Patrick Dix
Kyle King
English 138T
3/13/13
Detail and Respect
Deliberation generally can involve groups of individuals coming together to debate or ponder
the parameters of an issue, and, hopefully, succeed upon achieving some form of common ground
between the parties. With the rising popularity of the internet, the idea of debate and deliberation
forums seem to be fantastic platforms for individuals to debate a variety of issues and act as a form of
instant gratification without having to go to a town hall of some sort. One would believe that this could
be quite effective; however, after a few weeks of personally participating in this online “deliberation”,
discussions tend to descend into being rude and negative, without truly achieving any progress other
than attacking the other deliberators’ beliefs. The only method of achieving effective deliberation
occurred in my participation on Facebook debate, where respectfulness and healthy discussion were
present.
In my search for deliberation and debate based websites, I found the website entitled
Debate.com. The name seemed obvious enough and, in turn, I assumed that deliberation on this
website would be fostered by individuals who are effectively well-read on their respective topics and
tend to respect the parameters of deliberation and debate. Proceeding to scroll through the various
forums on the website, I noticed a plethora of topics to choose from for deliberation, including
philosophy, society, economy, and even entertainment. In truth, the chances for deliberation and
debate on this website appeared to be fairly good because of the environment developed and
encouraged on the site.
I chose to begin on the “Society” forum, which were listed questions for the debate based
around moral and social issues today such as gun control, abortion, stem cell, and topics of controversy
that I found an interesting thread based around how our attitude and action as a society has led to the
gradual increase in gun violence in the United States. As I read through a few pages of comments, I
noticed a generally digression in the quality of discussion. While the beginning of the thread proved to
be well intentioned, by page two the comments were based around attacking personal political “right”
and “left”. It was by no means effective deliberation, so I attempted to get the discussion back on track
by stating an opinion on what is causing gun violence in America, and how to go about stopping it.
The responses were less than encouraging. Both comments that I received back stated
something to the effect that “I cannot personally understand that madness people go through because I
have not personally experienced poverty and desperation that would supposedly cause these feelings”.
The rebuttal I posted was shot down with similar fervor. The negativity of the proceeding comments
discouraged me from continuing to contribute to the “deliberation”, as it was accomplishing nothing
more than degrading the opinions of others. To me, this is the exact opposite of what deliberation is
supposed to accomplish, as all opinions and views should be encouraged to achieve common ground.
Personal attacks and unnecessary hyperbole foster nothing positive in the arena of debate.
After seeing the issues with deliberation on this forum, I kept within the moral topic and moved
to the philosophy forum. The first thread was based on the prompt “Can we forgive humanity?” To me,
this was already incredibly disheartening, because a title that vague can lead to nothing good in the
context of deliberation. I joined the thread nonetheless in order to get a better idea of what the thread’s
author was attempting to say. Without focusing upon legal matters, he asked us to judge whether
humanity had broken moral laws and if they could be forgiven for such transgressions. He did not
explain what morals laws had been broken, only that essentially they had no legal ramifications. Even
without a context for moral laws, I immediately disagreed, because to me, humanity created these
morals laws and, since this means they can be altered at any time, I do not see the idea the thread
author was trying to get across. I presented this in a polite form that would encourage his response, yet
even before I could post this, the thread had already descended into a series of personal attacks at the
anonymous author. I did not feel this was necessary; especially considering the topic could have
harbored an effective and informative debate of human philosophy. Instead, all I saw were several
internet “memes” and vulgar language surrounding the author’s topic. Again, I became frustrated and
decided to completely move off of this website, not only because the atmosphere of disrespect
continued, but also because the topic was almost too vague to create any form of healthy deliberation.
As I was scrolling through Facebook, I noticed a friend of mine had to do a similar online
deliberation project, and had posted a forum for discussion on all that entails the legalization of
marijuana, including economic and social effects, and the morality of it (keeping with the common
ground of morality). In all honesty, this is the only effective deliberation that occurred throughout my
exploration of the internet, which was surprising to me because Facebook debating often does not work
well. The comments were all well thought out, factual evidence was presented by various members of
the debate (a few of which I was not personally familiar with), and effective compromise was achieved
without attacked the personal political beliefs of any of the individuals involved in the debate.
Regardless of whether or not the individuals involved in the deliberation used marijuana themselves,
both sides showed each other the respect deserved in the debate. To me, this is how deliberation
should take place at all times. I felt that responses were encouraged and, because of the positivity and
openness surrounding the deliberation, it was easier for anyone to get involved and make how effective
the results were more widespread.
In final reflection on the online deliberation which I took part in, I would say that the overall
result was essentially negative. While the final deliberation of Facebook harbored more effective results,
the problems with the other topics discussed on Debate.com left a negative taste in my mouth. It is
unfortunate that a website entitled Debate.com that has such a well-constructed structure for debate
and deliberation can have so much personal strife and hyperbole within its forums. Perhaps it is the
users themselves, or maybe it is the topics presented for the users to speak about, I am not sure.
However, I do know that civil discussion about a controversial topic is possible (we proved it in class).
Therefore, even with the obstacle of random usernames on various websites, I feel that respectful
deliberation is possible online and, perhaps with more concerted effort, can be achieved.
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