Have a conversation about immigration reform, and you’re very likely to end up talking about amnesty. Have a conversation about gay marriage, and you’re increasingly likely to stray into the story about the bakery forced to bake a “gay wedding” cake.” Have a conversation about amnesty for illegals, and it’s almost inevitable that welfare will be brought up. Have a conversation about global warming, and eventually it’ll morph into one about carbon caps and taxes. Have a conversation about militarization of police, and the words “cop-hater” often pop up.
These dialogic meanderings shouldn’t really surprise us. After all, the ones I’ve noted are related to the initial topics. The problem that arises, however, is that while they’re related, they aren’t the initial topics themselves. They’re separate issues covering common or similar ground. As a test, we can ask Is it possible to favor open-borders immigration reform but not support the current incarnation of amnesty? or Can one favor gay marriage but also support the right to a shop owner to refuse service to gays? or Can one support a path to citizenship while opposing expansion of benefits for newly-legalized immigrants? or Can one have a discussion about global warming, or believe that human emissions are contributing to global temperature increases, but stand adamantly against the proposed solution? or Can one oppose militarization but be “pro-cop,”?
The answer to all of these is, of course, yes, yet it’s very, very hard to actually have a conversation on any of these topics and not face the presumption that if you favor A, you favor B. Some may argue that A and B are inextricably intertwined, but isn’t that argument merely a resigned acceptance that A and B have been falsely conflated due to sheer repetition and sloppy debate? Certainly, many or most who advance catastrophic prognoses relating to anthropogenic global warming aren’t doing so merely out of academic interest, but rather to demand action. The problem therein is that the demand for action is overwhelmingly conflated with a particular action, i.e. carbon caps and taxes, rather than the risk is great enough to require a response, now lets figure out what will work best.
Some make this conflation out of ignorance or incomplete information. Perhaps they haven’t considered other options. Perhaps they haven’t considered the harm that carbon caps and taxes will cause. Perhaps they haven’t considered that carbon caps and taxes may not work.
Others make this conflation because it advances their agenda or achieves their goals. They may want carbon caps and taxes, perhaps because they’ll make money, or gain power, or satisfy a particular bias (e.g. that energy should be renewable or that oil/coal is dirty or that they don’t like holes being drilled in Gaia). They may simply want to be right – they long ago embraced the notion that humans are dangerously overheating the planet, and the imposition of carbon caps and taxes will validate them.
Still others conflate as a slippery slope argument. Some oppose gay marriage because they believe it’s part of a grander agenda to force everyone to accept the gay lifestyle. They warn of churches being forced to perform gay weddings and bakers being forced to bake gay-themed wedding cakes. They’re certainly correct in believing that this is the agenda that some are looking to advance, but it’s not true of everyone who is on the pro-gay-marriage side, and the conflation doesn’t add any merit other than as a line in the sand.
And, some are just lazy or cheating arguers. Police should have tools at their disposal to keep them safe and help them do their jobs, so if you say they shouldn’t have tanks and rocket propelled grenade launchers, you don’t believe in safety for cops, therefore you’re a cop-hater. It’s school-yard logic, but it’s commonly employed school-yard logic.
Fighting sloppy logic and lazy reasoning is an uphill battle and an endless quest, but it can be challenged when it appears, and we can resist the incorrect labeling and presumptions that false conflations produce. It is true that most people won’t care, but most people don’t care about any argument you make, at least not in the moment. The prospects for advancing your perspectives through logic, fact and sound arguments exist primarily in the long-term. Plant a seed today. It often doesn’t germinate, but it might grow roots in a week or a month. It may wither, but sometimes, half a year down the road, you hear someone repeat your own words back to you, someone who originally stood adamantly opposed to them. So, fight the false conflations. Don’t let others steer arguments away from the main point of discussion. At the very least, you can avoid being tagged with an incorrect label. And, who knows? Perhaps you might open an eye or two.
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