Scissor Labels
A specific shape of online debate caught my attention in 2020. As I’ve reflected on the past year, I’ve realized that this pattern is happening frequently but is rarely understood.
We live in an age of constant narrative conflict. But today, not every battle is legible to the untrained observer. While some grifts are plainly perpetrated by would-be thought leaders, other battles for narrative control are hiding in plain sight, happening under the guise of intellectual debate. When these battles go unrecognized for what they are, even the best among us fall victim to meaningless conversations that waste the time of those involved. In this piece, I introduce the concept of "scissor labels," why they foment controversy, and how they're different from other linguistic debate
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