[WikiEN-l] Nude Kate Winslet Picture

Thu Apr 14 19:11:22 UTC 2005

> >>>>>>Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darueber muss man schweigen.
> >>>>>>
> OK, so I am both clueless and Germanless.  May I have a fully nuanced
> interpretation from the original speaker or an insider, please?

My pleasure! What Tony was referring to was your use of a rhethorical
trick. But since you seem to be unaware of it, it's not quite right to
label it a trick and instead let us call it a mistake. Basically you
were employing a variant of "The affecteds perspective" and
"underreporting" (excuse my terminology, English is not my naitive
language).

Your argumentation was that you yourself belongs to a large group of
people who is negatively affected by the words "nude" and "picture" in
the subject-line of mailing-list discussions. It is a great way to
argue for something, because it diverts attention from the subject and
makes the discussion personal. It makes it very hard for me to try and
argue that you are wrong because you have taken the role as one that
is "affected." The same thing happens if you are arguing sexual
assault issues against a rape victim - she will have a huge advantage
because she is "affected." Same thing with arguing housing issues with
homeless people etc.

For the rest of the audience: Think of how you would have read Tom
Haws message if he had not said he himself was affected, and just
referred to those affected by "nude" and "picture" subject lines as
"they."

As I said, it is a great way to imply that you are speaking for a
large group of people when in reality, you are only speaking for
yourself. The only effective way to really counter that argument is to
be a member of the group of people you try to present. And it will be
hard since you stated that "many others like me ... also have various
reasons to be discouraged from participating in debates about the same
images." Well, I'm a son, a brother, a boyfriend, a Christian, an
engineer and many other roles in which I am loathe to be associated
with the subjects of these debates, but that hasn't stopped me from
participating so obviously I cannot pretend to speak of being a member
of the group you are representing.

The other trick I was speaking of was your use of "underreporting."
Not many have reported an inability to participate in wiki-en debates
because of bad subject lines, why? Underreporting! Since noone has
objected they must be afraid...

Sorry to sound harsh, it is not my intention. I'm sure what I have
called rhethorical tricks are just honest mistakes that we all do when
arguing sometimes. It is just good to be aware of them.

-- 
mvh Björn