Building Arguments

     In Writing 122 classes at Rogue Community College and the University of Oregon, I taught how to write an argumentative paper: how to build an argument for a position on a controversial issue. One of the important aspects of building that argument is to understand the point of view of the opposite side from the one you've taken. You can't just argue for your position. You have to answer the arguments of the opposite position.

    Yesterday I listened to an interview with Liza Wiemer on the NPR program "Think," about her new young adult novel, The Assignment. In this book, a high school teacher, teaching a unit on World War II, gives his students an assignment to argue for the Final Solution, the genocide of the Jews. In the novel, two students, both seniors, take a stand against the assignment itself, finding it reprehensible to build an argument in favor of such a position that cannot be morally justified.

    I haven't read the book, but apparently the point is how heroic those two students, Cade and Logan, were in defying the assignment, the teacher, the principal, and everyone else who thought it was a fair assignment. The interviewer didn't ask Wiemer the question that nagged at me throughout the program: What was wrong with the assignment? I know what is wrong with the Final Solution, but what was wrong in asking students to look squarely at it? Wiemer spoke about similar real-life assignments she felt just as strongly were inappropriate.

    But what's wrong with asking students to look closely at bad arguments? Is there any justification for genocide? No, of course not. Is there any benefit in trying to understand how people try to justify it or other acts of evil? Of course there is! Otherwise, we're just saying, "I'm right, and you're wrong" without any examination of arguments and evidence or any attempt to understand why people act as they do. 

    What would I have done if a student had wanted to write a WR 122 paper arguing that the Final Solution was a good idea? I think I would have helped that student look at the proposed arguments and see where they didn't stand up to reasonable examination. I did this sometimes with students: helped them see that to write a paper upholding a certain point of view might not result in a good paper (and a good grade) because the evidence wouldn't support their thesis. Isn't that what the teacher in Wiemer's novel would be doing with his assignment—helping students see by their own research and critical thinking that the Final Solution had no good arguments in its favor? The summary of the novel on Amazon.com calls the assignment a "school debate." Why wouldn't it have been better for Cade and Logan, instead of trying to get the assignment erased, to dig into the ideas behind the Final Solution and expose their falsity, cruelty, and reprehensibility? 

    I think we must not be afraid to look at bad ideas and see them for what they are. Maybe the assignment was a bad idea, but the interview with Wiemer didn't present reasons to prove it. Both Wiemer and the interviewer assumed the assignment was the wrong one.  I'm not so sure. Wiemer is Jewish. Would that have been a factor in her position? Yes, it was a terrible thing to murder the Jews. That doesn't mean it is a terrible thing to try to understand how people came to think it was a good idea. 

    Mike, my husband, who died in 2020, was also Jewish. I wish he were still alive so I could discuss these ideas with him.