Argument and difference and humanity!

Kastely asks a very genuine question: what if someone denies arguing? In other words, how would one argue with someone who is not ready to accept that there exists a situation that demands an argument? I agree with Kastely that the formalistic approaches do not address issues that related to these questions. In the traditional/ common understanding of argument, it is assumed that parties have agreed that there exists a situation that requires argument and they are ready to “fight” to prove themselves right. While reading Toulmin, I hardly thought about that formalistic approach to argumentation although I certainly thought that if arguments in the real world really functioned in so much formulaic way. But, it was Toulmin, and I hardly questioned him. But now, I can see how rigid, formalistic approach to argumentation may not always solve problems pertaining to argumentation.

In my previous post also I talked about difference, and here I also see Kastely dealing with “difference” a lot, but in slightly differently. There, in relation to feminist argumentation, or any argumentation made from the margin for that matter, I was talking about how the inability, or rejection, acknowledge difference, in the name of treating all as “equal” result into unfair ground for argumentation for the two sides, but Kastely talks about difference in terms of the existence of the positions themselves, at the level of existence in the language of statis theory.

The inability to listen to others, as explained in detail through the characters of Creon and Antigone, is a not very different from traditional, oppositional argument. That mode of argumentation is based not the desire to make an understanding but prevailing over the other. Kastely talks about threat, which I find very useful. Those who feel threat cannot listen to others; hence their argument is bound to be antagonistic. I would like to add that that sense of threat could also be a sign of insecurity – if I make concessions, I’ll be defeated, someone will prevail over me. That is exactly the fear that both the characters seem to have. The new method of argumentation, which is based on the acknowledgement that there are differences and it is fine to have differences, encourages one to come out of the rigid self and embrace others opinions as well. In that sense, the self making arguments is extending his or her self beyond himself/ herself. In this sense I like how Kestely relates argument to humanity. Nice reading; feel like I had hardly grasped the essence when I read it first (as if I were doing it now!)