What’s Wrong with the World

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What’s Wrong with the World is dedicated to the defense of what remains of Christendom, the civilization made by the men of the Cross of Christ. Athwart two hostile Powers we stand: the Jihad and Liberalism...read more

On attacking the person you have wronged

From Barchester Towers, by Anthony Trollope:

Wise people, when they find they are in the wrong, always put themselves right by finding fault with the people against whom they have sinned. Lady DeCourcy was a wise woman; and therefore, having treated Miss Thorne very badly by staying away till three o'clock, she assumed the offensive and attacked Mr. Thorne's roads. Her daughter, not less wise, attacked Miss Thorne's early hours. The art of doing this is among the most precious of those usually cultivated by persons who know how to live. There is no withstanding it. Who can go systematically to work, and having done battle with the primary accusation and settled that, then bring forward a counter-charge and support that also? Life is not long enough for such labours. A man in the right relies easily on his rectitude, and therefore goes about unarmed. His very strength is his weakness. A man in the wrong knows that he must look to his weapons; his very weakness is his strength. The one is never prepared for combat, the other is always ready. Therefore it is that in this world the man that is in the wrong almost invariably conquers the man that is in the right, and invariably despises him.

Discuss.

Comments (8)

The one is never prepared for combat, the other is always ready.

I was pretty much up to him until the section that's summed up in this bit; the man who assumes that it's enough to be right, and will not fight to defend it, is either foolish, holds it cheap, or has never been challenged.

Basically, the quote makes me think of Dark Helm's line about how evil will always win becausegood is dumb.

That said, the line: Who can go systematically to work, and having done battle with the primary accusation and settled that, then bring forward a counter-charge and support that also? sounds like something I'd want as a tag line-- "Who can systematically battle against primary accusations, then bring forth a counter-charge and support it in good manner? THERE IS SOMEONE ON THE INTERNET WHO IS WRONG MAN CAN!!!!

It does make one think of the Internet, doesn't it? And, yes, Trollope is somewhat given to hyperbole. But I think most normal people don't really want to be that guy in the cartoon saying he can't come to bed because someone on the Internet is wrong. So even leaving out the hyperbole, it is indeed true that it's all too easy to bring up frivolous accusations or objections and much harder--indeed, impossible--to answer every single one of them carefully and in detail.

That's why it's Alinsky tactics, no?

Probably a generational/cultural thing, sadly. Same way that my grandparents would have NEVER talked politics in polite company, my parents are horribly uncomfortable with it, and my generation is forced to either talk it or let people take your lack of speaking up as a weapon to make any belief but theirs unthinkable.

A thought came to mind... since nobody else is here....

A while back I noticed that there's a tactic in comboxes of shifting the conversation. It occurs that this is the same sort of thing. The solution I've found is to hammer away at that same point, rather than let the dancers choose the ground they want to fight or feign on-- you don't need to answer every question in detail, or even with more than "you still haven't answered X." It's rude, but so is a shifting ground attack, and it removes the "gain" from that rudeness and seems to prevent it in the future....

A while back I noticed that there's a tactic in comboxes of shifting the conversation

A while back? It's all human nature and been around since dirt. And we think each other are doing it because people seldom turn their beliefs on a dime no matter what, and also merely because of different personality types (sometimes we"re wrong that someone is "shifting"). It's the way God made us. Patience and persistence are what wise people use to discover the truth. We can thank God he didn't make us so that we'd analyze and reevaluate beliefs too fast or we'd be unstable and communities far more fragile than they are. And you never know whose mind you changed ten years later.

I think the quote is all good until the concluding part:

The one is never prepared for combat, the other is always ready. Therefore it is that in this world the man that is in the wrong almost invariably conquers the man that is in the right, and invariably despises him.

I don't think that follows. All depends on what he means by combat, but nuance seems abandoned here. The wise man allows himself to be conquered in some ways, and not in others. Wisdom is knowing when, and making oneself able beforehand since that is the only way to do many things. Christ went around astonishing people. The modern conceit is that we now get the plan he was using, so we wouldn't be astonished like his contemporaries were and we'd all get him. But I think wisdom is in judgement, which is highly fluid, creative, and unpredictable. I suppose if he walked among us today about the same proportion of people would be shocked now as then in watching his actions, and thus about the same proportion stumble over him.

......it is indeed true that it's all too easy to bring up frivolous accusations or objections and much harder--indeed, impossible--to answer every single one of them carefully and in detail.
C S Lewis coined the word "Bulverism" (originated by the imaginary Ezekiel Bulver) as the title of an essay which was published in the anthology, God in the Dock. It's a label for the philosophical emptiness of the impudent manoeuvre in political and moral debate in which a person's arguments are ignored so that his motive or person becomes the object of analysis.

I believe the use of "wise" in the quote was meant either as a reverence to wise in that which is worldly, or even a sarcasm.

As such, the conceit becomes clear, that the worst of villains will ever cry to be the victim of the innocent while robbing him. It performs the need to rationalize his sin away while turning attention back towards the imperfect nature of the wronged party.

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