In Frank Herbert’s Dune series, the Bene Gesserit had a power called ‘The Voice.’ Basically, it was the ability to compel someone to obey them simply by speaking to them in a certain tone. It was a subdivision of what they called the Weirding Way, their method of combat.
In February of last year, Holy CRAP! The VlogCast welcomed as a guest Dr. Samuel Conway, holder of a Ph.D in chemistry and a practicing scientist. The topic of the show (when we got around to it) was the persuasive nature of pseudoscience, and how easy it was for people to fall for it. A lot of us out there talk a lot about how we’d never fall for something we saw or heard on TV or the Internet, but as folks with a more skeptical mind, we’re somewhat atypical in our thought processes. In many cases I’d say it’s something we take for granted.
This first video below has Dr. Conway talking about hydrogen tablets. When I first watched the video, admittedly I didn’t know anything about the whole controversy, and since Dr. Conway is someone I respect as an authority, I went along with a lot he had to say:
This next video, he pulls back the curtain and reveals just how insidious peddlers of pseudoscience can be, and how if you frame your arguments the right way, you can come off sounding like you know your shit and can get others to believe it:
So what’s my point?
Think of all the videos out there on either side of an issue. Feminists and shit-posters, SJW’s and their adversaries, BLM supporters and those against them…they all have something to say, and many of them do so in a format that’s well-presented, professional sounding, and can easily bend the ear of the discerning listener. Alas, for every ‘good’ post, there’s a host of ones that, even if their claims held any weight, they’d lose any credibility due to their piss-poor production quality and apparent lack of effort.
We’d like to think that an argument should be strong enough to stand on its own, but sadly that’s not the case. Why do you think shit-posters are able to eviscerate these bedroom-shot feminist videos so easily? Kristi Winters’ so-called ‘strong feminist argument’ still hasn’t appeared (as far as I know), and even if it did, unless it was delivered with the same production force as many of those on the anti-SJW side do, no one would really listen.
This is not to say the camp of rationality is the sole gatekeeper on decent content creation. Tariq Nasheed’s magnum opus ‘Hidden Colors’ is a 4-part documentary detailing the untold history of the black man, and how they had an influence on just about everything, from Leonaro DaVinci’s education, to the development of the Samurai and Ninja in Japan. Now I know you’re all scoffing here and I’m right with you, make no mistake. But suppose you didn’t have the education you did. Suppose that you were raised with little more in your mind than how to survive day-to-day. Then along comes this professionally-done video series, with eloquent speakers, apparent figures of authority, and scholars all feeding you this ‘history.’ With no point of reference, you’d probably believe what they were saying.
This is the power of the Internet…the power of the voice done right. I’m a lot older than most of the shitlords posting on YouTube these days, and also have a few years on a lot of the atheist podcasters out there. I have not only a good grasp of history, but I also remember the time before the Internet, when encyclopedias and reference libraries were how you tracked down historical fact. Attaining real knowledge was a challenge, but now with the world at your fingertips, not only can you get information on any subject you want, chances are you’ll find samples of it that even fit your personal narrative.
To the uninitiated and those lacking the background knowledge, presentation becomes paramount in getting your argument out there. As I said, you could have the cure for cancer in your possession, but if you presented it on YouTube with shitty audio and even shittier graphics (if that’s how you roll; a lot of folks don’t), people will be dis-inclined to watch it, or even take your claim seriously.
The voice is a powerful weapon if handled right. Let’s make sure that those of us on the right side of history never forget that.