Reaction Paper Bullshit.docx

Villareal, Roma Francesca T.

February 29, 2019

SPCM 101 - U

Sir Jaime Ledesma

Reaction Paper: Rhetoric and Bullshit by James Fredal People living in today’s world, especially the youth who now have unlimited access to social networking sites and ever-evolving technologies, can now look at their surroundings through a lens that can instinctively recognize the difference between what may be considered credible, and just a foolish insolent talk about a certain issue. The rapid and constant proliferation of information nowadays have pushed individuals to have a keen sense of bullshit detection, encouraging us to exhibit good judgement through critical thinking and careful analysis of content or meaning. The term “bullshit” is extensively used by anyone to refer to deceptive or nonsensical statements and fallacious arguments. It is evident that people could grasp its concept, but it is important to dig deeper and figure out the ways in which these so-called “stupid” views manifest and affect the ways we perceive the world, establish relationships with others, and construct our beliefs. In James Fredal’s 2011 essay “Rhetoric and Bullshit”, he was able to bring forth a broad range of disciplines in which bullshit, or what he prefers to call as ‘taurascatics’, could be defined. I have always known rhetoric as the art of effective persuasive speaking and writing, but I never really thought of the tendencies in which a speech, or even a canon, could rest outside the usual classification between right and wrong, truth and falsehood, and reasonable and illogical. Just like how Frankfurt discussed bullshit from a moral philosophical point of view, it is not the same as lying. It could even be considered worse, for it does not even care about the truth. It does not aim to say the truth, nor to conceal it, but to say whatever befits a specific purpose. As Fedral continued to extend his discussion, also mentioning Daniel Mear’s statement that bullshit is a significant social phenomenon and different forms of deception and miscommunication are inevitable, I realized how we fail to notice that we are bombarded with too much information,

considering

the

emergence

of

social

media

and

technological

advancements, and how much bullshit we actually hear and imbibe every single day that recognizing bullshitters is a must to survive in this world full of people who claim to know

the truth of all things, or those of which who are willing to do whatever it takes to gain power and satisfy their intentions. Language as an instrument for manipulating meaning and exerting influence over others, as mentioned by George Orwell who focused on how bullshit can arise in texts, could clearly be witnessed today as the corruption of language successfully destroy the bond that holds the members of the society together. As some individuals choose to corrupt words to persuade others at any cost, they continue to obliterate the truth and undermine people. Obscurantism could be one of their means to gain their end, as the spread of knowledge or enlightenment is purposely hindered for their own benefit. The skill to willingly detect crap should be a necessity for us humans. We should want to know the distinction between truth and bullshit. However, we must accept the fact that we can never force someone to fully accept our opinion, no matter how ideological it may seem as Neil Postman stresses out the importance of the audience’s value system. There are different kinds and levels of bullshit in this world. We are free to consider any article, speech, or thought, as bullshit, for this is a highly subjective matter. We should practice listening to both the proponents and opponents of such claims, and develop transcendence within ourselves.

References: McComiskey, B. (2017). Post-truth rhetoric and composition. University Press of Colorado. Neil Postman – Bullshit and the Art of Crap-Detection. (2010, June 27). Retrieved from https://criticalsnips.wordpress.com/2007/07/22/neil-postman-bullshit-and-the-art-of-crapdetection/ On

Bullshit

by

Harry

Frankfurt.

(n.d.).

Retrieved

https://philosophynow.org/issues/53/On_Bullshit_by_Harry_Frankfurt

from