Is Twitter an effective or useful debate platform?

Like many others, I’ve noticed people tend to compartmentalize their brain candy, food porn, and political rhetoric. I have built up a fairly large friend base on Facebook but it seems people prefer to use FB for brain candy posts (e.g., baby pictures, wedding pictures, cat videos) and many get irritated by political posts.

Instagram to me is like a virtual journal. I like to post videos/pics documenting places I’ve been to, recipes I’ve cooked, and concert videos. There are political memes on FB but I just don’t feel like posting any. I have a modest 211 followers on IG.

Now comes Twitter and the purpose of this post. Twitter is obviously used by many to share their opinions about politicians, policies, and share feedback about sports teams or customer service. However, I only have 8 followers on Twitter and I can’t find many people from my FB who have Twitter accounts. Maybe it’s just my crowd. Again, I realize people like to separate their social media platforms based on what they’re in the mood to read or listen to. I also realize people generally like to separate politics & religion from their personal and professional lives. Many Americans just DGAF about politics and would rather talk about sports or other non-divisive topics. I can respect that. However, I feel most rewarded when I’m able to persuade a friend, family member, old classmate, or acquaintance to think a different way about a topic. It also feels rewarding some times to debate strangers and invisible pen pals too, but often more difficult to get through to strangers who don’t know you and don’t know the value you bring to a discussion.

Finally, in my course of reaching out to strangers on Twitter who allow DMs from non-followers, I might reach out to 20 people, 2 might respond, and only one of those will engage me in a full debate. I try to keep things private as much I can due to the sensitive nature of my job. I’ll comment on public tweets sparingly but even then I don’t receive any responses. Maybe it’s just me! Lol

Has anyone else experienced a similar issue when using other SM platforms, particularly Twitter, to find pen pals for ongoing debates? Do you think Twitter is useful at all or is it just another echo chamber? I’m really curious at what others have found. Back in the early 2000’s, I used to debate using AOL Message Boards but just like the game Medal of Honor Multiplayer for PC, it’s become a virtual desert. LOL.

Anyway, if interested, follow me on Twitter and I’ll follow back! Username: Elijah @YoungerOps

Mensch said:

Like many others, I’ve noticed people tend to compartmentalize their brain candy, food porn, and political rhetoric. I have built up a fairly large friend base on Facebook but it seems people prefer to use FB for brain candy posts (e.g., baby pictures, wedding pictures, cat videos) and many get irritated by political posts.

Instagram to me is like a virtual journal. I like to post videos/pics documenting places I’ve been to, recipes I’ve cooked, and concert videos. There are political memes on FB but I just don’t feel like posting any. I have a modest 211 followers on IG.

Now comes Twitter and the purpose of this post. Twitter is obviously used by many to share their opinions about politicians, policies, and share feedback about sports teams or customer service. However, I only have 8 followers on Twitter and I can’t find many people from my FB who have Twitter accounts. Maybe it’s just my crowd. Again, I realize people like to separate their social media platforms based on what they’re in the mood to read or listen to. I also realize people generally like to separate politics & religion from their personal and professional lives. Many Americans just DGAF about politics and would rather talk about sports or other non-divisive topics. I can respect that. However, I feel most rewarded when I’m able to persuade a friend, family member, old classmate, or acquaintance to think a different way about a topic. It also feels rewarding some times to debate strangers and invisible pen pals too, but often more difficult to get through to strangers who don’t know you and don’t know the value you bring to a discussion.

Finally, in my course of reaching out to strangers on Twitter who allow DMs from non-followers, I might reach out to 20 people, 2 might respond, and only one of those will engage me in a full debate. I try to keep things private as much I can due to the sensitive nature of my job. I’ll comment on public tweets sparingly but even then I don’t receive any responses. Maybe it’s just me! Lol

Has anyone else experienced a similar issue when using other SM platforms, particularly Twitter, to find pen pals for ongoing debates? Do you think Twitter is useful at all or is it just another echo chamber? I’m really curious at what others have found. Back in the early 2000’s, I used to debate using AOL Message Boards but just like the game Medal of Honor Multiplayer for PC, it’s become a virtual desert. LOL.

