Undermining (was: Curiosity – Caffeine Is Bad)

[Lebowski]

@anonymous58

You didn’t give arguments for Elliot to respond to. You didn’t engage in debate. You didn’t directly, openly say what the issues/criticisms are, which would let readers judge for themselves about each point. You suggested his arguments aren’t good enough without being specific. It’s indirect because, instead of (directly) stating your criticisms, you talked about them without sharing what they were. There’s no good way to defend against or counter that kind of negativity.

I agree my statement was indirect with regard to Elliot’s article in the way that you say.

Here’s my guess as to why I didn’t see it before: I did not want to debate Elliot about caffeine. That’s one reason why I said I was undecided, rather than in disagreement. Instead, what I wanted to contradict and debate was anonymous57’s summary of my position, to which my statement was a direct reply:

@anonymous57

Here’s my attempt to summarize your position:

The only moral caffeine is my caffeine. Caffeine is bad in general, and other people ingesting caffeine are making mistakes. I have super good logical reasons to ingest caffeine, but they don’t.

I didn’t (and don’t) know how to concisely contradict anonymous57’s summary without being indirect with regard to Elliot’s article. I could have simply said the summary is incorrect because I’m undecided about whether caffeine is bad in general or for me specifically, omitting any mention of Elliot’s article. I don’t think that would have actually been better WRT Elliot’s article though. The context of this thread implies I read and was unconvinced by the article but my revised statement doesn’t say that outright (maybe I just didn’t read the article yet, but maybe I did and was unconvinced). So it’s just more indirect, not better.

Any ideas about what I could have said to debate anonymous57’s summary of my position without being indirect WRT Elliot’s article?

@anonymous58

And people often will respond to a direct defense by denying they were even attacking the article (while continuing to hint that they are).

Maybe it seems like that’s what I’m doing here. From my (conscious) perspective, I was getting drawn into a debate I didn’t seek and didn’t want to have. Maybe my subconscious wanted to have it, but if so I don’t know why. I really am undecided about caffeine and don’t want to take the pro-caffeine side in a debate.