The Agora
In the spirit of the Ancient Greek Agora, we invite you to join our vibrant community - a contemporary meeting place for the exchange of ideas, inspired by the practices of old. Just as the Agora served as the heart of public life in Ancient Athens, our platform is designed to be the epicenter of meaningful discussion and thought-provoking dialogue.
Here, you are encouraged to speak your mind, share your insights, and engage in stimulating discussions. This is your opportunity to shape and influence our collective journey, just like the free citizens of Athens who gathered at the Agora to make significant decisions that impacted their society.
You're not alone in your quest for knowledge and understanding. In this community, you'll find support from like-minded individuals who, like you, are eager to explore new perspectives, challenge their preconceptions, and grow intellectually.
Remember, every voice matters and your contribution can make a difference. We believe that through open dialogue, mutual respect, and a shared commitment to discovery, we can foster a community that embodies the democratic spirit of the Agora in our modern world.
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- [Discussion]
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Your argument was that an unsavoury instance was against hosting your personal flavour of unsavoury content; hence you felt the need to browbeat instead of simply finding a better instance.
This appears to be your main method of "engagement" in discussion: incessantly hammer on your point, making persistent bad-faith invitations to "debate," then when you rile up the user to the point of them flaming you, you claim that you're remaining civil. It's called sealioning, it's a common enough trolling phenomenon that there exists an often cited web-comic about it..
Co-existing in a space isn't an open invitation for you to repeatedly argue the same point past a persons point of comfort, for the sake of your personal definition of "debate". When it's clear the debate has run its course and the person is clearly being emotionally effected, if you persist then you're acting in bad faith.
Your interpretation falls apart when I have found a better instance; sh.itjust.works
Nor am I sealioning, that isn't even what sealioning is. Sealioning constantly asks for sources, feigning ignorance when produced with a counterpoint and dismissing a user's points.
I make a deliberate attempt to not sealion, by often asking the other user if they'd like to continue the discussion, if they're comfortable, asking about common interests or things we can agree upon and conceding and agreeing with their points without questioning them as a person -- All of this is public information you can check.
I have been proven wrong many times, and I admit when I am. Most who I have a lengthy discussion with tend to come to a certain agreement or mutual understanding.
spoiler
"Where is the evidence for that opinion?""But doesn’t [x] really mean [y]?"
"What about [other issue]—how do you explain that?"
"What’s wrong with a polite question?"
"I’m just trying to engage in civil debate."
This series of questions may seem like a well-intentioned search for answers. It’s not—it’s a simplified example of a rhetorical strategy called sealioning. Sealioning is an intentional, combative performance of cluelessness. Rhetorically, sealioning fuses persistent questioning—often about basic information, information easily found elsewhere, or unrelated or tangential points—with a loudly-insisted-upon commitment to reasonable debate. It disguises itself as a sincere attempt to learn and communicate. Sealioning thus works both to exhaust a target’s patience, attention, and communicative effort, and to portray the target as unreasonable. While the questions of the “sea lion” may seem innocent, they’re intended maliciously and have harmful consequences.
Amy Johnson, The Multiple Harms of Sea Lions :::
You're sealioning in this very thread; you're just feigning ignorance and exploiting the fact that a term originating from a webcomic isn't well defined. Here you are incessantly replying in multiple comment chains, asking asinine rhetorical questions, insisting you just want an open discussion, and making sure to explicitly mention how civil you have remained. The only point of contention is that you're asking rhetorical questions instead of asking for evidence.
It's abundantly clear what you're doing. I've given my points, you've countered. It's in a public forum that others can access and make their own judgment. My standard for engaging discussion doesn't include chasing comment chains and rebutting throwaway remarks only to have them slightly rephrased or framed in a flimsy example. I will not engage with you after this comment.
Asinine rhetorical questions? bruh, I'm defending myself from your insults and falsehoods. And yeah, I'm responding to comment chains, so what? I want to hear what people say; I'm a candidate. I'm already learning a lot.
Truthfully, I think you're sealioning, at least according to your moving definitions, which you've already changed.
You only have 6 comments on Agora in the past day, all of which contain you attacking others.
You're calling me a troll.
You've called other people trolls in this very thread,
You're telling others they're arguing in bad-faith,
And you've also listed your information incorrectly twice, both my burggit account and Bit's comment chain. I like the Bit thread a lot since you make claims about Bit despite not knowing what the deleted comments contained.
But hey, let's read through this paper anywho!
What a nice broad definition, this can include everything -- convenient! But condescending and denying people the ability to question you? Sounds familiar, perhaps the very same that calls others trolls, bad-faith actors and sealions whenever they disagreed with you.
Oh, and uhhhh... This is really embarrassing, but you're also sealioning by your very own paper, oops.
Like you listing my burggit account (having to find my separate account that I've never linked before), you listing deleted comments from a large comment chain.
(Honestly this is a stupid definition. Using the search function is sealioning? Fuck off with that, Amy Johnson.)
my take? Sealioning is just a narcissist person's argument to get out of one or deny anyone shooting them down. As you said yourself:
Ah, the irony~