Judge the Argument, Not the Identity

One of the problems in our public discourse is that we too often decide whether an argument is acceptable based on who is making it rather than whether the argument itself is true.

The controversy surrounding the holdout juror illustrates the danger. If our judgment of a person suddenly changes when we discover his race, sex, religion, or political affiliation, then perhaps we were never judging the argument fairly in the first place.

A principle should remain a principle regardless of the identity of the person involved. If we believe someone deserves to be heard, his race should neither strengthen nor weaken that belief.

This applies to all sides of our political and cultural divisions. We should resist reducing people to categories and then assigning motives to them before we know the facts.

Truth does not change according to the identity of the person speaking it.

Perhaps our society would be healthier if we spent less time asking, “Which group does this person belong to?” and more time asking, “Is what this person is saying actually true?”