In a recent debate with a Harvard Law Professor, I was surprised when my counterpart insisted with (other dubious factual claims) that no one has celebrated the death of Charlie Kirk. He knew that the challenge for me to name one was unlikely to be answered in a debate on a different topic, even though many have celebrated and mocked the assassination on the left. The tactic is part of a type of name game being played on many cable shows. That was again evident this week when Harry Sisson, a liberal commentator, challenged a panel to name one person who analogized Trump to Hitler. It was also on display when Rep. Dan Goldman (D., N.Y.) challenged anyone to name a single Antifa member. The name game is popular because it is rarely challenged on the spot, though that was not the case with Sisson.
Most people had little knowledge of Sisson’s work as a social media influencer until he was featured in the video circulated by the White House showing President Trump dumping human excrement on his head (as well as others marching in the “No Kings” rally). For the record, I thought that the video was juvenile, distasteful, and remarkably unfunny.
The video propelled Sisson into greater public visibility and he appeared on “Piers Morgan Uncensored” and challenged the panel to name one high-level Democrat who’s compared Trump to Hitler. The response was crushing. When rebutted by the other guests, Sisson then demanded an actual date which is consistent with the tactic. After all, if anyone is fast enough to give a name, they would surely be unable to provide a date. Then someone did.
Obviously, this has been a mantra on the left with many Democratic politicians making the analogy. Jen Rubin was one of the first out of the gate after the election with a column titled “Hitler is in power.”
In the case of Goldman, many of us rattled off people criminally charged who proclaimed their membership in Antifa. The Administration then named two more in a major criminal indictment for terrorism.
The whole appeal of the name game is that you make the claim in a forum where no one is likely to respond. It then leaves naive viewers with the impression that it is manifestly true. The saddest aspect of an age of rage is the level of self-delusion that occurs. Many people want to be told that they can ignore troubling facts, leaving narratives unchallenged in their echo-chambered news and social media circles. Figures like Rep. Goldman are the denial agents that many need to avoid addressing their own disinformation or rage rhetoric. They are the Nathan Thurms of American politics:
The point of this game is not that it will convince most people, but will allow many to avoid serious reflection over their own actions or rhetoric. In American politics, there is no Walter White demanding that you “say my name.”
That is the key to the game. No one listening in your echo chamber wants to say the name. The problem is when you invite others to play outside of that silo. Then you end up like Sisson with a virtual Boston telephone book of rebuttals and not a single friend to call.
I don’t understand how “The Name Game” wins arguments. The speaker might “win” in the moment, as the debate opponent will not have names, dates, and times at their disposal, but the online brigade will soundly defeat them with links to YouTube videos of people saying it.
That is true, but how many limited-interest tools actually do the fine research and learn from it. This is a propaganda game, not a graduate course in logic. Realize the quantity of lofo voters that need to be convinced to 1) think for themselves, 2) use truthful data to compare fact from fiction, 3) give up the security of their bubble.
Don’t worry … all those names will soon be ‘disappeared’ from Google, etc., very soon. I notice that historical actions like spitting on the troops returning from Vietnam, leftist Americans saying her “chickens came home to roost” about the 9/11 destruction, etc., are now reported as myths and legends in Google. Yet, we were all there at the time. The Democrats are changing history.
Which is why we shouldn’t just report this fact, but double down and create many alternative programs that provide verifiable sources to contradict the dem lies and make these social media platforms readily and freely available all the time. We need to co-opt the progs methodology.
Go 6 harmonies
The term sealioning was coined in 2014 in a “Wondermark” cartoon entitled The Terrible Sea Lion by David Malki.
https://wondermark.com/c/1062/
There is an easy response if you don’t know a name or a date. Offer to bet the game player $10,000 that you can come up with a name and date within 24 hours.
Jonathan: You write about Trump’s “No Kings” video: “juvenile, distasteful, and remarkably unfunny.” Juvenile? Yes, but so what? Distasteful? I doubt it – most “No Kings” protesters already have potty mouths, so the taste of poop is a familiar one and one that they like. Remarkably unfunny? No way – it was hilarious!
Perhaps all right leaning peoples should attend seminars that feature the saul alinsky book Rules for Radicals. Two can play their game and we could rather confuse their well-used game plans. We tend to attack the left as a Roman Testudo while they are guerilla fighters attacking on all fronts with their semantic tricks and paid harassers. Stodgy is the best description of the traditional rightist response and we need to learn to be more agile in confronting an ever-morphing opponent.
Well Sisson and Goldman are part of the Dem Intellectual Elite that put their fingers in their ears and yell they can’t hear you when the facts start to flow against them! Genius future leaders for their Lemming Party!!
