Have Your Say: Low level of debate around the Caledonia demonstrations

To the Editors,

The Caledonia dispute is astonishing. To solve a problem, we usually try to use arguments that appeal to our opponent. But in this case the two sides seem to be putting out statements that belittle or even insult each other. Offending the other side is hardly the way to gain agreement.

In The Haldimand Press reports (October 29 and earlier), my sense is that the opponents are talking past each other without any hope of changing anyone’s position. At least five kinds of ineffective communication come to mind.

First, the opponents appear to have lost interest in unbiased evidence. In these days of social media, the most obvious symptom of that mistake is reliance on competing low-context or out-of-context video clips.