Costs of the argument culture

The following is an essay I wrote for Eng 102, it's actually a short summary of the last three sections of Deborah Tannen's essay: "The Roots of Debate in Education and the Hope of Dialogue."


The tendency to resolve our problems through argument and debate can hinder progress in our society. From our professional lives to our personal, it is very natural for us to clash and fight when we come into contact with disagreements. As Tannen illustrates in her essay, we must resist the urge to argue our point and rather persuade the other into our way of thinking, while keeping an open mind and listening to their view.
Resolve through arguing may seem so easy because it’s a form of aggression, which like many of our emotions may be built into our subconscious. Wherever this problem stems, it is more important what it costs us, as Tannen explains “… the most grievous cost is the price paid in human spirit” (695). Unfortunately, it seems to be a norm that we must make each point into an argument; that for something to be “true” there must be an opposing view that clashes against it. Being open to the opposing view, and all views for that matter, can be much more productive when trying to settle a problem, it shows that you are thinking about the whole situation rather than just the point you’re trying to get across. Treating your opponent as a friend rather than an enemy can also lead to settling differences and eventually working together.
We seem to have developed this notion that if you don’t do something original or something that draws attention in an extreme way, whether it be right or wrong, than your “just a sheep”; that your lack in making a firm stand on something makes you weak. This can put a horrible strain on the human spirit as lawyers must find guilt in the innocent, journalists must find the bad in the good, and so on. In order to get ahead, many would sacrifice human emotion and connection to seem tough and independent. Rather than working for what’s right and just, they sell their soul to make some gain.
In our western culture we can easily misunderstand issues as strictly having two sides, putting the bigger picture in a haze. In order to ease the tension between “two sides”, as Tannen states, we should “talk instead about “all sides”” (699). It seems that people these days would prefer to pick on little easy points rather than focusing on the issue as a whole, which may be why they simplify them to two sides. Winning the argument is much more important than being enlightened from the experience and learning something from it. Western news is often counterproductive and distorts the main issues in their “quest for ratings” as “moderators of… talk shows often provoke and stoke conflict to make their shows more interesting” (Tannen 700).
Although we are a country of people with many differences, it is important to realize that we can accomplish a lot more when we work together. Much of what is true to an issue is lost when we narrow our view down to two sides, and this concept of for one to be right, the other must be wrong, should be forgotten. Instead we should always be open to new ideas from our own, this way they have the chance to really be analyzed and understood before we make up our conclusions. If disagreement still remains, than we can “develop more varied- and more constructive- ways of expressing opposition” (Tannen 703).


Works Cited
Tannen, Deborah. “The Roots of Debate in Education and the Hope of Dialogue”. The New Humanities Reader. Ed. Richard E. Miller and Kurt Spellmeyer. 3rd ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2009. 677-703. Print.