[Blot2882]

> "the downright biblical flood of COVID misinformation that emanated from the right" is not a fact - it's an emotional plea

The term "flamebait" is also an emotional plea, but we trust adults to use their brain and decide how to report that in good faith.

"Biblical Flood" is a euphemism indicating "a lot of" misinformation (which is a fact [1]) and anyone not being willfully obtuse could interpret what the commenter meant. but I suppose it's easier to immediately dismiss that very true statement than engage with it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9114791/

[throw10920]

> The term "flamebait" is also an emotional plea

Incorrect. Emotional pleading is a logical fallacy wherein one manipulates the emotions of the listener in an attempt to convince them of an argument without actually supporting it. Labeling something "flamebait" is a characterization of the tone of an argument, and whether it appears to be designed to incite low-quality discussion/flaminess, which is orthogonal to the argument itself. An argument can be flamebait without containing emotional pleading, and vice versa. The two are unrelated, and the fact that you so confidently state that they are indicates that you don't actually know what either of them are.

> "Biblical Flood" is a euphemism indicating "a lot of"

Yes, I know that - and that's completely irrelevant as to its factual nature. It's still an euphemism designed to manipulate the listener, and is something that is impossible to prove factually. There is no objective test for whether something is a "Biblical flood" (and you can't even get different people to agree on what meets the threshold for it) - you thinking that it can assessed as true indicates that you don't have a good handle on what it means for something to be "factual".

> which is a fact [1]

Copy-pasting journal article links is not an argument, and that article in particular doesn't support the point that you think you're making.

[Blot2882]

> Labeling something "flamebait" is a characterization of the tone of an argument, and whether it appears to be designed to incite low-quality discussion/flaminess

Which is also not measurable and manipulates the reader. I don't see the readers comment as flamebait. Just because misinformation comes from right-wing media and people have eyes to see that and call it out doesn't make it flamebait. What should we call it? An unknown amount of totally apolitical misinformation from [insert party here]?

> It's still an euphemism designed to manipulate the listener, and is something that is impossible to prove factually

As are most arguments when we use phrases like "a lot", "similar to", etc. If you dismiss things based on such broad criteria, I am puzzled by your comment history. You have told users they are bad and support Tyranny[1], said it's malicious to support infrastructure spending[2], and called Snowden a narcissist (which proves he had no altruistic motives?)[3].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41434473 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41375616 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41406143

These are not emotional statements supported by an argument, these are arguments supported by emotional pleas.

And a simple cmd+f shows "Emotional plea" is a phrase you do not use sparingly either. You are using this word very broadly. If you cannot hold yourself to the same standards you hold other users, you aren't debating in good faith.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41375535 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41375602 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41406195 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41206808

You have obviously constructed a belief system that makes it impossible to engage with things you disagree with while allowing yourself to lash out at users however you see fit and bring up whatever politics suits you.

> Copy-pasting journal article links is not an argument

An argument is not a theoretical bottle exercise for one to wordsmith their way towards not engaging with the facts. In the real world, we have eyes.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/c...

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/21582440241258026?i...

https://www.npr.org/2021/05/13/996570855/disinformation-doze...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9637323/

[throw10920]

> Which is also not measurable

Yet most people can still recognize it when they see it, it's relatively easy to provide good heuristics ("is it unnecessarily politically partisan? does it bring up irrelevant examples?"), and is against the guidelines.

> and manipulates the reader

I already pointed out that the characterization of "flamebait" is not an emotional plea, as you incorrectly called it, and you didn't respond to that characterization at all and merely ignored it, so I can only conclude that you're inventing some other definition to fit the word.

Regardless, it's also against the HN guidelines, so we can safely put aside the problem of whether or not it's appropriate to point out, because it is.

> I don't see the readers comment as flamebait. Just because misinformation comes from right-wing media

...and that's why you don't see it - because you're pushing the same political agenda that they are.

This is also deceptive goalpost-moving - the poster didn't just say that "misinformation comes from right-wing media", but that it was a "Biblical flood" from "the right", which means an objectively large quantity, which neither you nor they have provided any evidence for.

It's pretty clear that that comment is flamebait. It made a politically-charged claim meant to attack a particular political group that had zero evidence for it, which you have also provided zero evidence for. Most of that user's other comments have been flagged and the account was eventually banned, which pretty clearly shows that they were engaging in flamebait.

> people have eyes to see that and call it out

Yet more emotionally-manipulative rhetoric. You still haven't provided evidence for these claims, either (although even if you had, it wouldn't excuse this).

> I am puzzled by your comment history.

Yet more emotionally-manipulative rhetoric (you are clearly not puzzled - you're personally attacking me), coupled with profiling, which is an ad-hominem that is extremely inappropriate (for HN, and for anywhere) and bad-faith.

> said it's malicious to support infrastructure spending[2]

This is a straight-up lie. I said "Proposing that we should continue to throw more money at infrastructure, before diagnosing and fixing the problems that are causing that inefficiency [...], is straight-up malicious." This is very different than what you claimed I said. You read my comment, and lied about what I said.

> and called Snowden a narcissist

Which is an irrelevant, intentionally misleading and out-of-context fragment of what I said - which was saying that he had narcissistic tendencies as an explanation for his actions, not as a means of trying to distract from an argument that he made.

> And a simple cmd+f shows "Emotional plea" is a phrase you do not use sparingly either. You are using this word very broadly. If you cannot hold yourself to the same standards you hold other users, you aren't debating in good faith.

More profiling. This is not appropriate for HN. Please do not do it.

> You have obviously constructed a belief system that makes it impossible to engage with things you disagree with while allowing yourself to lash out at users however you see fit and bring up whatever politics suits you.

This is yet another character attack - again, inappropriate for HN. As we've seen, you're also willing to lie about my words, so this assessment isn't based on fact anyway.

> An argument is not a theoretical bottle exercise for one to wordsmith their way towards not engaging with the facts. In the real world, we have eyes.

More emotionally-manipulative and deceitful rhetoric. Also, it's worth noting that you ignoring my point and instead proceeded to link-drop like it proved your point.

> https://www.npr.org/2021/05/13/996570855/disinformation-doze...

This is completely irrelevant to claims that there's been a "downright biblical flood of COVID misinformation that emanated from the right".

I don't need to read the others - if you have a claim that you want to make, you can source the claim from the paper, because given that you lied about what I said, the burden is on you to prove that your claims are based in reality. Posting a link is not proof behind a claim.

If you can't argue in good faith without profiling other users, making personal attacks, making partisan political comments, justifying guideline-breaking behavior because you agree with the opinions made, claiming that your opinions are "facts" without providing evidence, sneering at people who don't agree with said opinions, and actively lying about other people's words and claims, then you shouldn't comment on HN.

Please do not respond if you can't avoid doing the above - especially if you can't avoid lying about my own words back to me.