Debate and argument

[Vlad!]

With my little foray into the Downhere messageboards (you can read about that little adventure on the Music board if you want), I was shocked to see how they were unused to contoversy! It's obvious that they merely surround themselves with people who think like they do and spend alot of time agreeing with one another. I guess it's to be expected on an official fan messageboard, but I'm still quite surprised at how many of them just didn't know how to respond to an attempt at debate.
On the other hand, we at the Base take the view that debate is generally healthy because it exposes differing viewpoints and lets the participants understand the opposing side. This place would be no fun at all if every post I made had a page's worth of threads agreeing with me, and then we moved on to the next warm, fuzzy topic.

What do you guys think? I decided to let those poor Downhere fanboys and girls alone after they started deleting their own posts and breaking out the kumbaya-style warm fuzzies, but I certainly don't think that's a healthy attitude to take!

[DvChWi]

I agree with you completely that some debate is healthy(ironic, no?).  But there is a difference between healthy debate and all out arguement.  Just flat out bickering gets us nowhere, but intelligent debate can.

[Josh]

I was thinking about this as I read through L'Engle's Walking on Water last week. It was as if she went out of her way to avoid stepping on any toes, and therefore I was greatly offended.  =D

More on that book at the Literature board, as I find the time...