One of the most pervasive effects of postmodern philosophy is the virtual death of reasoned debate in some quarters. Whereas in the past people argued their positions cogently, far too many people today seem to be unable to do so.
To risk over-simplification, Postmodernism holds that all sincerely-held positions are equally valid, there is no such thing as right or wrong, only insincerity. This means that rather than arguing against someone's position, the only weapon that the Postmodernist has against an opponent is to attack that person's character; the person is insincere, bad, and evil. This means that the postmodernist gets nasty very quickly. Now, when one has no absolute standard of truth that is understandable. What worries me is when Evangelical Christians who profess a belief in absolute truth act like postmodernists and go straight to personal attacks against those with whom they disagree.
Any true proposition is capable of reasoned proof - so are quite a few false ones, come to that. Any right course of action is capable of reasoned proof. When we fail to act reasonably and move straight to personal attack, we are denying what we profess to believe; we are allowing our thinking to be conformed to the pattern of this world.
No, the response to false arguments is always to refute them, unless we are quite sure that the 'argument' is just silliness being brought up to cloud the issue, in which case it should be firmly pointed out that this is neither the time nor the place for jesting.
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