Deborah Tannen The Argument Culture Analysis

Drifting Poles In her essay “The Argument Culture: Moving from Debate to Dialogue” Deborah Tannen speaks at length about how america and humanity in general have become more ideologically polarized and have drifted further and further away from compromise. This holds true in the modern America we see today. The country is being torn apart by bitter divisiveness and an unwillingness to even consider an inkling of the point of view of the opposition. This bitterness and deep seated resentment has caused rifts in the country which have serious consequences on our daily lives as americans. Our concept of a debate has begun to change, becoming a brawl of words and lies as opposed to a contest of ideas weighed by pros and cons. While real issues

This concept however, has become an ideal. Instead of the calm rational discussion that one expects would be stimulating despite being with someone who holds a different view, debates and discourse have become rather different. The idea of a discussion or even a conversation has become blurred with the concept of an argument. We gather or thoughts and ideas like bullets shooting them at the opposition hoping to batter them into submission with the perceived legitimacy of our argument, while simultaneously attempting to delegitimize their own viewpoint. This stems from how we approach those with opposing ideas, as an all or nothing scenario in which one must be infallible and the other, demonic. However this conflict oriented debate draws on only a select few, and can alienate many with informed opinions or enlightened ideas “when debate opposition and fights overwhelmingly predominate, those who enjoy verbal sparring are likely to take part” “and those who cannot comfortably take part in oppositional discourse, or do not wish to, are likely to opt out.” (495). When presented with more limited range of ideas inevitably the more radical ideas tend to rise to the surface. When this scenario is presented over and over again online and in the media it can create a perception that only these limited