Hi, it’s me, Steve. Not a character. Oh, please continue to eat. I think you can listen and eat at the same time. I want to read you a little something I wrote about conviction, which happens to be the title of the show, so I thought it would align pretty well.
Conviction is an interesting word to me. Conviction is one of the words with two distinct definitions: according to Merriam-Webster, it can either mean the act or process of finding a person guilty of a crime especially in a court of law or a strong persuasion or belief. Not exactly opposites, but I would venture to guess that most people would rather have strong beliefs rather than a criminal record.
The word conviction takes the familiar pathway to English from Latin through French and into Middle English. The core etymological root is the Latin word meaning “to refute.” There is something powerful about the act of refuting. To prove wrong by argument or evidence. There is a sense that that refutation is something that reveals or affirms the truth.
I love that line from Frederick Douglass that Arthur Pretense got to say in his piece: “At a time like this, seething irony, not convincing argument, is needed.” I liked to spend a moment unpacking it–as we English profs like to say. This is what normal people just call doing a good think about it.
So, what exactly is seething irony? In Douglass’s case, it was the celebration of Independence Day while millions of people were enslaved. Not only was this a discrepancy between the reality and the expectation, but it was seething–boiling like a pot on the stove–and urgent and heated. It was an emotional heat, a physical heat, and a literal heat.
But why is this irony better than convincing arguments? Well, there is a whole trove of studies that have shown that people not only hang onto their beliefs even when they are presented evidence to show that the foundation of these beliefs are false, they dig in even more. We often retreat to unfalsifiable beliefs–ideas that can’t be proven or disproven–when our views are attacked. Some psychologists think that this is an evolutionary trait, that we evolved to prioritize survival over correctness in uncertain environments. And folks like Arthur Pretense aren’t immune to this, despite their honorary degrees. One study showed that highly educated people were more likely to interpret data in a politically biased way because they had more rhetorical resources to draw upon to defend their beliefs.
So, convincing arguments can often fail. As someone who has taught students how to craft convincing arguments for close to three decades, this is a tough pill to swallow. (In fact, if I am honest, I can probably construct a really good argument to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt how convincing arguments are vital to a functioning democratic society.)
Douglass knows that he can’t just lay out a set of facts to make the case that slavery is wrong. Because the people who he needs to convince won’t listen to him, will dig in even more deeply, will retreat back to their unfalsifiable beliefs, and use all of their rhetorical skills to craft a counterargument.
But irony? Irony can cut through this framework. Irony lives the land of incongruity and dissonance. Irony is both what is and what seems to be. Irony defies. Irony refutes.
I believe in irony. I know it may be strange to have a strong conviction about something as tricky to define as as irony. I mean, people even criticized Alanis Morrisette’s song, “Isn’t it Ironic?” (For instance, they claim that the line “Like rain on your wedding day” isn’t ironic, it’s just good luck arriving from folklore. But still…)
I want to hold onto irony for its ability to protect us, to allow us to resist when the conventional wisdom is wrong and won’t listen to reason. It provides us a way to strengthen our convictions, while perhaps avoiding conviction. My criticism about authority? It’s just irony–a joke–you get it, right?
So, one of my convictions–my strong beliefs–is in the power of conviction. Not the power of our legal justice system–that’s a conversation for another day–but my belief in the need and value of conviction.
Or, maybe not, who knows?