How To Win An Argument Against A Difficult Person

We've all felt that frustration of arguing with someone that just won't listen. So in this video, we'll go through six tips to actually change a stubborn person's mind without hurting your relationship. The first step is if you can say two things they'll agree with before stating where you disagree. This sets the frame that you actually agree about more than you don't. Let's watch a clip of Jon Stewart as an example. Jon is arguing here that people are too upset with Joe Rogan for his Covid views. And he knows that if you're upset with Rogan on this, it's because you think he's spreading misinformation. So listen to how he leads into his argument.

There's no question that there is egregious misinformation that's purposeful and hateful and that being moderated is a credit to the platforms that run them. But this overreaction to Rogan I think is a mistake.

Here he is a minute later. Notice how he again uses this two to one rule.

He may say some things that you think is misinformation and he may platform people that you think are wrong because. But to single that out as something so egregious. I think there are dishonest bad actors in the world, and identifying those is so much more important to me.

The whole point of this two to one rule is to open up a stubborn person to be more receptive to your argument. So now how do you actually persuade them to see things the way you do? One psychological trick you can use is to create consistency with a principle. That means you find a similar situation where you know the two of you agree, identify the underlying principle, then show them that consistency with that principle puts them on your side of your current disagreement. Let's go through a specific example. Pretend you wanted to persuade someone. It's a bad idea to ask Spotify to censor misinformation. How would you do it? John does it by drawing an analogy to the 2003 Iraq War when he was publicly questioning the mainstream narrative that Iraq had WMDs.

I was promoting what they would call misinformation. But it turned out to be right years later, and the establishment media was wrong. And not only were they wrong, in some respects, you could make the case that they enabled a war that killed hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people.

Most people would agree we wouldn't want Jon Stewart to be censored for trying to stop the Iraq war. And if we agree there, then we agree that sometimes it's Good to have people questioning the experts. Therefore, it can be dangerous to give institutions the power to censor anyone they say is spreading misinformation. That's how you create consistently with a principle. Let's watch one more quick example.

In the liberal community, you hate this idea of creating people as a monolith. Don't look at Muslims as a monolith. They are individuals. It would be ignorance. But everybody who voted for Trump is a monolith, is a racist. That hypocrisy is also real in our country.

In both these first two points, there's an emphasis on agreeing. That's because if you want to persuade someone, you have to avoid triggering the other person's us versus them psychology. And this means being persuasive is about more than just the words you say. It's also about your delivery. This next clip is a good example of what not to do.

You know what? Explain to me. You explain to me why black kids aren't graduating high school. Explain that one to me.

Ben's Destroy videos are great for building an audience who already agrees with you. But if you actually want to persuade the person you're speaking with, it's extremely important to make sure you maintain a calm conversational tone. If this is something you struggle with on certain topics, you can literally steal the sentence at the end of this next clip.

You stated this. There is no. I don't believe that there's a thing called white privilege.

There is not.

See now.

Okay. Now we have a conversation we can have.

Okay, look beyond tone. It's hard to convince anyone of anything if they don't like you. So a key part of persuading someone is prioritizing your connection. There's several ways to do this. A great first habit is to allow for playful breaks. Often when someone is tired of arguing, they'll make a joke to try to lighten the mood. Some people steamroll right over that joke to make their point. But John momentarily sets aside the debate if there's an opportunity to build rapport. Here's a quick example.

Joe Rogan has power because so many people listen to him. But that.

Because of the elk meat.

Yeah. Let me go back. Because. Because you're right. Jake J. Rogan has power because of elk meat. And that is what allows him to have the energy to have all the.

Jon didn't say anything insanely clever, but you can see how just going along with someone's joke can help you build more of a connection. You saw it on the other guy's face. The next way you can build rapport in an argument is by clarifying the person's ideas before you disagree with them. It should look something like this next clip.

Correct me if I'm wrong. What you're saying is if an artist supports someone that has been convicted of killing a cop, they should not be allowed to go to the White House.

No, it's a little bit more than that.

Okay, say it again.

I am saying to build rapport, it's important you do this genuinely. You don't want to pretend to be summarizing the other person's points while really straw manning them like that. Cathy Newman interview with Jordan Peterson.

You were saying female traits by implication.

