Thank You for Arguing (Revised and Updated)

by Jay Heinrichs

  Argument Tool

  COMFORT, OR “COGNITIVE EASE”: When your audience’s brain is on autopilot, it’s more susceptible to persuasion.

  The brain, it turns out, basically operates in two gears, System One and System Two. System One works on autopilot, operating instinctively. I like to think of it as the Homer Simpson state. If I say “Two plus two equals…,” you think “Four” without really thinking. If I say “Bread and…,” your brain says “Butter.” That’s System One doing the talking. Homer Simpson.

  System Two is the Thinker, the one who cogitates, who works on the hard problems. Remember how you felt when you took a math quiz in high school? You were in System Two. System Two asks questions and figures things out. He’s very skeptical. So if you want someone docile and cooperative, he’s not the guy. Sure, System Two isn’t likely to punch you in the face. But he’s much more likely to lawyer up.

  The good news is, System Two likes to hold himself back; he kicks in only when he has to. He’s just trying to save resources, because System Two burns through large amounts of glucose, the body’s ready energy. That’s why you felt tired after taking an exam—not just your head but your whole body. In order to conserve energy, humans evolved to engage System Two, the Thinker, as little as possible. Which makes it easy to call on the Homer Simpson in our audience’s brains.

  The most important way to use System One with an angry person is to keep everything simple. The moment you begin to confuse someone, to make him think, the frown deepens, the arms cross, and System Two starts pondering litigation. So you need to use simple language and avoid jargon. If you’re responding to a large, angry audience in print, use sans serif type, the kind without the curlicues. Keep your sentences short. Stick to plain, honest-sounding language.

  While you’re talking, try to make your audience feel powerful. Give them a sense of self-control. Research shows that people who feel powerless tend to lash out more, and once they calm down a bit, in comes System Two, a thinker backed by lawyers. Later you’ll see how to avoid making your audience feel belittled. Right now we’re just talking about volume control. Suppose your loved one comes home furious about being cut off in line at the supermarket. Suppressing your own relief that your spouse is mad at someone other than you, you come up with a reply that’s both simple and empowering.

  WRONG: I often wonder whether there’s a sociopathic connection there, in which someone who’s a rule breaker in a line might live an exemplary life otherwise. We should contemplate this conundrum together—unless you find such a topic a bit over your head—with a glass of your pinot grigio.

  RIGHT: What a jerk. Why don’t I pour you some wine? Red or white?

  Note that the right answer offers a choice, giving your angry audience a feeling of control over something. Having employed simplicity and empowerment, now try for a third System One factor: a smile. Just the act of smiling seems to help System One engage. People frown when they’re thinking. Electrode-equipped scientists have shown that the frowning itself helps people think. The opposite also seems to be true. Make them smile.

  Stop, Herr Freud, You’re Killing Me

  Persuasion Alert

  I devote more space to humor than to any other emotion, because that’s what Cicero did. I try to practice what he preached: this book is full of my attempts at wit. Humor relaxes the more fearful emotions and, I hope, makes you less wary of my argument for argument.

  Humor also works to assuage anger—provided that you use the right kind. Sigmund Freud said that making people laugh “relieves anxiety” by releasing impulses in a disciplined manner. The wisest rhetoricians knew that you can’t teach it; Cicero noted that the Greeks put out several manuals on humor, all unintentionally funny. Freud should have learned that lesson. If you ever get a chance, take a look at his book Jokes (Der Witz). It’s hilariously full of unfunny jokes. (Prisoner on his way to the gallows: “Well, this is a good beginning to the week.”)

  Although the rhetoricians found it hard to teach, they had a good time codifying it. One type of humor may work better for you than the others.

  Urbane humor depends on an educated audience; it relies on wordplay. When British general Charles Napier captured the Indian province of Sind in 1843, he alerted his superiors with a one-word telegram: Peccavi. Every educated Brit knew that peccavi is Latin for “I have sinned.” Damned droll, that Napier chap.

  TRY THIS AT A PROFESSIONAL MEETING

  One way to inject urbane humor into a talk is to invent a neologism that only your audience would understand. I did this once while lecturing on political rhetoric. Having explained the difference between deliberative rhetoric and the verbal fighting called eristic, I suggested calling talk show hosts “eristicrats.” I’m sure I saw at least two people smile.

  Urbanity has fallen out of favor. A good pun gets a groan these days, but wordplay, like a mind, is a terrible thing to waste. You don’t force this kind of humor. Just be ready for any opportunity. The other day, as my family sat around the dinner table discussing Transamerica, a movie about a transsexual, the conversation turned to the actors we would most want to see playing transsexual roles, and whether the actors would ever agree to playing them.

  DOROTHY SR.: Would John Wayne?

  ME: No, he would wax.

  Get it? “To wax” is the opposite of “to wane,” and men have to wax their legs in order to play women. A double pun! That’s urbane humor, though my family failed to appreciate it. It is the only kind of humor that you can teach yourself. If you lack a sense of humor otherwise, the urbane version makes a reasonable substitute.

