Fighting About Words Is Medieval

I dislike using “medieval” in any sort of negative context, since that has been done so often and so unfairly. This time, however, I will, and that’s because, historically, fighting about words really is medieval.

The big intellectual model between Rome and the Renaissance was called Scholasticism, and it involved the use of word formulas (syllogisms, as well as dialectics) to prove or disprove almost anything. It could be elaborate, but word formulas really were at its core, and that fact is all we need for this discussion.

Let’s begin with the fundamental pivot of word fights:

When you fight about words, you’ve stopped trying to understand the other person and are defending pre-chosen conclusions.

When fighting this way, you’ve pre-committed to a specific result; you’ve left off communicating and are striving to win.

It’s also worth grasping that word fights deal with abstracts rather than concretes; they address categories rather than realities.

If, rather than fighting about abstracts like words, we remain focused on the real world, the truth of things opens to us, as Bruce Lee sagely noted:

If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.

Backhanded Good News

In an odd, backward sort of way, this also brings some good news, because it shows us just how quick and creative our minds can be. In a flash, we are able to recognize where a conversation is going, then jump instantly to the end so we can defend it. Honestly, that’s rather impressive.

So, we have the root ability to think very quickly, to pass through multiple blockages (confusion, intimidation, previous training, etc.) and to create effective arguments as required. That reveals a lot of mental firepower, and in more or less all of us.

In other words, we’re a lot smarter than we’ve realized. Now we just need to repurpose that function of intellect for better uses.

Scholastics And Manipulators

Words, of course, are imperfect descriptors of reality. The better scholastics understood this (these were not stupid people) and were careful using their formulas. Still, once the inertia of institutions got going, such people had to be quiet, conform or be removed. And so word formulas and similar less-than-pure representations of reality were treated as if they were pure, leaving academic hierarchies spewing errors for centuries.

We can also understand that the central tool of human manipulation is words. If you want to trick humans, you need to overcome reason with emotion. That’s not hard to do, but it does require words. You can use images, of course, as in beer commercials, but such things still require words as triggers. You could likewise attempt to use music, but political music trends to be bastardized music, and seldom resonates beyond true believers.

Manipulators, then, are stuck with words, having no choice but to fight with them and about them.

This problem will remain with us so long as people seek safety in larger groups rather than in their own processes. More and more of us, however, are seeing through it, especially as horribly manipulative advertising (as in social media) animalistically grabs at every last bit of our mental space.

Recognition And Growth

When engaging in word fights, we block our best channels of reasoning… our best channels of consciousness. If, however, we are able to recognize this as it happens, we’ll soon be able to control it, gaining a powerful tool for the cleansing of our minds.

Along these lines I’ve long appreciated a passage from the Bible’s letter to the Ephesians. Here’s how I render the Greek text (from chapter four):

They went plodding along in the ineffectiveness of their awareness, their channel of intellect being dimmed. The hardening of their core and their ignorance made them non-participants in the higher life. And so they became numb. Surrendering both integrity and control, they busied themselves in a reverse catharsis.

I recommend that you print that one out and spend some time with it. It’s surprisingly potent.

And please, let’s stop fighting about words. Rather, let’s understand what the other person means. Let’s focus on what others are trying to communicate, even if they don’t get the words just right.

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