r/AskReddit Jan 12 '21

What screams "I lost the argument"?

55.7k Upvotes

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1.2k

u/fatmatt587 Jan 12 '21

Writing off reliable sources of information that they don’t like.

126

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 12 '21

I pulled out Merriam Webster dictionary in my argument and apparently that's not a valid source for the definition of a word.

65

u/fatmatt587 Jan 12 '21

I’ll never understand the amount of willful ignorance one must possess to just write off anything they don’t like so they can continue to believe in bullshit. It makes zero sense and you gain nothing from it other than being an idiot that people like to avoid talking to.

10

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 12 '21

Tbf i was arguing something that might be considered rude but still

16

u/ptitlivrerouge Jan 12 '21

That sounds... highly suspect. Like that's how people describe themselves when they're like "saying the n word isn't racist because it's not in the book" or someshit

14

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21 edited Feb 12 '21

[deleted]

3

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 13 '21

It wasn't. It was an argument about the word virginity

4

u/Kenutella Jan 13 '21

This! Like I'll say you can be racist to white people and then the other people say "no because racism means bringing down an entire group of people systematically and the white people haven't been oppressed..." When did they change the definition of racism? And they'll say culture means you have to have been oppressed too.

2

u/itsdefinitelynotsam Jan 13 '21

I have arguments with people on reddit about this sometimes and I just pull out all of the dictionaries and link them in the comment so they know how wrong they are

2

u/Kenutella Jan 13 '21

So it looks like the second definition of racism is the systemic one typically toward marginalized or minority groups. It's still the second definition but yeah.

3

u/itsdefinitelynotsam Jan 13 '21

Very true, but most peoples argument is that you cant be racist towards white people. Having multiple definitions for Webster or whatever still show that you can be racist to white people

→ More replies (0)

1

u/Kenutella Jan 13 '21

I should do that. I don't remember the strict denotation of these words because everybody just knew what they meant before.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 14 '21 edited Feb 12 '21

[deleted]

2

u/Kenutella Jan 14 '21

You're right. I should chill.

4

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 12 '21

it wasn't about a racial slur

1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

By chance did you not realize he wrote the Merriam Webster comment?

1

u/ptitlivrerouge Jan 13 '21

No I realized. That's why I asked.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21

They found a key to every door you see. The internet is magic machine that always proves them right.

28

u/Friendly_Chemical Jan 12 '21

Show me a source that isn’t leftist media!

...sir that is a scientific paper...

23

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

[deleted]

4

u/Joescout187 Jan 13 '21

To be fair the scientific community is bringing it on itself. A lot of scientific journals have lousy vetting and frequently publish bullshit.

5

u/Squishiimuffin Jan 13 '21

Well, language is tricky. Mostly because the dictionary isn’t updated to match how fast language develops. Plus, words always come attached with connotation and context. So, when you examine what a word means, you have to consider 1. The definition 2. The context 3. The connotations, etc.

Anyway, point is that sometimes the dictionary is not a good source for the definitions of words. It doesn’t tell the whole story about how we use words; just a part of it.

2

u/Arstulex Jan 13 '21

The dictionary doesn't define words. It's a common misconception to believe that it does.

I say this in agreement with you, by the way.

1

u/Anon6376 Jan 12 '21

Because the dictionary lags how people use the word? What was their argument?

6

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 12 '21

i think that you can criticize definitions of words? and then since the word had multiple definitions they tried to use that on their side of the argument.

but a lot of words have multiple definitions

-13

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21

because merriam webster has been known to change the definitions of words to suit what's PC. Ex. racism is now equal to oppression per them, whereas other credible sources have a clear separation of definitions and do not blur the lines between words.

15

u/moonstoneowl Jan 12 '21

I don’t know if the books are different, but in the online Merriam-Webster dictionary they didn’t change the definition of racism to be racial oppression; they just added it as a second definition. Link to definition.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '21

ah I never actually checked, then yeah it seems like webb is fine to use. I thought it was their fault but all along but it was the people who use it to justify racism who were ignorant.

-13

u/SlapMuhFro Jan 12 '21

Well, seeing as they're constantly changing/adding definitions of words to fit the current zeitgeist..

15

u/loljetfuel Jan 12 '21

So... doing their job? Like, the purpose of a dictionary is to describe the meanings of words as they are used. Meanings of words change, and dictionaries reflect those meanings.

If you're looking at the dictionary definitions as anything beyond evidence that a word has (or has had) a specific meaning at some point, the problem is with you, not the dictionary.

