I think it assumes that it's a complex problem and to untangle the mess will require that this is done persistently over a longer stretch of time. we didn't get into this over a couple of weeks. If this was unfolding since years if not decades then what we have now is the end stages of boiling frogs (we're just waking up to the water being unbearable having been oblivious for so long). I'm personally convinced that facing the problems can only be done by following these steps (even if it's painful and we'd rather have a quick fix to all this). It will take a long time to recover from this I think (having enough patience to hear an opposing view without judgement isn't easy).
All of this sounds good and, frankly, I don't have a simple alternative. To add, I think it's necessary to strive for good faith as a baseline.
So, I am not disputing the principle that good faith is required; on the contrary, I am lamenting its demise and the weaponization of good faith against its practitioners.
So, the issue is that while hoping it is sufficient to act in good faith, others are able to profit wildly from their own bad faith. In effect, your good faith empowers them. And, while the current situation unfolded over years, we cannot ignore the recent rapid acceleration and its meaning.
We have come to a place where bad faith is normalized and even celebrated. Not sure what the way back is.
It’s only painful in a stable, peaceful society with a strong rule of law. In any other context it’s downright lethal. Take the extreme of Dark Forest theory; you can try to explain your position and values all you like, and while you do it just serves to broadcast your location to someone who already decided to kill you. That’s extreme of course, an hopefully fictional, but in the intellectual and social spectrum it takes two to tango. If I’m just trying to waste your time and energy, and you’re insisting on addressing every point of my Gish Gallop... I win.
Suspending judgement is an interesting and valuable intellectual exercise, and trying to see other perspectives makes us better people. We have to accept however, that a time comes when just like any other approach, such measures not only fail, but full catastrophically. Just like an ardent pacifist, or an equally ardent militant, lack of adaptability is doom. Sometimes you have to sit down and talk, and sometimes you have to fight to the death.
The trick, and no one has yet figured out a formula for this, is to know when to adapt and how much. Anyone who tries to tell you that the only way to deal with a Nazi is a bullet, or conversely, love, is wrong. It’s advice that sounds good, but it’s totally useless. When to to talk, when to listen, and when to reach for a sidearm is the real question and more often than not people don’t even acknowledge that; it’s too nuanced, too open to interpretation, and too messy.
The thing is, it’s messy regardless of whether or not we choose to approach conflict (intellectual or otherwise) programmatically rather than dynamically.
That's kind of the point. Assuming good faith is akin to not ascribing to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence (or ignorance). Note that the incompetence or ignorance is not assigned so it may be either or both sides, which places a certain burden on you to try to evaluate and correct at least your part of that failure.
