“Consider the question… why do liberals want women to be able to kill babies after birth? For the record, I think this question is ridiculous. But some people are asking exactly that question to prove how crazy liberals are. But you are doing the exact same thing. Now someone could come up with quotes that imply that babies can be killed after birth. And democratic politicians have voted against laws to prevent abortions from happening after birth.”

Except I’m not doing the same thing at all. The problem with this example is that with just a touch of context, it’s proven untrue at best and deceptive at worst. Anybody who brings it up is either dishonest, ignorant, or had better bring some hard data to back it up. It isn’t a question of mudslinging, it’s a question of observable reality. Bring truth, I’ll talk.

“open borders”

Except under any definition I know of “open,” there are no such things. The immigration enforcement people are hard at work intercepting illegal migrants every day. So again, anyone who brings that will need some definition I can work with.

“allowing men in woman’s bathrooms.”

This is a complicated issue. It should be obvious nobody is in favor of allowing men in women’s bathrooms. The problem is the definition of “man.” So that’s the actual question that needs answering. The problem is it’s usually presented as if liberals are in favor of evil male rapists lurking in restrooms, which definitely isn’t true. In fact, women tend to favor Democrats in part because they’re the party most likely to support women’s issues, prosecuting rape and assault being two examples you can argue the GOP has stood in the way of.

So we need to sort out:

• Is this actually about bathrooms or a backdoor attack on trans people?
• Have there actually been any sexual assaults by trans women in restrooms? I’d be interested to know. I haven’t seen any examples, just plain old assaults by hetero men that are old as time.
• Does it matter that trans kids report very high levels of harassment and assault when they use their birth sex bathroom? Should we be striking a balance?

“These mud slinging attacks on liberals are nonsense. I think you understand this.”

Definitely, though there are perfectly sensible attacks on liberals. For instance, their open-heartedness can get them into trouble — they can get too touchy-feely and lose touch with practicality. (Trying to get a bunch of liberals to agree on anything is like herding cats.) For example, I believe in diversity, equity, and inclusion, but liberals can get way overheated and take things too far. I vote for Democrats even though they constantly annoy/disappoint me because they’re the best available option.

“And so are the mudslinging attacks on conservatives.”

But it’s not mudslinging if I’m using actual quotes backed up with credible sources. Surely it’s not controversial that the TFG spews nonsense and has clearly lost whatever mind he might have had; the right won’t compromise on abortion; you don’t understand democracy if you can’t accept that losing elections means you have to put up with other people’s laws; Mueller didn’t prove there was “no collusion”; and that TFG is up to his neck in Russians and now his party is too. In case any of those were, I provided sources for additional study.

“It is all a game that you are choosing to play.”

Dude, I spent quite a while running all this stuff down, and I research the questions I get from others to be clear and verify their accuracy. Yes, I can be snarky and sarcastic with silly stuff, but not about something sensible.

It’s not a game. It’s taken me an hour and a half and about 20 open browser tabs just to write this response.

I’m out here trying to learn. If I believe something untrue, I want to toss it overboard. If someone else is spewing BS, I will call them on it.

But I’ll repeat: get me solid, supportable answers to some interesting questions, and I promise to publish a piece about it, give you credit, and apologize if I’ve been wrong in the past.

Otherwise, admit you got nothing but opinions you won’t challenge, and we can be done with it.