Name one, Lucy Martinez?
https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.indiatimes.com%2Fthumb%2F124697792.cms%3Fimgsize%3D80036%26width%3D616%26resizemode%3D4&f=1&ipt=ce58b49ef52dc7211eb0cd9581db7e1fbb4eea96bad6602d1e213214dcc38fd5
Sisson is not a good influencer. He’s astro-turfed by the DNC for the young, white male vote, but he’s apparently not nearly as effective as Charlie Kirk was.
The problem with Sisson is that he comes off as the teen know-it-all who should do more listening than talking. Even young men find him unconvincing. Charlie actually debated people mano a mano and earned his vast following the hard way.
Diogenes,
Never heard of Sisson till now. Does anyone really want to play this “name” game in this day and age of the internet? Watching him get his posterior end handed to him was rather amusing. Watching him trying to regain the argument and failing was even better.
The “name game” is a juvenile tactic that reveals the person is not debating in good faith. It’s not clever, and as you point out, it’s easily anticipated and countered. A good lawyer would never try this in court.
Tragically, Charlie earned an even bigger following the hardest way of all: he gave his life for what he believed.
Charlie Kirk did not actually debate. He did the same shtick known as crowd-work in the comedy circuit of accumulating a bunch of retorts that don’t stand up (pun!) to scrutiny.
Example: He claimed that God must exist because the universe exists, because the universe could not come from nothing so it had to have been created by God. Who created God? Who created the creator of God? The basis that someone had to create something means an infinite progression. Why not worship the creator of the creator of the creator of the creator of … ”
The reason for stopping just one level up is that all Charlie needed to have an immediate source for his own authority on every subject. No matter what, God created Charlie and therefore Charlie was the spokesman for God.
The children Charlie debated weren’t schooled in the sort of deception Charlie used in his grooming exercises. More sophisticated than offering ice cream to get into the back of a rusty van, but no different in the deceit.
Charlie was pulling $80 Million a year and it wasn’t from student contributions. He’s just another millionaire paid by billionaires to tell the middle class and the lower class to support tax breaks for the upper class. The best way to do that is to do, as Charlie did, and say that Empathy is designed by the Libs to hurt the conservatives. Take away all social support by the government and use that as a tax break for people who are gladly off-shoring American jobs.
Hi, can you dm us your employer? Cancel culture is so much fun!
GOD always was, by definition.
Antifa as an organization does not exist, so no one can be a “member”.
You’re a member…aren’t you Dick?
LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL
The situation is this. When your friendly debater asks you to name one person who said this or that, it serves as a reminder that it’s been said many times even if you cannot remember a name. Who remembers such names? Only your stamp collector types, slightly unbalanced people driven to such memories. It’s not unlike the science student who remembers the formula but not the concept it represents. So, when Sisson says name one, you remember the many times it has blurred in your memory without a particular “John Doe” in mind. This is the way memory works.
It’s a gotcha question. Like when a candidate for vice-President says they learn a lot by reading magazines and so the reporter asks “Which ones?” How unfair! I’m sure they heard someone say it, but it didn’t mean anything to them at the time to notice who that someone was.
sadly… no matter how corrupt or evil a democrat is…Their voters will vote for them!
Democrats regularly vote for previously jailed candidates and for people that have ruined their cities, states, and the country!
Democrats are fascists…it is that simple!
Their goals: steal as much as they can, consolidate total power, destroy America and Western Society
Voting for any Democrats is just enabling evil…they vote in goose-stepping lock step!
One cannot destroy a society, unless no people remain. One can change a society. How awful that the biggest change the Democrats have been working on is to remove those people who siphon off 40% of healthcare spending to the wealthiest people on the planet. It’s so funny that the Republican response is along the lines of “There’s no need to make an ocean liner. Each person can more cheaply swim across the Atlantic. Bootstraps, people, bootstraps.”
By the way, the term “Lifting yourself by your own bootstraps” is to remind people that they cannot progress alone, not as an explanation of how people can succeed on their own.
“. . . ‘Lifting yourself by your own bootstraps’ is to remind people that they cannot progress alone . . .”
Nice try, collectivist.
Your claim about the meaning of that expression was true — in the mid-19th century. Then in the early 20th, it came to mean the uniquely American virtues of self-reliance, individualism, and not depending on others to reach the goals you want.
Yes, the video was juvenile and in poor taste. “Unfunny” I’m not so sure. What I am sure is that it is the type of thing that you will furrow your brow and tut-tut over, as you do over so many other things. And I am also sure that mockery is the correct response to the massive straw-man demonstration that was the asinine “No Kings Day”.
