I feel like I’m confused by what you would find more convincing here given that there was no evidence in the first place that they did say something like that?
Like would them saying “No we didn’t” actually be more persuasive than showing an example of how they did the opposite?
Or like… if we take for granted that words that someone might interpret that way left their mouth, at what point do we stop default trusting the person who clearly feels aggrieved by them and seems willing to exaggerate or lie when they then share those words to others?
I’m not sure if you meant to reply to a different comment, but yes, exactly.
I think what you’re asking is, supposing Nonlinear has after all done nothing remarkable with respect to anyone’s romantic partners, how do I come to believe that? How does Nonlinear present counterevidence or discredit Chloe in exactly the right way such that I’m swayed towards the true conclusion? If they deny it, it’s just their word. If they show me a text conversation, well, no one actually said that they didn’t have that text conversation, so it’s not responsive to the complaint. There’s basically no winning. It’s genuinely, upsettingly unfair.
I mean, in some sense, there has to be such a way, or else I’m hopelessly irrational. Which is, yes, exactly, I think a professional, considerate Nonlinear would not have made this post. They would have done something else.
There are plenty of context in which the thing alleged is not at all abusive, and plenty of contexts where it is. Without reason to believe they were actually keeping them isolated, I’m not sure how much weight to put on it.
This is another thought feeding into my wondering how much this kind of “spot checking” really matters. While I’m glad people seem to have appreciated working forward from a particular claim, it would feel way more valuable to work backward from a decision. For me, at least, I don’t think the question “did they keep people isolated in an abusive way” is on any back-chained path, which is good, because I don’t expect to be able to answer that question.
But others are going to want to be convinced or not on different questions. This is why I tried to separate out the parent from my more high-feeling and reactive takes in these other comments. Maybe they can figure out how it fits in to the judgments they need to make.
I think this is meant to be the fantasy version of Closing Notes on Nonlinear Investigation, where Ben writes,
I understand that you’re taking liberties for your allegory in imagining a “triumphant follow-up”, but I think it’s worth being clear that the actual follow-up all but states that this was a miserable experience and not worth the time and effort:
The high price communicates how little Ben wants to do this again, not that he thinks he did something that others should value at that price.