  Wit isn’t ha-ha funny either, just mildly amusing. Its humor is drier than urbanity, and instead of wordplay, it plays off a situation. When Chief Justice John Roberts worked for Ronald Reagan, the White House asked his advice on whether the president should send the Irish ambassador a St. Patrick’s Day greeting on stationery printed with An Teach Ban (Gaelic for “The White House”). Roberts said he saw no legal problem, but he encouraged the staff to fact-check the Gaelic. “For all I know it means ‘Free the I.R.A.,’ ” he wrote. Not ha-ha funny. But rather witty.

  Facetious humor, which covers most jokes, is supposed to make you laugh. That is its sole purpose. Rhetoricians through the ages have frowned on this kind of funny. If your ethos is on par with Calvin Coolidge’s, joke telling could win you the sympathy of your audience—but only if you have a staff of professional yuck scribes, as Laura Bush did before her famous send-up of her husband at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in 2005. The former school librarian told what ABC News claimed to be “the first public joke ever by a First Lady about the president of the United States engaged in intimate contact with a randy male horse.” The crowd went wild, and the president’s own ratings got a boost.

  Classic Hits

  CICERO KILLED ’EM, AND THEY RETURNED THE FAVOR: Banter was Cicero’s favorite kind of humor. While he was famously quick with a comeback, though, not everyone appreciated his talent. One of the many victims of his ridicule put a hit on him. Cicero literally bantered himself to death.

  A joke can defuse a touchy argument, if only through sheer distraction. If it’s funny enough, people will forget what they were talking about.

  Banter is a form of attack and defense consisting of clever insults and snappy comebacks. The traditional African American game of snaps offers the most competitive banter today. The object is to out-insult your opponent.

  Your mama’s so fat, when she hauls ass she has to make two trips.

  Man, that snap was staler than your breath. Your mama’s so ugly, her birth certificate was an apology letter from the condom company.

  Well, your mama’s idea of safe sex is locking the car doors.

  But that’s demonstrative rhetoric. When you use deliberative argument, you might prefer to banter with conce
ssion, agreeing with a point only to use it against your opponent. Cicero cited an example during a trial in the Forum, when a brash young man used concession to rebut an elder:

  TRY THIS WITH YOUR CHILDREN

  Admittedly, it’s not easy to perform a bantering concession well. My children have made themselves alarmingly good at it by practicing with the television. They banter with the ads and talking heads.

  TALKING HEAD: America is a faith-based culture.

  DOROTHY JR.: Right. It takes faith to believe an ape like you has a culture.

  ELDER: What are you barking at, pup?

  YOUNG MAN: I see a thief.

  The young man accepted the elder’s point: Maybe I am a dog. Then he used it right back at his opponent. There is a technique to this. First, accept your adversary’s statement at face value; then follow its logic to a ridiculous conclusion or simply throw it back with a twist. Kids often use a crude version of this concession: “Yeah? Well, if I’m a [insert insult], then that makes you a [insert worse insult].”

  In deliberative argument, though, banter works best in defense, conceding a point to your advantage. No one did this better than Winston Churchill.

  LADY ASTOR: Winston, if you were my husband, I’d flavor your coffee with poison.

  CHURCHILL: Madam, if I were your husband, I should drink it.

  Tips from the Ancients

  TWO CORPSES WALK INTO A BAR: Cicero helpfully advised Romans not to make jokes about a shocking crime or a pitiful victim. Apparently they needed to be told that.

  You have seen the advantages of rhetorical jujitsu already. Combine concession with wit, and you get banter. If you find an opportunity to follow up with a great retort, go for it. You might disarm your opponent. But make sure you’re capable of this rapid-response humor. Frankly, I’m hit-or-miss, which is why I try to entertain my unappreciative family with puns.

  Otherwise you can limit your banter to slower forms of communication, such as snail mail, to allow more time for cleverness. In an old Cold War joke, the Soviet Union places an order for 20 million sixteen-inch-long condoms from the United States, just to mess with our minds. We Americans comply, sending 20 million condoms in packages marked “small.” That’s banter—not live banter, but postal.

  Kick My Ass or I’ll Tell a Joke

  A riskier, sneakier, and far more enjoyable technique seems to head in the opposite direction: set a backfire. Artie Fufkin, the publicist in This Is Spinal Tap, does a superb backfire defense when no one shows up for a record signing.

  ARTIE: Do me a favor. Just kick my ass, okay? Kick this ass for a man, that’s all. Kick my ass. Enjoy. Come on. I’m not asking, I’m telling with this. Kick my ass.

  TRY THIS WITH A CLIENT

  A caveat: The backfire works best one-on-one, with someone you know and like. Strangers may take your dramatic statement at face value. If you have a good client, use a screw-up to strengthen the relationship. First tell her you wanted to be the one to bear the news; then detail what you have done to fix the problem; finally, mention how angry you are at yourself for not living up to your usual standards. If you have the right kind of client, she’ll defend you, and think the better of you.