Are not female traits. Oh, no. I mean that's very dangerous territory. Not saying that at all. You're saying, well, that's just a fact of women aren't necessarily going to get to the top. No, I'm not saying it doesn't matter either. You're saying it's saying there are multiple reasons for it. When you're arguing something, it's important to genuinely consider the opposing side. Otherwise you'll never know when you're wrong. A great exercise is to ask yourself, when was the last time I changed my mind on a major belief? It's extremely unlikely that you got every major issue right the first time you thought about it. So if you can't think of a time you changed your mind, that's a good sign that you're not engaging fully with opposing ideas. Our sixth tip is incredibly important when you're in an argument with someone who's stubborn. Debate ideas, not terminology. A very common mistake that will absolutely ruin your ability to have a quality conversation. Is getting caught up in debating a specific word. A great example of this is the conversation of Ben Shapiro and Malcolm Nance on Bill Maher. The show starts with Bill asking Ben to define critical race theory. Listen carefully to how he defines it because this will be important in a minute.

And so what that boils down to in sort of practical terms is all disparity equals discrimination. If you can see any stat where black people are underperforming white people, this means the system was set up for the benefit of white people and that white people have a duty to tear down these systems.

Ben explicitly says that to him, part of critical race theory is about tearing down certain Systems in the U.S. malcolm initially agrees with this, but then a few minutes later shifts his definition.

Malcolm, you tell me your definition.

Oh, I agree with everything he just said. Oh, what's happened here? As this. This Terminology, sort of like defund the police has been hijacked and been framed around the left as that. They want to do all this. They want to rip down the entire social fabric of America and they want us to be guilty about everything. I want you to teach history.

So you saw there, Malcolm is now shifting to the importance of teaching black history in public schools. This is an idea that Ben agrees with. But because the conversation is centered around the term critical race theory, they're unable to talk about ideas. They can't get past the terminology.

If we agree that history should be taught, why are you defending critical race theory, which is not history?

Did I not just say a moment ago that I think that term has been hijacked? And that's not okay, so let's say critical race. I'm going to go back and repeat that. I didn't say that.

You, you are literally defending critical race theory by redefining it as just teaching history, which is a cheap semantic trick.

And you know, if they could just drop the word and focus on ideas, they end up in complete agreement. But instead they end up talking past each other and the conversation gets hostile.

Is this what you do on your show? Because it sucks.

So if you find yourself in a conversation about a specific term and things are getting heated, drop the term. You may find someone who's been stubborn in the past suddenly becomes receptive to new ideas. Now it's worth noting how receptive someone is to your ideas isn't only based on how you present those ideas. Pre existing rapport is a huge factor. If someone likes you, they they're way more likely to find your arguments persuasive. And if someone doesn't like you, there's almost nothing you can do to persuade them. This is true beyond just debates. It's also true in asking for a promotion, selling a product, trying to land a date, or leading a team. Your success heavily depends on how well you can build rapport. If you want the ability to quickly build rapport with almost anyone, you may like our program, Charisma University. It's a step by step guided program guaranteed to give you more charisma and confidence in just 30 days. Here are just a few of the things that past members have written us the first to fill this position. And when asked why this was the answer. You have great social skills, which is rare for an engineer. You can think quick on your feet and you are open and self assured in your demeanor. Thank you so much for all that you have taught me. You have truly changed my life because without cu, I wouldn't have qualified for that position in a million lifetimes. This next one comes from another person who started a new job. They say, I wanted to let you know that I nailed those first few days at work. Everything energy, the smile, the positive mindset. With all your tips from last Tuesday in mind, it just could not go wrong. And this last one comes from an army officer. They say I used to come off overly serious and reserved, which got in the way of connecting with new people. Since taking the course, I have way more confidence to just go out and strike up a conversation with random people. It's also helped me handle body language and physical contact a lot smoother. And in general, I notice people are smiling way more when I'm around. Thank you for making it. I'm glad I joined. If you do join CU, it comes with a 60 day money back guarantee which is 100% for any reason at all. We make it 60 days even though the course is only 30 days, because we want to make sure that every single member truly feels like they're getting a ton of value from the course. If you want to check the course out, click the link on screen now or below in the description. We've had thousands of members go through this program and get a ton out of it and we'd love for you to do the same. Either way, I hope you enjoyed this video and I look forward to seeing you in the next one.