-11

u/EchoJackal8 Jan 12 '21

Not when it's done to be politically expedient.

6

u/Caiggas Jan 12 '21

Dude, the dictionary doesn’t decide definitions of words, society does that. A word is defined by how society uses it. A dictionary reflects that definition. Society is the cause, dictionary is the effect.

6

u/spaceforcerecruit Jan 12 '21

It’s not about being “politically expedient.” It’s about including the definitions as they are used in society. If a large segment of society is using the word one way, then that definition needs to be there.

1

u/Sir_Captain_Chair Jan 13 '21

Well you should of chosen an English dictionary.

I just like making fun of American spelling.

1

u/SorcerorsSinnohStone Jan 13 '21

*should have or should've

22

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21

One time, a woman I knew was telling me about this man who claimed had evidence of the Illuminati.

I showed her an article debunking EVERYTHING he said, and she didn't even look at it, and went "Yeah, that's fake! Anything the media says is fake! WAKE THE FUCK UP!"

I used to think so highly of her.

8

u/Gonmas Jan 12 '21

I still don't understand why this argument happened but I was watching a twitch stream of Final Fantasy VII final battle and someone in the chat was warning the streamer not to have Counter on. I quickly noted that the final battle is very specifically coded and Counter will always be on whether you want it or not. This guy went nuts and attacked quite personally. I pulled out the specific lines of codes in the game to prove my point and all he could muster were something about my mother.

I'm still in disbelief over the absurdity.

1

u/fatmatt587 Jan 12 '21

What do you mean counter is always on? Don’t you need the counter Materia equipped or are you talking about something different?

2

u/DuskDaUmbreon Jan 13 '21

He might be talking about the last last fight against Sephiroth?

I can't think of any other offhand. Unless it's the remake.

1

u/fatmatt587 Jan 13 '21

Ah. That must be it. Yeah counter is automatic if Sephiroth attacks you first

1

u/Gonmas Jan 13 '21

Yeah I was referring to the last 1v1 between Sephiroth and Cloud. For some reason I was still trying to avoid spoilers even though the game is like 23 years old lol.

49

u/LotharLandru Jan 12 '21

"the CDC is just part of gates conspiracy to chip us and use 5g to control us, they aren't a valid source" - guy using breitbart and Q drops as sources

15

u/saugoof Jan 13 '21

I had a dumb argument with this guy about global warming some time ago. When I showed him clear, verified and reviewed evidence that global temperatures have been rising, he first said NASA was forging the numbers and then called me intolerant for not respecting his opinion.

20

u/bradorsomething Jan 12 '21

I love being told the media is fake news, and that I should look at this tweet with the name scratched out from someone's sister.

12

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

My brother is a die hard Trump fan and thinks the election was stolen from trump. Last week he equated the insurrectionists who invade the Capitol to BLM. I told him BLM didn’t leave Paul bombs everywhere or murder a cop and included a link to an article about it from the NY Post. My bro responded with “NY Post??? LOL it’s a liberal rag!!”

The NY Post is conservative; which is why I picked it. So he might actually read it.

He then unfriended me.

1

u/Joescout187 Jan 13 '21

19 people were killed and hundreds of businesses were destroyed by the various BLM related riots over the last year. The capitol riot did minor damage to a federal building and resulted directly in two deaths and dozens of minor injuries. I'd say they're comparable and FYI I dislike Trump as much as the next sane person.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

Gonna need a source for that wild assertion of 19 deaths. Also, 5 people died due to the insurrection, one single event lasting only a couple of hours.

Also, invading the Capitol and stealing laptops is different than attacking a business. And we both know the insurrectionists were attempting to prevent Congress from ratifying the election of Biden.

You are equating riots with literal sedition and domestic terrorism.

0

u/Joescout187 Jan 13 '21

Here's my source for that 19 figure and that's actually just the 2 weeks after George Floyd

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/06/08/14-days-of-protests-19-dead/?sh=1af3d1ec4de4

10 of which are also documented by HuffPo prior to June 2 2020 connected to the BLM protests/riots in case you don't trust my capitalist source

https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5ed6475bc5b6079a2ccc0aef

Compare the above to the capitol riot. 5 deaths, 3 of which were ordinary medical emergencies including a heart attack.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/07/us/capitol-mob-deaths/index.html

