By all means, call it silly, all the more incentive to get to the bottom of it.

"more like the process of actually assembling a persuasive argument"

Why do you use "persuasive" there? If you were right you should be able to prove your point without politeness. Furthermore, if you /need/ politeness to be considered right, /then/ either they're buying bs or you're selling bs. Both are bad for this world.

In my view, people should agree with you based on logic, sane thinking, and not on "what feels good". Because true news isn't always good news, but it's always better news.