WBTYM: The Video Devolution

Words are the instruments of thought. Words are the tags we apply to categories and specific entities, that we might speak of them, their characteristics, and their actions in a fashion that conveys useful knowledge. Words occupy the same position in the landscape of logical thought as do symbols in the realm of mathematics. When I seek to convince someone of a causal proposition, I employ words.

Video is a medium of entertainment and diversion. Video conveys images that can fascinate, even hypnotize a viewer. With its power to dramatize isolated incidents and render pure fiction as visible as objective reality, it can suggest without substantiation, persuade without argument. Were I to embark on a campaign of manipulation or deception, I'd prefer video to verbal argument. There's no way to refute a video.

Words engage the cerebrum, the logical center of the brain. Video goes straight for the amygdala, wherein the emotions are formed.

Beware him who seeks to persuade you of a causal proposition by means of video.

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There are legitimate uses for video in politics. There's no better way to immortalize a particular incident; a politician's gaffe caught in a video clip can never be effaced. But video should not be used to argue for specific policies. It's a poor format for the effective presentation of a policy's systemic consequences. When a video succeeds, however modestly, in such an undertaking, it's invariably the case that a verbal presentation would have been even meatier and more conclusive.

The expanding use of video in political outreach can only mean that the proponents of the propositions those videos attempt to promulgate are tired of argument. They've talked until they're blue in the face, but their progress has failed to satisfy them. So they've decided to go for the "quick kill." They're eschewing argument and aiming for the heartstrings.

The fallacy here follows from Porretto's Third Law of Emotional Manipulation: For any conceivable emotional thrust, there's an equal but opposite thrust. Think what you like about your powers as a polemic cinematographer; among your foes are some who are just as good. Indeed, your gambit is likely to energize them into producing a counterstroke. This is not the case with arguments properly supported by objective evidence.

Please, please, please, fellows of the Right: Do your arguing with words. Reserve videos for specific instances of idiocy, infamy, and atrocity among our adversaries. That will give you two weapons to our opponents' one, for deceitful emotional appeals are all they have.

Alongside that, if you have an argument to make, reading it without having to watch a dozen videos will save me quite a bit of time in my twice-daily news sweeps. I am getting old, you know.