  A backfire inspires sympathy through a mea culpa routine that exaggerates the emotions the audience feels. It works in just about any setting except politics. (Bids for sympathy won’t help you get elected unless you’re the widow of a popular, and recently dead, incumbent.)

  Early in my publishing career, I worked for a small magazine that had no fact checkers. When Mount St. Helens erupted for the first time, I wrote a short news piece in which I cluelessly placed the volcano in Oregon. I didn’t realize my mistake until after the magazine was published and a reader pointed it out to me. I walked into the editor’s office and closed the door.

  ME (looking stricken): I’ve got bad news, Bill. Really bad news.

  BILL: What?

  ME: It was sloppy and stupid and I swear, boss, it’ll never happen again.

  BILL: What will?

  ME: I put Mount St. Helens in the wrong state.

  BILL: It’s in Washington, right?

  ME: I put it in Oregon. I’m dying over this one.

  BILL: Hey, don’t be so hard on yourself. These things happen. Just write a correction for the next issue.

  ME (handing him the correction): Done.

  My wife uses the backfire constantly; she loves to oversympathize with my mood.

  ME (wincing): This firewood is heavier than I thought.

  DOROTHY SR.: Is your back okay?

  ME: It hurts a little. [Thinking fast] I could use a back rub.

  DOROTHY SR.: Sure. Let’s get you some ibuprofen first, and I’ll heat up a compress in the microwave. Lie on the bed.

  ME: I was about to go swimming.

  DOROTHY SR.: You’re not going anywhere with your back in that condition!

  ME: I’m fine.

  DOROTHY SR.: I thought you said your back hurt.

  ME: It doesn’t hurt anymore.

  If she weren’t such a good person, I’d say she talked her way out of giving me a back rub.

  Use the backfire only if you’re willing to risk a blaze that gets out of hand. This is one instance where agreement may not serve you: tell someone to kick your ass, and the danger is that they might comply.

  The Tools

  Passive voice. If you want to direct an audience’s anger away from someone, imply that the action happened on its own. “The chair got broken,” not “Pablo broke the chair.”

  Comfort. Also known as cognitive ease. Keep your audience in an easy, docile, instinct state, and your persuasion goes down more easily. Comfort also helps counter or prevent anger. To achieve comfort, keep things simple, empower your audience, and try to get your audience to smile.

  Humor. Laughter is a wonderful calming device, and it can enhance your ethos if you use it properly. Urbane humor plays off a word or part of speech. Wit is situational humor. Facetious humor is joke telling, a relatively ineffective form of persuasion. Banter, the humor of snappy answers, works best in rhetorical defense. It uses concession to throw the opponent’s argument back at him.

  Emotional refusal. When being bullied or heckled, refuse to show the emotion the bully wants. Gain the audience’s sympathy by trying to look calm and above it all.

  Backfire. You can calm an individual’s emotion in advance by overplaying it yourself. This works especially well when you screw up and want to prevent the wrath of an authority.

  11. Gain the High Ground

  ARISTOTLE’S FAVORITE TOPIC

  How to use your audience’s point of view

  Speech is the leader of all thoughts and actions. —ISOCRATES

  A man feels sick, so he goes to a clinic.

  DOC: I have good news and bad news.

  MAN: Give me the bad news first.

  DOC: You have a rare and incurable illness, with less than twenty-four hours to live.

  MAN: My God! What’s the good news?

  DOC: You know that nurse who took your blood pressure, the one with the huge…

  MAN: Yeah, so?

  DOC: I’m dating her.

  Argument Tool

  THE ADVANTAGEOUS: Base your argument on what’s good for the audience, not for you.

  Nice bedside manner, dude. It sums up the prevailing enough-about-you-let’s-talk-about-me mindset. People often pitch an argument that sounds persuasive to themselves, not to their listeners. This rhetorical mistake can be fatal, because messages that appeal only to the speaker have a tendency to boomerang. You saw how important sympathy is in argument by emotion; the same thing goes with argument by logic. In deliberati
ve argument, you need to convince your audience that the choice you offer is the most advantageous—to the advantage of the audience, that is, not you. This brings us back to values. The advantageous is an outcome that gives the audience what it values.

  If you can persuade a two-year-old that eating her oatmeal is to her advantage, for example, then she may actually comply. Suppose the toddler holds the value that older brothers should be taken down a peg.

  Classic Hits

  HE WOULD HAVE LOVED GITMO: In reality, Aristotle would have caned the kid. He was a great believer in corporal punishment; he said a slave’s testimony was invalid except under torture.

  YOU: Eat half your oatmeal and you can fling the bowl at your brother’s head.

  While your argument may seem morally dubious—and from the brother’s point of view, personally objectionable—at least it does what an argument is supposed to do. Aristotle maintained that the person most affected by a decision makes the best judge of it. The diner is more qualified to judge a dish than the chef, he said, meaning that the two-year-old outweighs you rhetorically. While the decision is up to the audience, the burden of proof is on you. To prove your point, start with something your audience believes or wants.