There are certain patterns—ideas that, once spotted, are impossible to “unsee.” Remember when you learned that the alphabet and “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” share a melody?
This recognition of a pattern can be edifying. Foundational principles of composition help you better appreciate art and design.
Other times it’s maddening. Basic media literacy will ruin the Internet for you. Truly, some 95% of media is little more than advertising. Start with a hook, end with a call to action. Don’t forget to follow for more.
Such patterns also emerge in our communication. I wouldn’t call them all logical fallacies, but perhaps they’re conversational cliches. And some are worse than others.
Take politics, for example. One particular trope, like a weed, can’t help but to sprout its way into debate. I’m referring, of course, to the notorious Everyone I don’t like is Hitler.
Democrat and Republican, both sides are too eager in its use. Forget to bless someone for a sneeze, and suddenly you’re reminiscent of history’s worst man.
It’s so cliche that you’d think we could filter it out, but no. We’ve all been guilty—if not of this crime, then of another. In Twitter replies and small-town cafes, we employ our preferred pitfalls.
Certain arguments are just too tempting.
Last week, President Biden announced his plan to forgive some $240 billion or more in student loan debt. I am happy to say that I’ve heard no WWII comparisons. If they’re out there (and they probably are), please don’t send them to me. I’m better off unaware.
Now, I’m no political writer. If you leave this piece thinking it’s about policy opinion, you will have missed the point.
If you don’t want anything resembling a policy take, scroll down to the next picture. It’s not that important. But for the sake of disclosure—since I’ll benefit from the loan forgiveness—I figure I’ll show my cards.
Ostensibly, I will have the $10,000 forgiveness applied to my loans. This is a significant chunk of my school debt and will be massively beneficial to not have to pay.
Looking as dispassionately as I can, my feelings are conflicted. I want to support a student loan relief. Principally, I’m behind right-sizing tuition costs and easing the debt burden on a generation of Americans. We tax-benefit and subsidize all sorts of things in order to benefit the larger economy; this, done right, could be that.
However, I don’t think it is. The timing is bleak. The action doesn’t solve any larger issues. If not for this economic moment, I wouldn’t even complain about the transparent midterm play—politicians do what they do. But overall, there’s not much to praise.
At the same time, I think many criticisms being cast around widely are manufactured. It is politically popular. It’s not benefitting the upper class. Inflationary? Technically yes, but I think it’s a wash. I don’t know how much it matters if we don’t fix supply chains and manufacturing.
When it shakes out, I guess I’m 60/40 for and against, factoring in my personal benefit.
It’s fair to disagree with me, though. Many people do; some never went to college, some previously paid off loans, and some host large radio shows.
It’s always fun to find a brother-in-arms; there’s a joy inherent in sticking up for someone, especially when you’d appear to have little in common.
That’s the relationship I have with one Dave Ramsey, radio host and leader of the massive financial movement.
Externally, Ramsey and I would seem unalike. We have different personalities, different politics, even different life experiences. He’s been poorer than I’ve ever been and richer than I’ll likely ever be.
He said some funny things in the COVID days. I reject his ideological commitment to 15-year mortgages.
But to me, this is all secondary to one thing: I like an honest opinion.
Truth-telling is my love language. Here I don’t mean truth as certain knowledge. I mean a frill-less expression of what you think. And Dave has made a living off this practice.
No one who watches a Dave Ramsey clip is ever left to wonder. Disagree if you’d like—I sometimes do—but you know where he stands. In this sense, I feel a kinship with Dave; he’s like me without a filter. He speaks how I think.
Not everyone thinks so fondly of him, though. Jesus hates Dave Ramsey. At least, that’s what my Twitter feed would have you believe. Every 12 months or so, he really sets things off, and I’m left to laugh.
Shortly after Biden’s student loan announcement, “Dave Ramsey” was trending. People circulated clips in outrage of his (relatively banal) disapproval. Firestorms broke out in the replies between those supporting loan forgiveness and those opposing. It was a big weekend for Christian-adjacent Twitter.
Generally every tweet took one of two patterns:
Jesus loves student loan forgiveness.
Jesus hates student loan forgiveness.
I’d never before realized how often Jesus spoke about government-issued loans. Look, I have a worldview. I’ll take my ten big ones to the bank. But I can’t help but think that none of the scriptures cited were the clear dunks they were used as. On both sides of the argument, things got a little embarrassing.
Let’s back up from student loans. It’s topical, but it’s far from the only political argument we baptize for approval. More often, I see back-and-forth tweets about capitalism and socialism.
If you’re a capitalist, you use the parable of the talents. “To those who use well what they’re given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance.”
If you’re a socialist, it’s the rich young ruler. “Sell your possessions, give to the poor, and follow me.”
The problem is neither of these statements are about monetary systems. We can interpret the principles to inform us; we should. But in our interpretation of the unclear, why abandon Jesus’s most direct statement? Don’t pin it on me.
If you’re not in the Christian world, all of this may seem of little relevance to you. My point is not about political systems or which are doctrinally supported. It’s that we lack the security today to simply hold an opinion—to feel a way about something and say it.
Rather, in our personal insecurity we grasp for ultimate, external supports—exaggerating every idea to Hitler or Jesus. At best, these instincts are conversational cliches. At worst, they’re attempts to compensate.
The Bible makes no statement on student loan forgiveness. And you can still have an opinion on it.
Dave Ramsey does.
The irony of the Ramsey-twitter saga is that his was the most honest opinion in the bunch. He never used the Jesus card; that was his opponents and defenders. Rather, he laid out what I thought was an appropriately nuanced take. I disagree with it, but I defend it.
The clip sparking the most ire was his recommendation that a caller pay off their $2000 in remaining student loans (her own suggestion). Conspicuously cut from the clip were his repeated assurances that there’s nothing wrong with taking the forgiveness. “Take it… I’m happy for you.”
Rather, he counseled that because he’s been so personally outspoken, it would be dishonest to turn around and take the forgiveness. As it appears, his company didn’t receive any PPP loans during the pandemic. I wouldn’t be mad if they did.
Ten years ago, I was a high-school senior taking Personal Communication at a local university. In class one week, the professor showed us a daytime-TV documentary. It profiled three marriages, their interpersonal struggles, and their attempts to save from divorce.
One character stood out in the doc. He had a Dog the Bounty Hunter look about him—a little rough of a personality. His rash comments made us itch around the collar. Dude, you’re losing your marriage. You just told your wife what?
Our teacher paused and quizzed us throughout the video. Privately, when asked who was the best of the husbands, most of the class selected him. His wife genuinely seemed happiest among the marriages—more so than those of the sportscoat-touting gentlemen. We reported our answers sheepishly, each thinking that we were the only one to make this terrible estimation.
But this was exactly the result our professor expected. “He’s not a bad communicator,” she said. “Even if you don’t like it, you never have to guess what he’s thinking.”
At the end of the documentary, not all the marriages survived. Dog’s did.
In our inclusive, relativistic society, we’ve made ourselves allergic to opinion. We squirm in our seats like students in a Malone classroom.
We maintain our own perspectives—but we dress them up as more than they are. They’re not opinion; they’re reality.
Ironically, as we posture our claims as absolute, they often devolve to little more than platitudes—patterns that proliferate time and again.
There’s something to value about an opinion, an offhand remark, a joke. (By the way, I saw some great Dave Ramsey memes in the mix.)
We’re all people. We’re all shielding something. We seek the approval of someone greater, to sanction and validate our own experience.
At least, that’s my opinion.