(My answer on Quora)
Gaslighting is a colloquialism that is defined as making someone question their own reality. The term is also used informally to describe someone who persistently puts forth a false narrative which leads another person to doubt their own perceptions. (Wikipedia).
The term originates from the 1944 movie Gaslight but has found its way into the social sciences as well as politics. It is a useful but odious device for shutting down debate.
Source: Blackburn center
Answers here on Quora are deliberately littered with gaslighting responses that serve to advance a specific point of view while cynically negating all alternatives in the cheapest way possible. Gaslighting answers are anti-intellectual and anathema to the elucidation of the truth.
Here are five examples that I have come across routinely on Quora. These are often repeated by some of Quora’s popular writers to great fanfare.
1.Critical Race Theory is a legal framework and is therefore not taught in schools.
Reality:
This is a classic example of using the No True Scotmen fallacy in a gaslighting context. At one point we were told by those in the know that there is nothing to worry about with respect to CRT. Now apparently it has only a very narrow range of applicability. Which one is it?
The truth is that the version of critical race theory that is taught in schools is a modified form of the overarching legal theory. It has been specifically adapted for school age teaching and re-branded by the more benign phrase Anti-Racism Pedagogy. By necessity it lacks the intellectual sophistication of the parent theory but is still framed in the same language of systemic injustice and the problematic whiteness of institutional structures (aka white supremacy culture).
It is predicated on a divisiveness that has substituted race for class. This concern that is further heightened by the fact that it is presented as moral dogma to a captive audience.
Yes the United States has a troubled history (as does virtually every country on this planet) but there are far better ways of teaching the nation’s political and cultural legacy than pushing it uncritically through a deliberately highlighted ideological narrative that has been poisoned from the get go.
2. Political Correctness is not a reality but a necessary request for people to be polite and not so mean.
Reality: The emergence of cancel culture, big tech censorship, speech codes and constraints on dogma eviscerate this attempt at gaslighting. Only the most naive partisan or deliberate grifter would make the case that the ability to speak freely about difficult topics hasn’t been put through the meat grinder of the political lens.
Political Correctness is a neologism that represents the cumulative efforts to restrict the level of discourse to narrowly defined parameters predetermined by so-called acceptable ideology. The Will to Power plays a key role. If one frames the debate within ‘acceptable’ parameters then tough-to-deal with inconveniences magically disappear. One can then target the heretics which seems to be the purpose of those who use euphemisms to hide their actual intent.
Source: Cato Institute
Source: Los Angeles Times
3. Questioning the Scientific consensus is equivalent to science denial.
Reality: Science is not an ideology. It a broad method of examining claims through empirical investigation and then drawing conclusion that have predictive value. It uses the framework of mathematics and statistics to analyze the evidence thereby opening up further avenues of investigation to test deeper claims. In this regard it has been very successful.
However when the practitioners of science become dogmatic and political in their outlook to the point that they transform the practice of science into a milieu dominated by groupthink.
The willful neglect of contrary evidence and the elevation of the power dynamic of credentialism then takes precedence and science crosses over into the realm of the ideology of scientism.
This invariably results in stagnant thinking, the formation of a closed secular priesthood/authority and the sacrifice of the rigorous scientific methodology to preordained conclusions.
Questioning such a tainted groupthink becomes the moral obligation of all who value necessary skepticism and free inquiry. Science remember is ultimately about understanding the physical reality. It is certainly not a popularity contest. No single person is the Science. Period.
Source: Syracuse.com
4. That story is false as it was first reported in media outlet X. X is a …………………(insert pejorative) media outlet.
Reality: A story either has merit, some merit or no merit. This is determined by examining the claims that the story itself makes . Yes some publications have more of a history of carrying meritless stories but this does not detract from the critical analysis that should be applied to the story alone.
Using the perceived bias of the reporting site as a substitute for the rigor required in dismissal or acceptance is a cheap and self serving slight of hand. It also has a history of being littered with folly. Remember Walter Duranty…
5. There are doctored pictures out there showing Chinese ill-treatment of the Uyghurs. Therefore the Chinese government is not guilty of human rights abuses in this context. The Western Media is deliberately trying to defame China.
Reality: This line is a favorite among supporters of the CCP, 50 Cent army and their fellow travelers. Yes there are some doctored pictures out there as is the case with other human rights abuses.
This however does not diminish the reality fact that the Uyghurs have indeed suffered abuse at the hands of Beijing’s authoritarian regime. Numerous human right sites have reported on this. In addition stories of Uyghur persecution have appeared on media outlets on both sides of the political spectrum. These are the same outlets that are normally at each other’s throat on a variety of issues. To assume that all of these outlets act as one on this particular issue is both ridiculous and insulting to the victims of such abuse. It also reflects a certain degree of projection from the situation that exists in China where the central authority does indeed control the media message with minimal push back.
Now one could add more stories to the catalog of political and social gaslighting. Clearly this approach has efficacy in swinging opinions to favor a specific narrative. For lazy thinkers it provides a quick fix for the Confirmation Bias sub-routine.
For those interested in a deeper debate it is best to relegate such mind games to the effluent stream of zero information rhetoric and let it marinate there.
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