Anyway, if interested, follow me on Twitter and I’ll follow back! Username: Elijah @YoungerOps

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Maybe, but I do not think the character limit or the ability to have followers mob other users is useful for debate. It appears more effective for quick soundbytes, insults and glittering generalities than for actual written post-by-post debates taking on major issues.

I do not think it is any better a platform for debate than a live debate in which the interlocutors are allowed only 30 second windows to speak, and the audience is allowed and encouraged to heckle them both while they do so.

Felis Leo said:

Maybe, but I do not think the character limit or the ability to have followers mob other users is useful for debate. It appears more effective for quick soundbytes, insults and glittering generalities than for actual written post-by-post debates taking on major issues.

I do not think it is any better a platform for debate than a live debate in which the interlocutors are allowed only 30 second windows to speak, and the audience is allowed and encouraged to heckle them both while they do so.

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I prefer Oxford style debates myself, but I’m also OK debating via email or private messaging. It’s just difficult finding intellectual people with the time and stamina to go toe-to-toe.

No...its not. If the site would have taken less than 5 characters I would have just posted NO!

Is Twitter an effective or useful debate platform?

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No...

No No No

Mensch said:

I prefer Oxford style debates myself, but I’m also OK debating via email or private messaging. It’s just difficult finding intellectual people with the time and stamina to go toe-to-toe.

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Well, yes, that is a pragmatic puzzle that's hard to solve in an online setting such as Twitter. There's a surely way to approximate Oxford-style debate on Twitter, but Twitter isn't really structured for it; moreover, Twitter "rewards" the vulgar understanding of written brevity far more so than the rigorous form of it. Further confounding the matter is that, in general, people are reticent to keenly organize and focus their remarks on a single topic. Indeed, even DP (and other forums like it, I presume) too isn't. It's not that it absolutely can't be done in a venue like DP, it's that people simply won't comport themselves thus. Consequently, even though one may easily create and upload a YouTube video or upload as an image an argumentative essay, this quality of debating.....



...simply won't happen on Twitter.


There is also the matter of people either disregarding or not being aware of what the actual debate topic is. To wit, in "Income inequality exists, but is it a problem, an existential threat? No," one will find that through all the pages in that thread, two or three members (a couple days ago I counted them, but the number escapes me now) responded with an on-topic direct rebuttal argument. In a thread wherein the affirmative position (the OP's position) is that the NRA's argument against gun registration is illogical, not one person presented an argument for the opposite position -- the NRA's argument against gun registration is logical. Plenty of folks shared their thoughts about gun registration, but the opening post (OP) doesn't entreat for that. Obviously, one can't expect every person to have directly taken up the negative proposition, but on a site having "debate" in its name, it's bizarre that among 500+ responses (truly, I'm amazed that thread obtained so many responses), not one is directly refuted the affirmative stance presented in an OP.

That it's hard to find intellectual people is too a challenge. For example, in "Which of the offered social welfare (economics context) models most obtains your approbation?," I presented four models in as brief a form as possible and among the responses was this, "The OP is needlessly obfuscated and technical (why would you choose formulas over qualitative descriptions?), even pretentious." (Nevermind that the thread contains a link to a site that provides a narrative explanation of the models. I also created a similar thread that offers a bit more "qualitative" exposition, and that thread obtained even less feedback.) I was quite surprised by that comment because the only math one needs to understand to read the "formulas" (models) is addition and multiplication. How "intellectual" need one be to read statements that require one to understand only those two operations and identify which of the measurement approaches offered one most prefers? Not very, I dare say. How "intellectual" need one be to listen to someone describe four models and then state which of the options described one most prefers? Not very.

As for the stamina element in the emboldened statement, well, I think people on the Internet -- Twitter, DP or otherwise -- have plenty of stamina. One need only look at their post count to see so. And how much stamina does it take? There's no rush to reply and all one need do is sit down and type (or talk if one uses a talk-to-text application).

Twitter is no good for debate.

At least on a debate board, a complicated subject can be addressed in a lengthier (even if concise) post, and those with attention spans greater than a stunned goldfish will read it. Little can be said within twitter's character limit. Simplified expressions of opinions fit in its limit, not meaningful debate. National policy is often quite complicated. Meaningful argument takes some space. Hence, most posts here are just people blaring their opinions at other people.