Framing talk as fact-exchange makes political conversation feel intimidating and pointless.

Evidence

The focus on facts also made conversation and debate intimidating and irrelevant: if all I can do is offer facts for someone else to memorize, why not just leave that effort to the news and the textbooks? Betsy told me that Soviet TV had been at a nearby theme park and Gorbachev was in Pacific City. I had not heard about it, since I had been out of town, so I idly asked, expecting speculation more than a factual answer, why they picked the theme park. She said she ”could not remember any of the details.” Expanding her case, she added that she cannot remember anything ”like that.” — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1013

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Disengaged citizens read public debate as mere theatrical self-display — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1785; Privatism and fact-fetishism both deny politics’ dialogic nature. — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 944; Requiring technical facts to justify speech silences ordinary citizens entirely — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 991 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Sociable conversation loses its character when it pursues objective truth #corroborates (0.85) — Georg Simmel, The Sociology of Georg Simmel, 2253
• Impersonal factual and personal self-interest talk are two sides of the same anti-political coin #expands (0.83) — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1502