'Talking points'

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This is really a pet peave of mine - I see people on both sides throwing this term around, 'Oh, they're just spouting talking points that got shoved up their sleeve'. It seems like its hard to have a political conversation, with things that you've even checked, examined, only may have heard in passing but lined up with your own understanding of the world and when someone may bring that up in a debate - either private or public, people like to act as though there's this 20 point list on the Fox News website and a 20 point list on Moveon.org.

I can't understand how people put up with or even promote this crap unless they actually mean to play some underhanded games. The reason being - facts either stand or don't stand *on their own*. The term 'talking points' is a bid to pejoratize information or ideas in a much more blanket way than calling it socialist, fascist, communist, or neocon,etc.. Pejoratives are essentially bombs a person drops on their opponents IQ and their own, summarily ending meaningful conversation or analysis. When people invoke 'talking points', it seems like its they're way of saying that either a) they have no answer or defense to the criticism they're given or b) they simply don't care enough to explain their side of the story well enough to counter a few criticisms, supposedly hackneyed enough to imply that these thoughts were simply fed or brainwashed into their critics, which either means that they don't know what's going on or are far too superior to need to stoop so low as to really hold their beliefs under any real scrutiny. Either way it ends up being just as bad.

Don't get me wrong, I know there are questions of the 'So when did you stop beating your wife?' variety but it seems like it gets thrown at much more reasonable questions even more often.

So, when have you stopped beating your wife?

Talking points aren't necessarily a memorized list of points to stick to (well, they may be for a politician about to give a speech or enter a debate); talking points can also refer to the rehashed arguments people like to give when they're discussing political issues. This is why it often seems that you've heard it all before when you're discussing a heated issue like health-care reform, abortion, evolution vs. creationism, global warming, or economic-stimulus plans. They may not be consciously choosing to use arguments they read in a book, editorial, or blog; saw on TV; or got from friends—yet it often ends up happening.

Both sides, generally should know those and have answers that dissect the logic of the 'talking point' down its seams to where it falls apart on its own if it is garbage (ie. break it into its components, address its components, address why the suggestion of such a dynamic is false) - a skilled and thoughtful mind can pull that off and it worries me that we'd have people in the hights of our societies power - whether government, media, etc.. The side of an argument that uses the most pejoratives is the side that effectively spits into the wind the most as well as doing the most damage to the intelligence level of the dialog.

The times I object to "talking points" is when people are just repeating what they heard from pundits. You can usually tell if that's what someone is doing, because often the phrasing is quite similar, and almost as often the facts are completely wrong. At that point you know someone is just repeating BS they heard from someone else and not presenting their own opinions in any meaningful way.

Perhaps it isn't so much the issue of rehashing or talking points but rather a tic of echolalia...

Last edited by MissConstrue on 26 Feb 2010, 12:09 am, edited 1 time in total.

Agreed. There is a prolific poster here that regularly seems to slightly rephrase articles off of Counterpunch.org and post them as their own opinions, see if you can guess who it is!

Wouldn't start with an S and end with a D would it?

Oh shucks I keep forgetting....we're not suppose to talk about other members here...

And then, of course there are those who seem addicted to Biblical quotations.

And then there are those of us addicted to lyrical quotations...

Such as those from the lyricist John Lennon?

Talking points are generally a lie, repeated as truth. At least from my experience. It also happens to come from the group that is wrong and has no other option.

If you want a lesson in what talking points are AND how to screw up using them, listen to any interview Sara Palin has ever done. She has master spiting out random talking points and never making any sense, I find it entertaining until I remember that she was nearly the VP of the USA.

I wonder who that might be. When I find relevant material on Counterpunch I give direct links.

Not you, Sand, you attribute your sources and generally have original thought to go with them, though taking a break from Counterpunch probably isn't a bad idea, if you're not living in the States that place can give you a pretty gloomy picture of the situation of the ground here. No, the member I'm thinking of likes to post angry, semi-articulate rants backed up by sketchy journalism and the whole thesis of their posts is often lifted (without attribution) directly from a recent Counterpunch articles. Narrowing it down for you yet?

I readily admit that a part of the material on Counterpunch is over the top. But there is also a good deal of material with accurate names, places, and dates of negative material about what is going on in the States that never is exposed in other publications. This material is worth looking at and refuting if it is inaccurate. Unfortunately too much of it is discouragingly accurate.

I've never heard of counterpunch but now am interested.

*goes to look*