If he can’t answer it, he will lose some status. That’s probably good—if his position in the OP is genuine and well-informed, he should be able to answer it. The question is sort of “calling his bluff”, checking that his implicitly promised reason actually exists.
Public discourse norms, especially in the twitter age, are funny. Hanania has a lot of options, none of which really change his status much.
he can ignore you. There’s enough volume that he doesn’t respond to most comments, so this isn’t him dodging a particularly harsh criticism, it’s just not worth his notice.
he can answer cheaply, by rephrasing (or just reposting) previous texts.
he can answer a different question that’s vaguely related.
Yeah I mean, I’m not claiming it has a big sense of obligation, only that it illustrates a condition where discourse seems to benefit from a sense of obligation.
Here’s an example of a cheap question I just asked on twitter. Maybe Richard Hanania will find it cheap to answer too, but part of the reason I asked it was because I expect him to find it difficult to answer.
If he can’t answer it, he will lose some status. That’s probably good—if his position in the OP is genuine and well-informed, he should be able to answer it. The question is sort of “calling his bluff”, checking that his implicitly promised reason actually exists.
Public discourse norms, especially in the twitter age, are funny. Hanania has a lot of options, none of which really change his status much.
he can ignore you. There’s enough volume that he doesn’t respond to most comments, so this isn’t him dodging a particularly harsh criticism, it’s just not worth his notice.
he can answer cheaply, by rephrasing (or just reposting) previous texts.
he can answer a different question that’s vaguely related.
Yeah I mean, I’m not claiming it has a big sense of obligation, only that it illustrates a condition where discourse seems to benefit from a sense of obligation.