Comment by dbrueck | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dbrueck | Hacker News Reader

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I'm fascinated by your stance - genuinely fascinated, I'm not trolling you, I'm serious.

So to recap, the CEO of Chick-fil-a is part of a group of people ("they") who are actually unable - as in, incapable - of honestly considering certain viewpoints? How did you reach this conclusion, and how did you come to be so certain that this CEO is in that group?

Is your understanding that he gave no serious thought to his opinion (i.e. it was just imposed on him), or that he thought about it lightly but lacks critical thinking skills, or something else?

Is there any possibility that he simply has a different opinion than you, and that's all there is to it? Like, he educated himself like you did, thought about it like you did, etc. but just reached a different conclusion than you? Or is the only explanation that he is flawed/limited in some way?

Apologies in advance if anything I've said comes across as demeaning, I'm genuinely trying to understand. Thanks!

I was raised in a cult. I know what it’s like to be incapable of considering others’ views because of dogma because of my experience.

I am assuming that his Christian perspective is similar to the one I had. My experiences with Christians since have reinforced this expectation.

Does that help?

Ok, I appreciate your willingness to share.

FWIW it's virtually impossible to determine the open-mindedness of someone from afar, and to make assumptions about their ability to even consider other ideas seems like a way to insulate oneself from difficult ideas - by declaring that someone is incapable of an honest evaluation of your perspective, it prevents your perspective from being scrutinized (which, ironically, could lead to being close-minded if you're not careful).

A parting thought: most people (a) can be reasoned with if not attacked - you can find common ground and have a good discussion with nearly anybody (b) on every "interesting" social/political issue there are intelligent and thoughtful and just really great people with nuanced and reasonable perspectives all across the spectrum - the extremist nutjobs on the fringes are wildly outnumbered by pretty normal people

So as a random dude on the internet, just a friendly warning that if the above strikes you as untrue (e.g. if you believe large chunks of people are intolerant or incapable of being reasoned with, or if you see a difficult social issue as pretty much black and white and can't understand why so many people don't get it), then there's a good chance that you've been duped and have been sucked into a form of modern tribalism.

Have a great day!

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