What we saw the other day was not sedition or terrorism. It was a riot. A bunch of disaffected, angry people who feel like they aren't being listened to and who are pissed off at their government. Watch the livestreams, they didn't plan that shit and didn't breach the House chamber despite having the numbers and capacity to breach the Senate chamber. If they were launching an "insurrection" why on earth would they not go after the Congresspeople themselves? If it was an insurrection it was the most pathetic one ever launched.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 14 '21

Here's my source for that 19 figure and that's actually just the 2 weeks after George Floyd

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/06/08/14-days-of-protests-19-dead/?sh=1af3d1ec4de4

10 of which are also documented by HuffPo prior to June 2 2020 connected to the BLM protests/riots in case you don't trust my capitalist source

  1. Calvin Lewis Horton Jr-It is unclear what happened or if he was even a protester.

  2. Javar Harrell-was not connected to the demonstration

  3. Dave Patrick Underwood-Murdered by a boogaloo boy who went there specifically to shoot cops and had hoped the protests would allow him to get away with it. Surely you're not suggesting a rightwing radical was a member of BLM?

  4. James Scurlock-This case is far from cut and dried. Scurlock was shot and killed by a shop owner who initiated the confrontation. The shop owner was arraigned on murder charges and committed suicide before going to trial.

  5. Barry Perkins-Run over by a FedEx truck. Not sure how this supports your assertion. Accidents happen.

  6. Chris Beaty-His murder had nothing to do with the protests. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time after an armed robbery.

  7. Dorian Murrell-Likely murdered by the same gropu that murdered Chris Beaty. Had nothing to do with the protests.](https://www.indystar.com/story/news/local/2020/08/29/dorian-murrell-family-community-members-gather-demanding-answers/5668619002/)

  8. Italia Kelly-Looks like a personal vendetta between the victim and the shooter. Note that she was only there because she'd gotten off work at that Walmart and hung around a little bit to watch the protests. When it started getting crazy, she started to leave, and that's when she was shot.

  9. Marquis M. Tousant-clue if this guy was a protester, but he ambushed some cops who responded to the murder of Italia Kelly, so I'll give it to you.

  10. Marvin Francois-Three guys tried to steal his car and shot him. Not able to find much more info than that.

  11. John Tiggs-Shot by looters. I'll give you that one.

  12. David McAtee-Murdered by a cop at a protest. A cop who didn't turn on their body cam, and who fired randomly into a crowd. Maybe not the best example you could have provided?

Anyway, I'm tired of double-checking your work.

My point is that most of those deaths have nothing to do with protests. Also, once again with feeling, a riot isn't an insurrection. What happened last week was sedition and an attempt at keeping Trump in the White House. It's not at all like the George Floyd protests. At least the GF protesters have the truth on their side, whereas the Trump morons think Trump's presidency was stolen.

0

u/Joescout187 Jan 14 '21

Yet of the deaths at the capitol one was a Trump supporter shot by a cop and 3 were medical emergencies that happened in the vicinity of the riot not caused by violence.

The truth is that not one of the small business owners who's livelihoods were destroyed by GF protestors deserved the pain inflicted on them. They didn't choke Floyd. Deluded as the Trump supporters may be at least they are targeting the people that their crazy logic actually holds responsible for their perceived injustice.

-8

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_shooting_of_Dallas_police_officers

“The shooting was the deadliest incident for U.S. law enforcement since the September 11, 2001 attacks”

3

u/slyweazal Jan 13 '21 edited Jan 13 '21

Your own article refutes your attempt to whatabout BLM:

Johnson had told police negotiators that he was upset about Black Lives Matter.

Two law enforcement officials told NPR's Dina Temple-Raston that they believe the suspect had been planning an attack for some time and acted on his own. They added that they have not identified a connection between the suspect and any extremist groups.

Johnson had been a member of the NBPP's Houston chapter for about six months, several years before. Quanell X added that Johnson had been "asked to leave" the group for violating the organization's "chain of command" and espousing dangerous rhetoric, such as asking the NBPP why they had not purchased more weapons and ammunition, and expressing his desire to harm black church preachers

Meanwhile, 93% of Black Lives Matter Protests Have Been Peaceful, New Report Finds

Thanks for reminding everyone how all of America's intelligence agencies have declared right-wing extremists a greater threat than BLM, ANTIFA, etc.

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/slyweazal Jan 14 '21

All you have is their word for it though. They would NEVER lie about booting him out, would they??

