think this is a very rare scenario, and I don't believe this applies to any of the examples I outlined. I find the practice of trying to trip people up over random trivia to be extremely annoying but that's not the same as what I've described.
I wouldn't ask you to go and look for an example, but if you already have examples in mind where my red flag criteria does not serve as a reliable indicator of dodgy behavior I would be curious to see them.