When confronted with facts I'll search out other facts than evaluate my opinion in the face of new evidence.
Hi,
OK Jake, I come in peace. I think I might be able to help. I am a conservative. When I started posting on this forum, if I saw something that agreed with my views I posted it and found very quickly that was not enough. I was hit with questions like, what is your source, give me a credible source etc. The point being, regardless whether what I posted was conservative or not, the forum wanted legitimate stuff that was backed up with facts. If your are an economist you get that part real quickly.
In one of my early posts on this forum I posted an article and then slammed the libs and it was the "Tanker" who said the source I quoted was not good enough, they have a reputation for making stuff up and I needed to find another source. I will confess that was a real slap in the face. I am 70 years old, have a pretty good reputation and very seldom was I questioned. At the same time, what a blessing his remarks turned out to be. Did not take me long to realize, regardless of what the source was, if it agreed with my point of view, I took it as fact and the only sources I questioned were those I did not agree with. More l hung on this forum I realized that the libs do not own the exclusive right to make up stuff and if you want to have credibility, you better make sure your starting point is accurate, not some opinion column that has no more credibility than the Huffington Post.
Much like the government makes up the inflation and CPI data, unemployment data, etc. that just did not fly with this group. It was actually a good thing because they made me much better in dealing with my friends outside of this forum. Instead of spouting off, I found myself building a case based on the data which was irrefutable.
As a result, I learned a second thing. When you confront a liberal with the facts and back them up, they respond emotionally, "It's Bush's fault!" "You are just a bigot or racist!" are some examples because they were screwed, they had no place to go with their arguments.
That is why Glenn Beck drives them nuts. If you follow him closely you will notice that most every point he makes he uses the words of the person he is attacking against them, either speeches they gave, or things they wrote. In other words he backs up his point using first hand information provided by the person he is nailing.
The gist of what I am reading is that you are getting similar feedback to when I started. I finally learned to state my source first then draw my conclusions. I have a nephew who is the local union rep where he works. I started debating with him and he told me to quit sending him crap, if I could not send him facts don't waste his time. Over a two year period he is a convert because, between him and this forum, I was taught so substiantiate my points of view.
Now, after I got that figured out, I learned that most on this forum are like my nephew, they are pretty forgiving when I say, "in my opinion", and I string out a conclusion based on the premise and clearly state that it is an opinion. It is going from a known set of facts, then bridging into what could easily be the logical conclusion but stating that the conclusion is only my opinion. While some in the group may not agree with my conclusion, I find that the personal attacks are very much diminished. Twas a good lesson for me to learn.
Just trying to help,
5412
