In an online world of e-mobs and outrage, where thinkers and intellectual prophets battle not only for the veracity of their ideas but for our eyeballs, one of the main events we absolutely love to watch, one of our favorite spectacles is no doubt the death of a strawman.

Wut?

If you are confused, I do apologize but I promise I'm not punishing my keyboard for the sake of putting out at least a second post for the day, that's not it. This weird post is inspired in a conversation I just had with a fellow of the "opposition".

What opposition? You may ask, and yes, that's a good question, but let's sweep it under the rug for a second and talk about denim overalls stuffed with hay. Metaphorically speaking of course.

You see, the fallacy, which for this post I've chosen to call a spectacle, is very common, and it does give us a tingling sensation in our poggies when someone we agree with partakes of the event.

So what you mean is....

I will grant you this is not the only way conversations get derailed, but it's sure the most common way that they do. The "trick", if you will, is to repackage the opposing view as a caricature, and then proceed to beat it senselessly, since of course that is the only think we ought to do with ridiculous propositions.

Let's say that you are arguing for the idea that we should strive to create a society that takes care of the less fortunate. That we ought to have social programs that give our country a safety net that does not let anyone fall through the cracks. I think for the most part that position is noble, and easy to agree with, but if hypothetically, I want to "defeat you", I could enter the battle arena in the following way.

So, what you are saying is that personal responsibility is not a thing, and that we should steal from those who are responsible, those who work hard and give it all to the drug addicts and the criminals?

As you might imagine, the next phrases out of my hypothetical mouth are verbal daggers that eviscerate the "translation" I've presented of your once coherent position. And, as you can also imagine the straw man is defeated easily, the crowd cheers, the likes on the video or the post become plenty, and the echo chamber impenetrable seal is further reinforced.

Oh, but I don't ever...

Don't lie, no need, nobody is watching you read this..

Hey, you are probably not going to comment anyways..

Listen, you may not build the straw men yourself, maybe you don't like confrontation, but you do love to see one get slaughtered by a superior intellect.

We should probably add a question mark to the word superior, but I digress. The point is we all do it, we all love it, it's the battle of ideas, if said ideas were tinged with fetishistic coloring and edified in futility for our viewing pleasure.

What's that? You don't know what I'm talking about?

Ask me if I believe you... go ahead.

MenO