I enjoy a good argument. I'm not likely to care enough to take offense if someone chucks a bit of dirt my way.

This old man has a few wise words.

This reminds me the pyramid of argument.
The 2 highest levels bring the discussion forward, The second level corrodes the power of an argument until you have enough "argument power" to go to the highest level.
Not always the second level will bring to the first, sometimes it ill just change the conclusions accepting part of the arguments, combining with new ones that will go to a different conclusion, those are the nicest discussions in my opinion and are in the politely disagreement that can come to a nice synthesis, bringing a new agreement out of the disagreement.

The third level create parallel discussions, because it does not talk with the first argument. It is useful on political debate to change the subject, but on an structured argument, it only expands and create confusion. Should be used only after the first level is achieved.

The fourth level just puts smoke on the discussion and does not create even an alternative route, it is pure distraction.

The lower levels don't even need comments XD

Love this

Those who view a difference of opinion as an attack also feel justified in attacking others themselves. There seems to be levels of maturity and certain traits that go along with them. When you're mature enough not to automatically view a difference of opinion as an attack, your also mature enough not to feel the need to attack to defend your point.

Thanks for this post. I've noticed that if I reply to someone they think I am attacking and that I should not be able to do this. If I disagree with you I am only trying to make you think. For the most part there are more attackers on Facebook than anywhere else I've found. If someone's info is wrong just post a link to a trusted site that gets the info right and that should settle it. This can be done without pages of debate, and I do not like debate. The problem with debate is that the original subject is lost in all the ongoing pages of reply.