“How old were you when you stopped having sex with your pet?”

“What!? I never had sex with my pet!”

“Stop avoiding the question. How old were you?”

“But, I…”

That argument is clearly going nowhere. And the reason is obvious: the most important part of the question is actually the assumption underneath it. The questioner creates a domain and, in order to answer the question in any way, you must acknowledge the validity of the domain. To answer in any way, you must admit that your schnauzer was kinda cute.

Absurd as the above volley may sound, try out this one, from today’s Boulder Daily Camera (our local newspaper that sometimes has the editorial weight of Tinkerbell):

“Are human beings inherently good or evil, connected or disconnected?”

This was from an article about how more people are calling themselves “spiritual” rather than “religious” (I’ll have to save my thoughts about THAT premise for another post… but the short form is: same ugly prom date, different dress).

Check out the question again: “Are human beings inherently good or evil, connected or disconnected?”

Not much different than, “When did you stop pokin’ the puppy?”

They imply a belief: a spectrum on which we can judge people, with “good” on one side and “evil” on the other, and a set of relationships where “connected” or “disconnected” are the only possibilities.

They rely on the person answering to make up what “good” and “evil” and “connected” and “disconnected” mean, and then land on one side of the fence or the other.

And, clearly, “good” is better than “evil” and “connected” is more evolved than “disconnected.”

In reality, this question is no more meaningful than: “Are human beings inherently 4.17 or yabba-dabba-do, jalapeño flavored or Dutch?”

To even entertain the question is to suggest that you agree with the unspoken premise. And, sadly, to tell the questioner that they have been unknowingly speaking in a language that sounds like English, but is really a dialect of Moron makes you “defensive.”

Anthropologist David Eller gave a great example of the statement-under-the qusetion during a talk today: If we’re at a restaurant and I ask you ‘Are you going to finish those fries?’ I’m not asking for you to predict your future eating habits… I’m telling you to push the plate towards me!

Just because a sentence ends with a question mark, that doesn’t make it a question!

(But if it ends in an exclamation point, it *is* serious! Seriously!!!!!!!)

A question mark is like the command a stage hypnotist uses to make someone start clucking like a chicken. Say it at the right time, and the person will stop what they were doing and start looking for bird seed. Use a question mark at the end of a veiled statement and it’ll make the listener hunt and peck for an answer.

“How can I attract more money into my life?”

“How do I get rid of the blocks and resistance that are keeping me from having a successful relationship?”

“How do I get over my fear of intimacy?”

I know these SOUND like questions, but they are actually statements about a ridiculous set of beliefs. And to even consider that there is even a way of answering them means you buy into these beliefs. Let’s have a word swapping party to see what I mean.

“How can I vomit more money into my life?”

“How do I get rid of the hybrid cars and jelly donuts that are keeping me from having a successful relationship?”

“How do I get 5′ to the left of my fear of breathing in and out?”

Trust me, the first batch of questions is as ludicrous as the 2nd if you don’t believe in notions like “attracting,” “blocks,” “resistance,” “getting over something” or “fear of a concept.”

And, BTW, to “not believe in those” notions doesn’t mean you believe in the opposite. It means there’s no frame of reference for which  those notions have any meaning at all.

I’ll bet that if you’re reading this, you don’t believe that the Sun is actually the burning of Thor’s hammer as it travels through the cosmos. It’s not a question of whether Thor’s hammer is or isn’t burning, it’s that the question is nonsensical.

If you want proof that not all questions are questions, just go listen to your average high school student make the simplest statement and use the rising intonation at the end of their sentence, as if there were a question mark at the end!

“Hey, young man. How old are you?”

“I’m 17?”

“I can’t tell from the way you said that. Are you asking me, or telling me?”

“Um, I’m telling you?”

“Do you WANT me to shoot myself in the face because I find the way you’re talking so annoying?”

“No?”

BANG!

I’m starting a new campaign that all humans should wear diapers.

No more limiting this revolutionary article of clothing to the very young and very old. We should ALL wear them!

And not because of the combination of convenience and entertainment value that we would get by being able, say, to interrupt the negotiation of a Kosovar arms treaty with, “Could you repeat that, General, I was taking a leak.” And not because it would replace the stress of trying to find a clean bathroom in 3rd world countries with a self-satisfied and self-reliant smile.

But because, as far as I can tell, no matter our age, we haven’t really grown up. And we may as well admit it and demonstrate it with the symbolic act of replacing boxers with Depend undergarments (full disclosure: as soon as I make this post, I will find the company that makes/owns Depend and buy their stock).

While I could site seemingly countless examples of how we haven’t grown up, today I’ll focus on just this one: that the arguments over most serious topics facing our world today devolve into: “You are rubber and I am glue; whatever you say bounces off me and sticks on you!”

Athiests criticize those with religious beliefs… and are then criticized by being “religious” about their atheism (they’re actually being “passionate”).

Those who attack Islam for being intolerant are re-attacked as being intolerant (actually, “critical” does not equal “intolerant”).

Christians who scream that we should allow prayer in the school and then scream louder about how their children are having science shoved down their throats (I don’t even know where to begin on this one).

Speaking of science, opponents of “intelligent” design (btw, it’s more accurate to put quotes around the I-word and not the whole phrase) as not giving a actual answer to how things began are opposed by those who say, “Well, you don’t know, actually, what happened at the moment of the big bang, do you? Nanny, nanny, boo, boo.” (sometimes they leave out the last part… but they don’t seem to understand that not have a complete counter-answer doesn’t give credibility to a meaningless answer).

The US government says it refuses to be made fearful by the threat of nuclear attack… and then threatens nuclear attack on those who made the original complaint (this might be less a “rubber/glue” issue than a debate about the blackness of pots and kettles… but it still warrants diapers).

I could go on…

So, I’m going to propose that until we learn to argue, debate, and negotiate like adults, we show our true colors with the wearing of a comfortable absorbent layer of pillowy freshness.

Oh, and on a similar note (don’t ask me HOW it’s similar; I haven’t thought it through that far. It’s just the thought that appeared next in my mind so it MUST be similar): I don’t understand why people are shocked when someone lies about an affair. When’s the last time you heard THIS conversation: “Are you sleeping with that fire-eating circus freak?” “Well, in fact, I am! I’m so glad you asked!”