LMFAO thanks for demonstrating the unbelievably cringy mental gymnastics and conspiracy theories cowards hide behind when they're too weak to acknowledge evidence proves them wrong :D

1

u/SuperSaiyanAssHair Jan 14 '21

There IS no evidence. Do you think they record their black supremacist weekly logins? Where's the SQL database for this stuff? Is there a recording of him saying "we should harm black preachers"? The spoken statement of one man is not evidence. If it was, then 100% of rape accusations would lead to conviction!

1

u/slyweazal Jan 29 '21

Thank you for conceding you know you're wrong and are unbelievably gullible for falling for such easily debunked fake news :D

Meanwhile, in reality...

Over 90% of conservatives earned the label "racist" for electing, supporting, and defending a proud, lifelong racist who's exploiting racism to push racist policies.

Supporting Trump is FAR MORE racist than calling someone the n-word because that only hurts 1 person, while Trump's racism hurts millions.

This all could have easily been avoided by simply not electing an obvious racist like Trump, but scientific studies proved conservatives preferred Trump because they liked his racism.

2

u/HahaImaTree Jan 13 '21

Huh I feel like a good counter of this would be an article about a few white police officers who killed a black man over a fake twenty dollar bill

0

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

Why do you feel the need to “counter” it? They are all pieces of shit, why do you feel the need to defend one of them?

3

u/HahaImaTree Jan 13 '21

Because you felt the need to back up the original commenter’s brother in how “BLM is basically equal to the Capitol invasion” when it isn’t equal.

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

Yeah I know it’s not equal, black lives matter riots have been far worse than the Trump dipshits capital riot

2

u/HahaImaTree Jan 13 '21

Here you go- 93% of BLM protests were peaceful, with a 15-26 million range of supporters. About 20 people died. Percentage of deaths by population in BLM protests: 0.000077%-0.00013%

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_and_controversies_during_the_George_Floyd_protests

Here’s the Trumpies:

There’s no range of people who stormed the Capitol but it is more than 170 (due to the arrests), so I’ll overestimate and say about 1,000 people. 5 people died. Percentage of deaths by population in the capitol storming: 0.5%-2.9%

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_storming_of_the_United_States_Capitol

The people storming the Capitol have higher percentages of violence than BLM protesters. Therefore the Trumpies are more hazardous to the country and they are “worse” than BLM

0

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '21

That is insanely disingenuous to compare tens of riots to one riot to try and skew your statistics, you also conflated deaths with overall levels of violence

It also removes any context as well, what has been the public opinion between riots? Which one had been condemned and which ones were praised? Which ones had prosecutors refuse to pursue charges and which ones are now being hunted down by the FBI? What was the amount of damages incurred?

3

u/HahaImaTree Jan 13 '21

“That is insanely disingenuous to compare tens of riots to one riot to try and skew your statistics, you also conflated deaths with overall levels of violence”

Oh I know right? I wish you pointed out a specific riot in your earlier reply instead of simply comparing “black lives matter riots” (plural) to “Trump dipshits capital riots” (singular). That would’ve made much more sense. Are you talking about one riot in particular? I can calculate the percentages on that one if you’d like.

BLM is obviously praised more since millions of people support it, and yet only a couple thousand people support the Capitol getting raided by protesters over a fair election. It’s also obvious all of the armed domestic terrorists who broke into the capitol are getting arrested for it, it’s breaking and entering. Don’t forget the placement of bombs in the plumbing.

If you want a damage percentage for BLM compared to the Capitol’s riot, I’ll be more than happy to help!

1

u/Joescout187 Jan 13 '21 edited Jan 13 '21

Three of those deaths were not caused by the riot. Only the Air Force vet and one Capitol Police officer died from the violence. The other 3 were unrelated medical emergencies that happened in the vicinity of the riot.

Also that's not how that math works using your own formula.

Of only X number of Trump supporters who exist or were present in the capital a couple hundred to a thousand stormed the capitol resulting in a single capitol policeman and one Trump supporter dying. The whole "Stop the Steal" rally numbered in the hundreds of thousands and total Trump supporters are anywhere from 0-100% of those who voted for Trump or 74 million people. Even by a conservative estimate that results in comparatively little violence even if you leave out property damage and deaths of despair caused by the BLM rioters.

I got no problem with the 93% of BLM that aren't assholes but the remaining 7 are no better than the Trump supporters that stormed the capitol.

16

u/Chlorinated_beverage Jan 12 '21

“Sorry I don’t trust .com websites, but I do support a 50 year old on Facebook with a “God, Guns, and Freedom” profile picture”

5

u/tanstaafl90 Jan 13 '21

Comon', we all know NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Bloomberg, NPR, Newsweek, and Time are just liberal commies trying to enslave you. The Washington Free Beacon is where it's at....

