[the_af]

A long time ago I reached the conclusion whoever plays "crazy" or "fool" long and consistently enough is in practice crazy/fool. It makes no difference what the person believes inside their mind, if they always play the fool, they are fools.

Scott Adams has been like this for a long time. Trolling or sincere makes no difference, if he acts like a bigot he is one.

[AnthonyMouse]

Wouldn't that make all satirists bigots? Is Stephen Colbert? Carroll O'Connor? It can't be that the only difference is whether someone is successfully trolled.

[the_af]

No, professional satire by definition doesn't count. In interviews they often tell you their real opinions or how they construct their character. I guess if they always stayed in character and never gave any interviews you could make a case...

You're begging the question re: trolling. You don't know they are trolls; you merely believe so. In fact, there's no way to tell real opinion from flamebait with the people under discussion. That's the whole point: if they always act like fools, they are fools.

[AnthonyMouse]

> In interviews they often tell you their real opinions or how they construct their character.

But that's exactly what Adams does.

> In fact, there's no way to tell real opinion from flamebait with the people under discussion.

Sure there is. If it's of the form "there is a valid argument against this, but it's inconvenient for partisans to make that argument" then it's flamebait.

[the_af]

I don't think that's the case for Scott Adams. You're giving him too much credit.

There's no way to tell the form you claim is flamebait. You assume it is, but you don't know for sure. If it requires too much assuming, it's indistinguishable in practice for the real thing.

An act that is kept up 24x7 is the real thing as far as I'm concerned.