I was recently talking to someone about israel/gaza in the context of the new iran war. I couldn’t help but notice we were coming to much the same conclusions, but through totally different lines of thought. To summarize, like most lefties, he opposes israel for “what they’re doing to the locals” i.e. from the perspective of “anti-colonialism”. On the other hand, I oppose israel for what they’re doing to do us in the West.
What is your reaction to a situation like this? And more broadly speaking, what do you think about this notion of coming to the same conclusion as someone else, while following wildly different trains of thought? Try and convince them that their entire perception of the world is upside down? Take it as a win, in an “enemy of my enemy” kind of way? Can they be trusted to ever come to the “correct” conclusion again if their rationale is “wrong”? Or is the line of thought more important than the conclusion? If not in general, can it ever be?
I suppose this post is basically just turning that giancarlo esposito (“you dislike X because Y, I dislike X because Z, we are not the same.”) meme into a text post lmao, but I think there’s actually some kind of important discussion to be had, related to this idea
Go deeper. Underneath both of your reasonings is a common thread. Expose that, or rather lead your acquaintance to say it themselves, and you truly have common ground; a bedrock that you can build upon. From there you can open their eyes to much more.