>>But that's just what gets our plain-speaking types all riled up. If
>>you just speak the truth in simple sentences - that would counter all
>>the lies told by the government and the media . . . It's the lies and the
>>lying liars who tell them (TM) and not the credulity of the public
>>that produces nonsense like Osama = Saddam. Doesn't Chomsky believe
>>that humans are hardwired for truth and it's only the lies of the
>>powerful that confuse them?
>>
>>Chomsky believes in Cartesian common sense, that each one of us has it, but
>>must work to use it. And as a plain-speaker (to the degree that I speak
>>plainly), I don't think that using simple sentences and small words alone
>>counters the massive propaganda that average people absorb every day -- but
>>it does help to break down some of it, and makes it easier to digest or
>>understand. Still, though, there are those who enjoy the propaganda, who
>>believe in it and will fight to keep it intact, and no amount of plain
>>speaking will alter that.
>>
A lot of this theory-versus-plain-speech stuff strikes me as circling
around the basic issue of personal style. If I'm talking to someone, and
I have to explain some complex point, I don't tell myself, "Okay, theory
first, then evidence," or "Okay, outline the evidence, then present the
theory." I just try to make it informative and interesting and
not-too-didactic. Chomsky could raise the same points in a lecture, and
make a strong logical case for his position. Bill Hicks could take the
same points, and have us hemmorhaging with laughter.
A few years back, I once got a solicitation from the secular humanist group CODESH. The offer included a book called "Fighting Back," which purported to explain how I could be presenting my secularism in everyday life-- what to do at weddings, what to say when people sneeze, etc. Couldn't believe this: were they telling me that secular humanists were _incapable_ of handling this stuff without an instruction manual? Their problem was that they were treating everyday encounters and conversation in much the same way that evangelicals did-- a stage where we'd get to _witness_. The result was that they kept coming at this with far too _much_ analysis.
Obviously, if we're describing some general principle-- how powerful interests behave, our own values, whatever-- there's going to be something that _could_ be called "theory." Even with the plainest of language, there's always going to be a theory lurking in there somewhere. So while Doug is right, in that simply presenting the facts won't be enough, I don't think that fact amounts to a _mandate_ for theory. It'd get in the way of simple human interaction.