Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.
The bullshit asymmetry principle aka Brandolini’s Law which states that debunking bad faith claims is an order of magnitude more difficult than creating the bullshit to begin with is a natural consequence of this behavior, and it’s one the conservatives have used forever. The torrent of absolute bat shit crazy nonsense flooding right wing media is extremely difficult to pull someone out of once they’ve been drawn in. We need to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine
If we’re doing quotes, this Sartre one is good:
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7870768-never-believe-that-anti-semites-are-completely-unaware-of-the-absurdity
Basically they often know they’re being absurd, but they don’t care. They use language for power and effect, not truth.
The bullshit asymmetry principle aka Brandolini’s Law which states that debunking bad faith claims is an order of magnitude more difficult than creating the bullshit to begin with is a natural consequence of this behavior, and it’s one the conservatives have used forever. The torrent of absolute bat shit crazy nonsense flooding right wing media is extremely difficult to pull someone out of once they’ve been drawn in. We need to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine