When did someone last change your mind?

[igenlode]

"When did someone last change your mind?": an interesting question on this week's Radio 4 "Any Questions", that initially stumped all the panellists (according to the presenter's observations!), and which of course they all then proceeded to dodge/spin into political dogma -- with the exception of the Conservative peer, who thereby gained some respect in my eyes. Because yes, it *is* hard to think of any occasion in which someone else's opinion/arguments have honestly changed yours -- most of us are exceedingly stuck in our opinions, once we have actively formed them, which means that change, where it happens, tends to be experienced on an emotional level as the result of a violent apostasy or sense of betrayal. People are 'converted' from their opinions rather than simply changing their minds as a result of someone else's argument... (Which is one reason the jury system tries to go to some lengths to pick jurors who haven't heard all about the case in advance, and why press coverage is limited as soon as there is a case to be brought, in a nowadays fairly vain attempt to avoid bringing in a jury whose minds have been influenced by advance knowledge, potentially presented by those with biased opinions...)

Like the "Question Time" panellists, I too drew an immediate panicked blank in the face of that particular challenge; I'm not sure I can honestly think of *any* case in which an opinion of mine in one direction has been changed as the result of someone else's representations. Like most people, I cling to my prejudices even if battered by a tsunami of vociferous opposing arguments, which may shut me down but don't actually change my belief...

I think the best example that comes to mind, though it is not the result of anything that anyone else actually said to me, is my reluctant relaxation of my kneejerk distaste for Real Person Fiction. I could never understand why there would be any attraction in it at all; having now been lured by morbid curiosity into reading some (mainly because there was next to no *non*-RPF for that particular fandom, with only a handful of fics in existence overall) in a situation where I had a sufficiently detailed background knowledge to be able to appreciate the sources that were being drawn on and the very recognisable character dynamics... yes, I can say that I appreciated it and now realise that it *can* be done without being grossly offensive. Though I still wouldn't want the people involved to read it (as to be fair I understand that most of the writers wouldn't) and still find the attempted erotica neither convincing nor appealing; I did find the non-erotic interactions charming and funny, though, and can see that they were written from a position of affectionate --even if, in the most entertaining example, very silly!-- fandom.

So someone, or someones, did change my mind, albeit not by arguing out their case (which to be frank I don't think would have had any effect, just as pro-slash arguments don't make me like slash any the better) but by practical demonstration, which is probably the only way to do it.

Comments

[watervole]

I've remembered once occasion where someone did change my mind.

It was a radio debate about preventing suicide in prisons. I had been of the 'who cares' camp, especially with violent offenders, but the point was made that the prison service had a duty of care to everyone, and that the system itself could drive people to suicide.

[igenlode]

That's a good example.

I can understand the point of view of the people who say they don't see why 'the taxpayer' (i.e. them) should pay to keep prisoners in 'luxury', and that prison should be made so intolerable as to be a deterrent/proper punishment, but from a purely pragmatic point of view -- quite apart from anything else -- treating people as brutes while they are *in* prison generally causes them to come out brutalised. And unless you are planning for all prison sentences to last until the prisoner expires of old age, society then has to deal with the consequences of releasing them as worse people than when they went in. Especially if they initially went in for relatively minor offences -- apparently we still haven't learnt anything from the case of Jean Valjean...

Likewise, we are not *supposed* to be condemning people to death by sending them to prison -- that is not part of the judgement or the approved penalty -- so that shouldn't be the outcome. Quite apart from the fact that it has a bad effect on both the other prisoners and the staff who have to deal with it :-(

[watervole]

Exactly.

And now I've seen data on re-offending rates, I also know that prisoners who get a good education, and chances to make meaningful social connected while in prison, save the taxpayer money in the long run.

[igenlode]

The one thing you ought to be able to do while people are in prison and thus in a contained and supervised environment is to get them off drugs -- it should be far easier to conduct a managed drug withdrawal for someone with an otherwise chaotic lifestyle if every hour of their day is already being controlled from the outside. But in practice prisons are apparently *introducing* inmates to a drug habit who didn't have one before because the supply is so ubiquitous and the boredom so stultifying :-(