Ask HN: What is going on?

55 pointsby eoincathalalmost 7 years ago

Bad day and ranting a bit, sorry. Just reached a very strange WTF moment. I'll be submitting my notice at work on Tuesday (it's a holiday on Monday). I'm no rock star programmer, I just hit my tolerance limits for ignoring problems on the purely professional front.Then, later today I went for a drink with a colleague, only to find he's a holocaust denier, Hitler was only trying to do the right thing etc. I found I couldn't mount any argument against his views - I had been indoctrinated etc, etc.And then I come home and have a chat with my normally right-on room-mate, and somehow we get onto vaccinations, and she's considering not vaccinations her (future) kids on the basis her cousin hasn't vaccinated here and they're ok. And she is deeply suspicious of vaccinations in the face of decades of evidence supporting them. She left the room. I had tried to explain the basis of vaccinations, herd effect etc but just upset her (though calling her potentially negligent really did not help).It's a day where no amount of attempts at explanations are sticking. On the professional front, oddly enough, I'm more accepting of that. But facts and history that I hold more dear are just getting eroded. Is there a way to convince and persuade without alienating people?

16 comments

pasbesoinalmost 7 years ago

Once you start lying, you lose your credibility -- even when you are telling the truth.More and more people are coming to believe society -- "the state", doctors, bankers, etc. -- has lied to them.The thing is, they're not wrong. Just look at the "outsourcing/off-shoring's good; we'll all become managers/bankers/lawyers/professionals" statements from the '90's. (Here in the U.S.) Rescinding Glass-Steagall. (And don't forget the Clinton administration's part in that) "Iraq has weapons of mass destruction." Eat margarine (trans-fats), not butter. Bullies only hurt themselves... Oh, and lately, "We'll only use these surveillance powers under extra-ordinary circumstances. For terrorism. On foreigners. Well, unless they're talking to someone from the U.S. Or we make a "mistake". Or we buy it from a third party. Or we use a Stingray, that we definitely don't want to tell you about. Parallel construction...Authority is shifting its base, in many places, from credibility to power.Making the incredible credible. Fostering a more base human nature.The conspiracy theorists may be wrong about some things. But the authority figures telling them this, have lost a lot of their credibility.This is the real cost of the lies we're facing, from our "leadership" -- political, economic, even scientific. (How many discredited studies, advisories, medications, herbicides, pesticides, commercial processes...? And not just discredited, but these results hidden as much and as long as possible, for personal profit.)How do I deal with this, in my personal life? I try to be as truthful as possible.Of course, my life experience with this puts me in mind of that song from Depeche Mode:<a href="https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/depechemode/policyoftruth.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/depechemode/policyoftruth.ht...</a>But, the people I end up valuing, seem to value the truth I have -- warts and all.

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phakdingalmost 7 years ago

Majority of people attach themselves to a viewpoint based on either emotions or because someone they trust and respect told them so. And once they do, they can't separate themselves from their views. If you try to attack their beliefs, they take it as affront to themselves. When that happens, no amounts of facts will change their mind. Instead they will just shut you out and their beliefs will now be more firm.I would love to tell you an alternative approach, but I don't know of any.I have just given up. I just nod and say ok or change the topic. It's not my job to change people's minds.

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sasaf5almost 7 years ago

Once a friend went on a moon landing denial rant. I immediately started an ironic spherical earth denial rant, copying every argument he was using. Problem solved.

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hjekalmost 7 years ago

Yes, sometimes explanations and reasonable arguments can just derail conversations completely. For preventing that, I find David Burns' disarming technique[0] really useful. It is about "finding truth in what the other person is saying, even if it seems blatantly wrong, or illogical, or exaggerated." His podcast is amazing.Perhaps part of what your room mate is saying is that she is concerned about the well-being of her (future) children? Surely that's truly good. She's also interested in avoiding certain medical treatments that are excessive or unnecessary, which is also good.Don't know about the Holocaust-denying colleague, but sometimes xenophones have a fear of losing their job to someone else, which could leave them unable to economically support themselves or their family, and maybe they really enjoy the job they have. If your colleague talks about you being indoctrinated, then he must have a high regard of the truth (which is good), and if he's interested in how indoctrination works, he may even be interested in reading about Chomsky's propaganda model[1].Of course, this disarming stuff is only useful if you actually want to prevent conflict with other people, and it's totally legitimate to have a conflict with anti-vaxers and Holocaust deniers. But also, you live and work together, and constant conflicts may not get you nor them anywhere but down.Also, Last Week Tonight has quite a good episode on vaccines[2] (but showing that to your roomie might not calm things down).WTF indeed, though.[0]: <a href="https://feelinggood.com/2017/12/11/066-five-secrets-training-the-disarming-technique/" rel="nofollow">https://feelinggood.com/2017/12/11/066-five-secrets-training...</a>[1]: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VG_s2PCH_c" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VG_s2PCH_c</a>[2]: <a href="https://chomsky.info/consent01/" rel="nofollow">https://chomsky.info/consent01/</a>

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csomaralmost 7 years ago

Billions of people truly believe in the existence of a super-natural creature up in the sky. Some devoting time, energy and tons of money.Not something that should surprise given the scale.

