A Glutton for Argument: Feast But Do Not Gorge on Words

A Glutton for Argument: Feast But Do Not Gorge on Words September 28, 2016

Pickwick_papers,_Mr_Pickwick_et_ses_compagnons_trinquent_à_la_santé_de_Mr_Pell43-1_optArgument can help save your soul (by God’s grace) or be a way to damn it.

Bad arguments happen when a husband and wife who disagree disagreeably. He cannot see why she cannot see what is obvious while she cannot understand why he does not understand the truth. Each pound away to win. Sometimes one will use soft persuasion, the offers of treats, to placate the other into compliance or words will hammer away until exhaustion produces consensus. These are arguments, disagreements, but they take words, one of God’ s great gifts to humankind, and turn them into incantations to manipulate. The words are multiplied and we gorge on them to get what we want.

Love is lost and we grow sick to our stomachs on words.

We are like the person who prefers mediocre all you can eat buffets to a true meal of delicious food carefully prepared. Arguments, discussions, rants, wooing words, passionate mic drop moments: we have them and then when we get our way, when the last friend is dropped from our Facebook feed who dares persist in speaking up and disagreeing, then we are done.

Arguments like this and people who make them leave us sick of arguments. “No more,” we think when we see the angry man who will not rest while somebody, somewhere, somehow has not seen his truth. Pity the spouse, the child, the student, or the workers who are stuck with this kind of argument.

Most of us know that there is a different sort of disagreement or discussion. Here we fight hard for the truth and can even passionately disagree, but the object is the truth. We pursue Virtue, Wisdom, and Joy together. We may talk late into the night (or an hour past the end of class!), but this argument is going someplace good.

There are gluttons for arguments and those who create a feast of words for friends. The feast may be spicy, but it leaves us wanting more tomorrow. Nobody’s opinion is safe, but every person is safe! The good marriage, school, church, or business has good arguments. The bad have only manipulation through fear or placation through rewards.

We might think: “Surely not us. We would not gorge on words while making no progress. We are open minded. Whatever we do or say is for ‘their’ good  . . .”  We know how to disagree agreeably, even though our staff turns over constantly and we cannot keep friends.

Our confidence in our ability to argue well and not badly is weakened when we see Socrates falling into using words instead of being guided by them. He faces a very difficult student, an angry young man with every bad ideas. He is alt-Right: strength is right. He scares Socrates and the teacher puts him in his place hard. The great man tames the wild man, but leaves him unable to speak.

Socrates has his fill of it, but says:

I have not dined well, however—[354b] by my own fault, not yours. But just as gluttons1 snatch at every dish that is handed along and taste it before they have properly enjoyed the preceding, so I, methinks, before finding the first object “Wof our inquiry—what justice is—let go of that and set out to consider something about it . …

What was the result of glutting himself on words? Socrates, the man whose life mission was to know himself and look for the truth through discussion, says: 

When I said this I thought I was free from the discussion . . .

Socrates wanted to be free from the discussion as shocking as if Sherlock Holmes tired of solving crimes or Homer Simpson became sick of donuts. The search for truth is revived by two feisty young men who do not care if Socrates is sated, they wish to learn. He has gorged himself on arguments, skipping from one idea to the next as he wishes, but they want to be truly educated.

Socrates, the teacher or guide, has followed his lesson plan, tamed the uppity student while burning him out on the discussion, and is ready to go. His job is done, but because he is a good teacher, he is not satisfied. Of course, because he is a good teacher and is facing a very messed up and even dangerous student, Socrates may have done his best in a bad situation. He has silenced the bad kid, but he has educated nobody.

What saves the day is that Socrates is not satisfied with “winning.” He knows something is wrong. He does not even care who is to blame, but this has been no feast and he feels responsible. The great virtue of Socrates is when two good students push him to keep going, he does. 

The good students are not persuaded. They like the conclusion of the discussion, but not the way it was done.

Socrates, God help us be like he was, immediately perks up and changes. He sets out a feast of words together with his friends.

We can do the same in a marriage when the “winner” realizes the “loser” has only given up or been bought not persuaded. We are not a “we” when we argue badly, but you and me. When Socrates discusses his feelings at the end of the bad discussion it is all “I.” There is no community, no city, no republic of ideas.

Words should direct us to the Word. We move from many words to the Word of God. We do this. You can argue with one person doing all the talking, but you cannot discuss (the good argument). You can lecture with everyone doing social media in the room, but we cannot discuss without full engagement. We can be a glutton for words, ignoring the topic to focus on what we feel, what interests us, what our opinions are. By contrast, when we work together to make a feast of words, then there will be spicy, savory, and sweet. We will both have our fill, but no more. We will be satisfied.

The good discussion will feed and nourish us, if we will only plan, prepare, and cook a feast and let the buffet of opinions, emotions, and ideas,  “my” words, sit under the heating lamps uneaten!

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Props to the students at the college at The Saint Constantine School for helping provoke some of these thoughts by exploring Republic I and I with me. Mistakes are mine.


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