It’s only as serious as you take it and then make it.

Readership: All
Theme: Community / Infighting / Metacognitions / Problems with The Red Pill / Sectarianism / The Gift of Singleness
Length: 900 words
Reading Time: 5 minutes

Intro

While living in Taiwan for a couple of decades, I’ve noticed a social tactic that men often use to deal with tense situations.  Whenever an offense has been committed, either accidental or intentional, one has the choice to take it seriously, which may very well lead to kung fu fisticuffs and/or expensive lawsuits lasting for years.  But if the issue is minor, and not deemed worthy of that level of energy, money, risk, and time, instead one may choose to laugh it off and walk away.  As an expression of forgiveness and grace, laughing it off often proves to be the most expedient and wisest response in most situations.

Derek L. Ramsey has written a thoughtful essay entitled Anonymity and Plagiarism (2024/6/17), in which he has argued that I have ‘deceived’ readers by plagiarizing their writings.

Initially, I wasn’t planning to respond to this accusation because it is peripheral to the purpose of the blog.  Also because Derek has stated on several occasions that his purpose is to derail discussions here on Σ Frame, claiming that he must do what he can to deconstruct arguments that follow after false lines of reasoning — ‘mental masturbations’ as Adam Piggott might say.  (Of course, I disagree with this characterization.)  So I recognized this charge as a ridiculous concoction meant to distract and obfuscate.  “Laughing it off” seemed to be the wiser response.

However, I reconsidered addressing this issue because I realized that this remarque kind of gets to the root of the mental puzzle that Founding Questions brought up: What is Seriousness? (2024/7/16).

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What is Seriousness?

I believe Derek’s opinions deserve the respect of a decent reply, but this is difficult when he has mischaracterized my stances with disingenuous candor.  Respect begets respect. Even though I might assume he has honestly misunderstood, if I took Derek’s false accusations seriously, would that in fact be “seriousness”?

Furthermore, would readers take me seriously if I took Derek seriously?

For instance, if I responded by saying,

“First of all, I’d like to thank Derek for pointing out how my writings can be improved.”

Or…

“I appreciate Derek for caricaturizing my writings to suggest that I’m a charlatan.”

… would that be sarcastic, satirical, sincere, or serious?  How would readers be able to tell?

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From these statements alone, readers cannot be certain.  Rather, readers must read a large number of statements to determine my overall philosophical position and disposition towards Derek, and then interpret the statement according to their own estimations of my attitude towards him.  But most readers honestly wouldn’t know, and many wouldn’t even care.  For those who do “take it seriously”, at some point, this question descends into a meta analysis — a confusing “he said I said you said she said” melodrama, getting lost in SubScRipt land”, and falling into analysis paralysis.  In reality, readers will not go to all the trouble to sort out the tedium, but will instead believe whatever strikes their wits at first reading.

This type of confusion is not limited to this case study or my interactions with Derek, but appears quite frequently within text-based interactions online. Hence, why I believe this deserves a blog post.

Post Truth Stuff

Whether a topic is treated with seriousness all depends on the values and opinions of the reader.  That is, if the reader generally agrees with the viewpoint of what he is reading, he is more likely to take it as a serious treatment of the matter.  Whereas, if he disagrees, he is more likely to “laugh it off”, and/or conclude that the author did not take the issue seriously.

Thus, from a larger frame, we might ask whether ‘seriousness’ is of value, or whether a more light-hearted or rhetorical or even sarcastic approach might be more effective.

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To offer my readers a tentative conclusion of this question, I’ll posit that for many issues (more and more these days) there does not exist a litmus test for ‘seriousness’ that can be externally and objectively applied.  Why? Because ‘seriousness’ largely depends on what one already believes about the matter being discussed, and whether one deems it worthy of their time. The conclusions reached by the reader are ultimately determined by what they preemptively believe upon going into it, and whatever influence one’s consciousness and set of values has upon their perception of the intent of the argument, and NOT so much on the logical rigor, validity, or even the truth content of the argument itself.

IOW, it’s ‘Post Truth’ stuff.

And if it’s too boring, too confusing, too convoluted, too deep, too fisky, too formal, too hard, too long, too meandering, too pointless, too tedious, too trivial, or too unsettling…

It’s NEXT!

For those who are ‘serious’, I’ll answer Derek’s charge of plagiarism in a future post.

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