We have good words for certain types of arguments, but I'm struggling with one, where you deliberately mis-define or re-define a term.
We have terms like dog-whistles, freeze peach, sealioning, and gaslighting. What is the term for purposefully mis-defining a term in an argument in order to shift the conversation?
Common examples that I see nearly every day:
- Claiming Zionism is about killing gentiles
- Claiming antisemism isn't real because "Jews aren't semites"
- Claiming that the Talmud says things it doesn't say
"Gaslighting" doesn't fit as the troll isn't trying to convince the author, just everyone else.
Sealioning often accompanies these things, but it doesn't directly fit.
Would love a term.
@emacsen
“Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”
— Jean-Paul Sartre in “Anti-Semite and Jew” (1948)
@BAPearlmutter
This is lovely. Thank you for posting it.