Yeah. The thing is, it’s waaay less like “magic buttons” that you push to escape the paradigm, and waaay more like trying to diffuse a bomb, that’s strapped to your soulmate’s skull, on the back of an off-road vehicle that’s driving too fast over rough terrain.
Which isn’t to say that it can’t be done.
Lemme give an example of a move that *might* work, sometimes:
==== ”You’re playing status games,” says X.
“What? No, I’m not,” says Y.
“Yes, you are. You just pulled a lowering-Z’s-status move. It was pretty blunt, in fact.”
“Wh—ah, oh. Oh. Right, I guess—yeah, I can see how that interpretation makes perfect sense if you’re playing status games.”
“I’m not talking about whether I’m playing status games. I’m saying you are.”
“Uh. I’m not, or at least not in the way you’re thinking. Like, I grant that if you put on your status glasses my actions only make sense in terms of trying to put Z down or whatever, but if you put on some other glasses, like your engaging in truthseeking discourse glasses, you’ll see that my behavior also is complete and consistent and sensible there, too.”
“So, I notice that now you’re trying to lower my status.”
“What?”
“You’re trying to set the frame such that if I object to what you’re doing, I’m self-identifying as not-a-truthseeker.”
“Wh—no, I—gah, the point is, I’m not attending to status in the way you are, at all. Like, I see it, what you’re saying makes sense, but I wasn’t trying to play that game.”
“Well, you are playing it, though. Your actions are having ramifications within that frame, which is an obvious frame that everybody’s obviously inside of at all times. And I gotta say, you’re being a real jerk within the commonly-accepted rules of that game.”
“I’m specifically trying not to play it, though. I agree that the status implications of what is being said, and who’s saying it, are important. And we can attend to those directly if you’d like. But I’d like to attend to them while ALSO trying to figure out *what is actually real*.”
“Okay. Do you understand that I may be distrustful about that?”
“Of course. Be as distrustful as you need to be. But help me get to the truth.”
“Okay. I can absolutely take at face value the claim that you want to get to the truth. Can you accept that if we want to get to the truth, we first have to get the status thing out of the way?”
”I don’t know. That doesn’t feel right.”
“Listen. I’m willing to take your claim at face value. Can you take my claim at face value?”
”No, because these claims have truth values to them, and I don’t believe that status has to be resolved before truth can be reached.”
“Are you willing to be walked through an explanation?”
”Not really, I feel like it’s distracting us from the original conversation.”
″Okay. Then let’s just return to the original conversation, but could you rephrase what you said in a way that doesn’t sound like being a dick to Z, and maybe apologize to Z for phrasing it the way you did? And actually attend to how you feel when you do so; if you notice internal resistance, please entertain the hypothesis that this is coming from a part of you that actually *was* playing the status game. I’m not saying that to accuse you of anything; I just want you to notice it, because you want to seek truth and parts of you that play status games can interfere with that.”
WHO SUMMONS THE GR*cough* *wheeze* goddamnit.
Yeah. The thing is, it’s waaay less like “magic buttons” that you push to escape the paradigm, and waaay more like trying to diffuse a bomb, that’s strapped to your soulmate’s skull, on the back of an off-road vehicle that’s driving too fast over rough terrain.
Which isn’t to say that it can’t be done.
Lemme give an example of a move that *might* work, sometimes:
====
”You’re playing status games,” says X.
“What? No, I’m not,” says Y.
“Yes, you are. You just pulled a lowering-Z’s-status move. It was pretty blunt, in fact.”
“Wh—ah, oh. Oh. Right, I guess—yeah, I can see how that interpretation makes perfect sense if you’re playing status games.”
“I’m not talking about whether I’m playing status games. I’m saying you are.”
“Uh. I’m not, or at least not in the way you’re thinking. Like, I grant that if you put on your status glasses my actions only make sense in terms of trying to put Z down or whatever, but if you put on some other glasses, like your engaging in truthseeking discourse glasses, you’ll see that my behavior also is complete and consistent and sensible there, too.”
“So, I notice that now you’re trying to lower my status.”
“What?”
“You’re trying to set the frame such that if I object to what you’re doing, I’m self-identifying as not-a-truthseeker.”
“Wh—no, I—gah, the point is, I’m not attending to status in the way you are, at all. Like, I see it, what you’re saying makes sense, but I wasn’t trying to play that game.”
“Well, you are playing it, though. Your actions are having ramifications within that frame, which is an obvious frame that everybody’s obviously inside of at all times. And I gotta say, you’re being a real jerk within the commonly-accepted rules of that game.”
“I’m specifically trying not to play it, though. I agree that the status implications of what is being said, and who’s saying it, are important. And we can attend to those directly if you’d like. But I’d like to attend to them while ALSO trying to figure out *what is actually real*.”
“Okay. Do you understand that I may be distrustful about that?”
“Of course. Be as distrustful as you need to be. But help me get to the truth.”
“Okay. I can absolutely take at face value the claim that you want to get to the truth. Can you accept that if we want to get to the truth, we first have to get the status thing out of the way?”
”I don’t know. That doesn’t feel right.”
“Listen. I’m willing to take your claim at face value. Can you take my claim at face value?”
”No, because these claims have truth values to them, and I don’t believe that status has to be resolved before truth can be reached.”
“Are you willing to be walked through an explanation?”
”Not really, I feel like it’s distracting us from the original conversation.”
″Okay. Then let’s just return to the original conversation, but could you rephrase what you said in a way that doesn’t sound like being a dick to Z, and maybe apologize to Z for phrasing it the way you did? And actually attend to how you feel when you do so; if you notice internal resistance, please entertain the hypothesis that this is coming from a part of you that actually *was* playing the status game. I’m not saying that to accuse you of anything; I just want you to notice it, because you want to seek truth and parts of you that play status games can interfere with that.”