I’ve recently noticed a resurgence in the online debate over debates. This was a major topic of conversation in the early 2000s amongst scientists, who worried over whether it was worthwhile to debate “the other side” on issues like climate change and evolution. Was an evolutionary biologist able to meaningfully educate and persuade an audience of young earth creationists? Or was the attempt less than useless, with a debate elevating creationism to be a philosophy on equal footing with evolution?
I’m sorry to spoil the ending for you here at the start but we never really came to a solid conclusion on that one. Even back then, I was on the fence. I enjoyed watching well-run debates, and especially appreciated scientists who went to debate in places like megachurches, where they were likely to reach young people who had been dragged their all their lives and might not have had an opportunity to see the ideas of the Church challenged.
At the same time, I started to get uncomfortable when I realized that people like Skeptic Magazine’s Michael Shermer had turned “debate” into pure money-making entertainment, going on tours across the country with Dinesh D’Souza, arguing over the morality of atheists for a bit before going out for drinks and yucking it up. It made me realize that “debate” was moving away from being an exercise in persuasion, or exposure to new ideas, and more towards being a form of base entertainment that clearly benefitted both parties in terms of financial gain and also of increasing their public profile. Back then, I had never heard of D’Souza. Today, D’Souza is a powerful far right voice, with several books and movies under his belt (along with a felony for a campaign finance violation, for which, of course, Donald Trump pardoned him in 2018).
Did D’Souza rise to fame because of his well-publicized cross-country debate tour? Not entirely, of course. But it was definitely a step on the stairway to infamy.
The debate debate is back now, because people have learned that debate is a money-printing machine, especially if you adopt the Jerry Springer tactic of hosting brawls between groups of extremists or otherwise loathsome people. And yes, I’m mostly talking about Jubilee.
You’re probably aware because at this point they’re unavoidable, but Jubilee is a media powerhouse that publishes wildly popular videos where “regular” people “debate” one another in various ways. They’ve been popular for ages now, but in the past year or so they’ve really hit paydirt with their “surrounded” series, in which one person defends their position against 20 people on the other side. One doctor versus 20 anti-vaxxers. One Palestinian versus 20 “protestors.” One Jordan Peterson versus 20 atheists.
Fun fact on that last one: it was originally titled (and pitched to the participants) as “One Christian versus 20 Atheists” but Peterson doesn’t know how to (or have the ability to) debate in good faith, so he just refuses to take a position and keeps demanding that his opponents define very simple terms to him until everyone gets confused and gives up.
The most recent one, as of this recording, is “One Progressive Versus 20 Far Right Conservatives.” The progressive in question was Medhi Hasan, a very talented broadcaster who was on MSNBC before they canceled him, probably because he was publicizing the plight of Palestinians. He then founded Zeteo, an independent news outlet with many contributors.
According to comments from Hasan afterwards, he apparently was under the impression that he would be debating hardcore Trump supporters, but for some reason, he did NOT expect to be debating fascists. Now, Hasan is a smart man, and he’s not known to hold back or mince words, so I’m not exactly sure if he really, truly thought that Jubilee would find him “far right conservatives” but weed out any who were openly fascist. From my perspective, that would be tough. Do 20 of those exist? Let alone 20 who live near the studio in LA and want to be eviscerated on a popular YouTube channel?
But Hasan has a (very good) rule: he doesn’t debate fascists. And when, early on in the “debate,” one of his opponents happily admitted to being a fascist, he was true to his word and ended the debate. And I’m sure he kind of had to keep going, but even he noted that at least half of the other “far right conservatives” applauded along to the gleeful self-labeling of “fascist.” Hasan was, in fact, surrounded by fascists, and through the rest of the “debate” several of them told him that he should leave the country. This country, the US, where he is a citizen. Because he’s brown.
Progressives online were pretty well split over whether or not Hasan should have been there in the first place. Did he just help platform a bunch of Nazis? What was the benefit of this show?
And again, I find myself on the fence.
There’s no doubt in my mind that debate, as a general concept, can be beneficial. Sure, the research on whether or not it’s persuasive is mixed, because that kind of thing is hard to judge. A lot depends on who is debating, what they’re debating, and how the debate is structured. In the Wild West of online debate forums, yeah, turns out nobody really tends to persuade anyone of anything. But formal debates by organizations like Intelligence Squared do seem to move some people, if you believe that surveys before and after are filled out honestly and not just in the hopes of supporting the side they want to “win.”
And debate is certainly good for the people doing the debating–research shows that when used in the classroom, for younger kids and for those in college, participating in debates develops critical thinking and the ability to deconstruct arguments, improves communication skills, and fosters engagement with others, which leads to participants retaining information for longer.
And I think that the Hasan debate actually illustrates a benefit to a participant, though admittedly I may be reaching, here. At one point, around an hour into the video, one man sits down to “debate” Hasan’s premise that “immigration is good for America.” And that man is Edwin, who is an immigrant who came to the US “illegally” when he was ten years old. And all he can do is ask if Hasan thinks that all conservatives think immigration is bad for America (he does not). And he sits there and works through his thoughts and it feels like it’s the first time he’s vocalized it. Here’s how it went.
I genuinely felt for Edwin because I think he is maybe the only guy there who showed up thinking it was possible to be a “far right conservative” but NOT a fascist. I really think he thought there were going to be 19 other people like him, where he’s probably, I don’t know I’m just guessing, against abortion, or maybe is concerned about crime, or whatever. And clearly Edwin has just spent the past hour+ watching white people sit down and tell Hasan that all Black and Brown people should be deported from the US. Sent to El Salvador. Ethnically cleansed.
I was hoping to find Edwin online to see what he had to say following all of this but his is not one of the social media usernames included in Jubilee’s video description. Instead, it’s all the white fascists, who are crowing that they “won” the “debate.” One of them, Connor Estelle from Colorado (who goes by “Pinesap” online) was fired, but he started a fundraising campaign so other Nazis could pay him. They’re currently up to $36,000.
So anyway, I don’t know what Edwin came away thinking. But it sure seems like he was confronted with a very uncomfortable truth: that the people he has allied himself with would quite literally slit his throat if they thought they could get away with it.
And so I’m faced with this issue: Jubilee is clearly a disgusting, amoral, worthless channel that apparently tricked a Brown immigrant into sitting down with a crowd of fascists who want him dead or gone, and they willingly gave those fascists a platform to grow by linking to their social media pages. And those fascists will edit these videos in whatever way they can to convince their fellow Nazis that they “won” the debate. And all of that is very, very bad.
And then we have Edwin, at least in the way I am interpreting Edwin. The country and the world are full of Edwins who still do not understand the overt, vile bigotry that is now mainstream in the United States. Sure, one of these dipshits got fired but he has $36,000 to help him out until he gets a new job at One America News Network or Charlie Kirk’s show or Tim Pool’s skate park or wherever. He’ll be fine, because the US is now okay with open fascism, and the Edwins need to know. If this is how they find out, great. Better now than on the way to the Salvadoreon concentration camp.
But ultimately I have to agree with the debate deniers: Jubilee has proven to be more interested in being the new Jerry Springer instead of their original stated intention to show various viewpoints and bring people together. They’re profiting off of Nazis, and helping those Nazis profit as well. That is officially the last video of theirs I’ll watch.