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bmarquezalmost 7 years ago

You can only convince people that are open to being convinced. Usually I've seen this take some sort of harsh real-world personal experience that contradicts their existing world-view.Personal example: I used to strongly defend Obamacare, and would dismiss any arguments against it as trolling. Until I had to sign up with Covered California, deal with the buggy website, wait on hold for hours, then deal with higher deductibles and miscellaneous bureaucracy. Then I realized the detractors had a point and basically switched sides.Lastly, do you have to persuade someone to take your point of view? Are you able to be friends with them otherwise? If so, continue to be their friend and wait until an event happens that leads them to question their beliefs. Then subtly drop hints...remember, nobody likes to be told they're "wrong".

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scott_salmost 7 years ago

Something the skeptical community talks about when dealing with conspiracy theories is that it's not enough to counter arguments and correct factual claims. You need to give them an entirely different narrative. They've bought into an entire narrative, a particular view of how everything works. THey're not going to let go of that if they can't replace it with something else.

staunchalmost 7 years ago

Consider that you're probably just in a bad state of mind. You shouldn't quit your job or write these people off while you're in a bad place mentally.When you're feeling better, you may find that your friend was just exploring his dangerous thoughts in private with you, and your roommate is just ignorant and/or nervous about vaccines.You should probably just relax and focus on getting some strenuous exercise, good sleep, healthy food until you feel better.

bjournealmost 7 years ago

I feel your pain but unfortunately I have no answers. There are people with these insane opinions and they are spreading.Two decades ago a school had a live debate between a teacher and a student Holocaust denier. The teacher thoroughly demolished the students arguments which made him look like a complete fool. Today the student (Björn Björkqvist) is the leader of one of the largest Nazi groups and the teacher severely regrets ever debating with him.

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hluskaalmost 7 years ago

How are you? Are you okay? Do you need someone to talk to? My email is in my profile.I used to have this neighbour. The first time I met him, I thought he was going to become a good friend. We talked for hours and I thought this cat was alright.The next time we talked, it turned out that he was a fucking anti-vaccer. Not a word of a lie, he said "Do you notice there are more kids with problems, you know, retards now?" He even put air quotes around 'retards'. In his cute little worldview, that's all because of vaccines. Fuck! I lost another friend.Or, there was this dude I worked with. I thought he was just about the coolest person I'd ever met. He was so smart, he had amazing taste in music, he had a great sense of humour and he even liked soccer. I thought I'd made a friend for life.It turns out that he takes freedom of expression literally and doesn't believe in hate speech laws. In his mind, advocating for genocide against the poor or mentally ill is totally fine.This might be the most real thing I will ever write, but people will disappoint you constantly. Some of the most amazing people will be nazis. Other people won't believe in the scientific method. And still others will do stupid fucking shit that will make your job suck.Find people who you love and let them love you back. Be fiercely loyal to those people because there won't be many of them.And, when you meet fuckstains who believe in stupid shit, you likely can't convince them. Or, you likely could though you don't want to. A vast part of their identity relies upon this stupid shit. If you pierce the veil, you'll have to put their shit back together. That's a fate worse than knowing anti-vaccers and nazis.

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htwilliealmost 7 years ago

Why do you believe what you believe is true? Independant study? Easiest possible explanation? Herd effect? Fear of standing out?It's rare that you can change another persons mind. But you can try to understand why they believe what they do.You present vaccinations as an example, with "decades of evidence supporting them." That's far less time than evidence supported a flat earth.The thing is, some vaccines work pretty well. Others don't. It's complicated by the fact that if they don't work, or if they injure or kill you, you can't get your money back or bring lawsuits against the manufacturers or providers.And there's no laws or regulations that say vaccines must work. Vaccine makers can literally solubilize dog shit and call it a vaccine. And it will "work" for quite a lot of people. There's billions of dollars counting on the us believing they're effective. That blind faith in vaccines has been waning for quite a while now.

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milestonealmost 7 years ago

People are a lot less individualistic than you might think. If you want to change opinions, change the messenger.

nso95almost 7 years ago

You have to pick your battles. Life isn’t going to get any easier.

sunsebalmost 7 years ago

Why do you even care about other people's beliefs?

rajacombinatoralmost 7 years ago

Talking to people who disagreed with you made you have a bad day? Maybe it could have been an interesting day if you put your ego aside and focused on trying to understand them. What makes you so certain your beliefs are correct anyway? Have you reviewed the evidence on both sides?

cmurfalmost 7 years ago

>Is there a way to convince and persuade without alienating people?In my opinion? No. Shame, humiliation, and ostracizing are the way to go. If they refuse to think dynamically or critically, they need to feel rejected from functioning society. In civil society, you follow certain normative rules and laws. If you don't, you get ejected on way or another. This is good.Insanity transfer theory: (I made it up, could be specious, buyer beware.) Every person naturally generates a certain amount of insanity. To prevent unhealthy build up, you need to transfer your insanity onto other people. Basically the deniers are doing this to you, and it's making you nutty. So do it back to them. I suggest ad hominem attacks in this case because a.) the problem isn't about facts or arguments, these are flawed individuals actively denying reality and trying to spread lies. b.) name calling in such a case is fun, even if shaming them fails to change their behavior. Just make sure you have fun doing it. And if not, dump them. If you can't make fun of their stupidity, it's unhealthy to keep them around, they'll drive you crazy.

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