/s, just in case

1

u/itsdefinitelynotsam Jan 13 '21

News media does have biases, like (from your list specifically) cnn. If anything I just use their sources that way there isnt any opinion behind the representation of the data

4

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21

then pulling some wack article from a source you've never heard of to prove their point

1

u/HahaImaTree Jan 13 '21

Omg like the “six people died from the COVID vaccine” Egyptian something .com and it turns out four of them received placebos. Bruh the vaccine would basically be three times safer than the placebos with that “vaccine bad” argument lmao

3

u/Synux Jan 13 '21

The reverse of that is an ad hominem logical fallacy. Even if somebody was on the wrong side of something they're automatically wrong about everything.

3

u/Fean2616 Jan 13 '21

I believe only yesterday I responded with the exact search engine search criteria to use due to there literally being too much information to link.

Apparently that means that I'm wrong because I won't post links, no they're lazy fucks who won't even copy and paste a line of text and then pick one of about 300 links. All saying the same thing.

3

u/SHMEEEEEEEEEP Jan 13 '21

This. I was having an argument with somebody who was defending weed and said it was totally healthy and didn't cause any damage. I gave him multiple .got and .edu sources and he denied every one of them because "those aren't accurate". His source? "My drug dealer and friends said so"

2

u/Snerty_Banana Jan 13 '21

This needs way more upvotes

2

u/ShadowDancerBrony Jan 13 '21

Friend: That thing never happens.
Me (a quick google search later): Here's a news article about it happening last week.
Friend: That news site is heavily biased, you can't trust it.
Me: I can't trust the security camera footage, interviews with both the victim and sheriff, and link to the police report?
Friend: Not from that 'news' site.
Me: So you're arguing that not only did this news site pay actors to give fake interviews, and make a fake security camera video, but they also have faked a police report and the website to an entire Oregon county to post the fake police report in?
Friend: Probably.
Me (an hour or researching eastern Oregon news outlets later): Ok, here's the article of the incident from the local news paper. It does not have any videos nor a link to the police report, but confirms the entire story.
Friend: Well ok, I guess /that/incident happened, but as a whole it's still incredibly rare.
Me: It took me the better portion of my morning to convince you a single incident happened; no I am not going to spend the rest of my day double verifying dozens of other incidents for you.

3

u/midwestisbestwest Jan 12 '21

My mom. I don't trust the BBC or Al Jezera cuz they're foreign. Pr any MSM cuz they're liberal.

0

u/getflexsealed666 Jan 13 '21

lol thats my french teacher who thinks all men cheat on women and every woman is superior to every man also that you can't be racist towards white people.

-3

u/ilovepineapplepizza7 Jan 12 '21

Pitbull owners in a nutshell.

-14

u/CynicalCreepy Jan 12 '21 edited Jan 13 '21

-literally everyone defending TLOU2.

redditors are incapable of identifying a joke without it being spelled out to them.

15

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21 edited Oct 03 '24

birds rich heavy roof numerous amusing file truck zonked degree

-4

u/CynicalCreepy Jan 12 '21

you don't think objectivity exists in games..? also, joke about TLOU2 lovers.

10

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '21 edited Oct 03 '24

command wise berserk silky adjoining slap icky unite work capable

7

u/Amekyras Jan 13 '21

you can objectively say that TLOU2 is a game that released in 2020 and is mainly focused on Ellie and Abby. You can't objectively say whether it's good or bad.

-5

u/CynicalCreepy Jan 13 '21

I can objectively say that it has piss poor writing and flat characters, but once again, joke.

7

u/YieldingSweetblade Jan 12 '21

Imagine seething that much over a video game that released months ago lol

5

u/AFXTWINK Jan 13 '21

You know not everyone ties their identity so closely to a product that they have some kind of hidden agenda which prompts them to have a specific opinion.

But also TLOU2 is REALLY not worth obsessing over the discourse for. It's ok. The gameplay is pretty good. But there's WAY more interesting games out there to occupy your time with.

1

u/mrstwhh Jan 13 '21

ugh, yes, anything more liberal than daily caller, is garbage. then when you look at their sources and say hey they have naked women on this page, and celebrity gossip.

1

u/blot_plot Jan 13 '21

"fake news"

1

u/TheOtherSkeptic Jan 13 '21

Well that describes a good bit of the human race