It should be noted that President Trump neither created nor commissioned it; he, or some staffer acting on his behalf, merely reposted it. If Leftists like Sisson throw shrieking tantrums over it, so much the better.
The shallow midwit Leftist celebrity Jeff Daniels thought he scored a point when he morosely asked, “Would Lincoln do this?” The response is, no, he wouldn’t. He would have suspended Habeous Corpus and sent in a half dozen regiments to level their weapons and shoot down the protesters, as he did in the 1863 New York City Draft Riots. Sharing a tasteless meme is pretty lightweight.
Yes, I see the misspelling.
“midwit”
Learned a new word. Thanks.
You can also use my preferred term for people like Jeff Daniels and that is demwit.
A US President sharing a tasteless meme about himself using US military aircraft to perform a biowarfare attack on US citizens is a sign of his underlying attitude towards America and of failing mental capacity on the part of his adherents. He is now literally tearing down part of the American institution to build a monument to billionaires.
Well, I guess, sticks and bones may break my bones but names will never hurt me. When Trumps disses someone its undignified, unpresidential, outright crude etc. Actually I’m amused by Trumps quips. This guy claims he’s childish, as if so called adults do not resort to brutal verbal attacks, even on Trumps family and two assassination attempts. But its always Trumps fault. The attacks on Trump will never stop, just get more evil and sick. Look at the Charlie Kirk murder, leftist celebrate it. So what’s Trump supposed to do? Hire Oprah and rebuild his name and reputation all the while the hate directed at him gets hotter?
There is no answer to this situation. I say, carry on Mr. President. That’s what we voted for.
The irony of this article is mind-blowing. Turley’s blog is rife with these “name games”.
It’s not just names. It’s also “cite the source” and citing exactly the literal original documents, or it’s BS arguments. These are part of what is ‘normal’ discourse on blogs like these.
FYI, Republicans also demand names and events and they get them. Often resulting in outright denials and deflections. This little game is not exclusive to the left.
Speaking of Hitler and Trump, it seems Republicans are making sure their racism and bigotry remain intact with the revelations of private conversations of young Republicans and special counsels. They seem to love racists, fascists, and the occasional pedophile. No matter how much they try they just can’t seem to shake off what seems to be a natural fit for Republicans these days.
George is a master baiter. Will anyone bite on George’s bait?
You did. Why do you always take the bait?
Nah. His idiotic comment was intended to provoke someone into asking for names or Republicans who “love racists, fascists, and the occasional pedophile.”
So far, nobody has taken the bait laid by the master baiter.
You need to improve your game. I encourage you to keep trying. Thanks for playing.
X if you would not lie so much people would not demand citations
Regardless “the name game”
Is played in face to face debate
It does not work on a blog
If I demand a proof from you
You have more than a few milliseconds to respond
You are free to google evidence for your claim
That does not work in verbal debate
So you are shills ng a false analogy
This reprehensible tactic exemplifies the complete dishonesty and growing desperation by the left. It is the direct result of a total lack of valid, factual, arguments to support their failing positions on pretty much any topic.
If all of the Left is represented by this one person, then all of the Right is represented by the child molester Trump had as a spiritual adviser.
I believe that when President Trump was convicted of “sexual assault” in the “in late 1995 or early spring of 1996 ” there was no specific date named. I could be wrong but I believe the date was somewhat unsettled. According to Wikipedia. If such a wide time was allowed for making the case with no actual date in a court of law (New York. so I am being liberal in my use of of the term court of law) and the injured party is still alive to testify then why are dates so important to Democrats now. They seem to be arguing both sides of a point of view.
Oh I forgot, they are Democrats and rules don’t apply to them.
“The whole appeal of the name game is that you make the claim in a forum where no one is likely to respond.” Unfortunately your blog attracts scum. Have you read the comments here? There’s hardly one that doesn’t resort to threats, insults and vile swearing. Here its beyond plain sarcasm. And to be direct, 99% are just ignorant diatribes. Sadly you provide a forum for those types.
I’ll second that.
You complain about insults from others AFTER calling commenters scum. Textbook case of cognitive dissonance.
Good commentary, TY, Prof. Turley……….it’s about time Sisson (a non American) got caught at his own game…. I have found his content on ‘X’ to be extremely ‘ juvenile, offensive, and remarkably unfunny…’ at first I would tell him so but that just kept his junk appearing on my feed to the point I finally had to block him……. as for Donald Trump.. his slips from Grace like the incident you mentioned just now need to sound off the alarm that President Trump is not supposed to slip into his Donald Trmp childish personna… if he must do that, then he needs an alter EGO as other celebrities have done and carried off very well… SO, Where are his Advisors to convince him of this?
Sisson is a USA citizen.