The building blocks of your position

A place for everything from anecdote to analysis.

Anecdote to analysis, and knowing the difference

Last night was another night of poor sleep and racing thoughts. So much so I eventually grabbed my phone and made this quick notation:

Anecdote, testimonial, lived experience, eyewitness account, history/data, analysis/perspective

I was thinking about the glut of input I’ve seen from connections online, particularly around the current Hamas-Israel War. It’s a lot to sift through, and what has me feeling overwhelmed, frustrated, and even at times somewhat terrified is that most of us are using many different kinds of building blocks to construct our arguments, but we’re not always clear on the difference between them ourselves, let alone properly identifying and disclosing them for others.

So, since my most relied upon mantra is that I’m here to be helpful, not to argue with strangers (edit to add: or friends) on the Internet, I thought I would lay out my thoughts on these building blocks and how I’m seeing them confused in online discourse today.

To be clear, there is a place for every one of these building blocks, as long as you’re clear on how you’re implementing them, and as long as your reader is too…for which you are responsible.

1. Anecdote and individual testimonials

Anecdotes and testimonials are stories, often based on an individual’s experience. Anecdotes are illustrative. Anecdotes are not, however, quantitative data, and it’s common now to see people dismiss “anecdotal evidence.” (It’s common especially for people to dismiss as anecdotal those stories that don’t align with their world view, but let other anecdotes go…which doesn’t help.)

I don’t dismiss anecdotes. There is a place for anecdote, even in research initiatives, often coming at the beginning or the end of a project. Before crafting a quantitative research study, I have done what is called ethnography, the process of observing and talking to the potential subjects of your quantitative research as a way to inform and improve what you ask people in the quantitative survey. And once you have your quantitative survey analysis done, you can enhance your presentation of the findings by aligning just the right anecdote from your ethnography subjects to bring an aspect of your quantitative analysis to life. (I should be clear that I’ve done statistically relevant commercial market research, but I’m not an academic, and I don’t claim to know the more rigid definitions and protocols in academia.)

Anecdotes are a powerful tool precisely because of their individuality, their immediacy, and their life, but the misuse most commonly associated with citing anecdotes is that people mistake individual anecdote for truth more broadly, without the statistical citations that can back that up. That sounds quite innocent, so I should also say that the intentional misattribution of anecdote can run rampant and involves purposely cherrypicking anecdotes from the people who are expressing exactly the world view you want expressed, and purposely excluding those with different views and opinions. Even cherrypicking can be fine, if one is transparent about the fact that these anecdotes were chosen to back up one’s existing viewpoint. I mean, I have no problem telling people that you are using these anecdotes to illustrate or express your opinion better than you feel you can, acknowledging that other opinions are out there and encouraging people to go find their own supporting anecdotal contributions.

Just in the last week I’ve seen, for example, some people sharing exclusively the views of Muslims, Palestinians, and Arabs who revile Hamas and support a two-state solution, among other things, and they share these views as evidence of a majority opinion (and obviously the right one in their view). But I’ve also seen people exclusively sharing the voice of Jews, Israeli or not, who revile not just Netanyahu as a leader and his government, but the very state of Israel itself, like that proves that that is a majority opinion (and obviously the right one in their view).

I actually do not know the data on either of these positions. That’s not my point right now. If I wanted to make that point, I would go research it to see if I could find out if these were majority views or not. My point is that finding people who espouse such views can be used to express, perhaps from someone more directly impacted than you are, your opinion, but it cannot be used to claim you have the majority or even the right position. I find it offensive when someone implies an individual’s opinion speaks for an entire group, like any group is a monolith. And when someone implies that in order to be a “good” [insert group identity here] one should agree with any anecdote. (Frankly, you don’t have to even agree with the majority view of an identity group to validate you are part of that group.)

Anecdote and testimonial have a role. But confusing anecdote with the other building blocks is egregiously common and often used specifically to inflame.

2. Lived experience and eyewitness accounts

You may be wondering how this is different from anecdote. Often anecdote is about a third party…”I know a guy who said xx about yy” or “I heard from a friend of a friend that…” Lived experience and eyewitness accounts are first-person. And I know when I’m on social media, I often look for someone’s feet-on-the-street observations, as best I can confirm it. I remember quite clearly the first time I really cemented the importance of doing this for myself in the first hours of the Ferguson protests. National news wasn’t covering it yet, and I spent some time finding local reporters, and local people who could be vetted (a local alderman, for example). Especially when such folks shared videos from their mobile phones, I felt pretty confident I was getting a first-hand account. Could such things be fakes? Probably more so today than ten years ago, but yes. Will there be people who, as an example, find the one pocket of trouble at a protest to film, or the one sign expressing a repellant view, while ignoring vast swaths of peaceful protesters? Also, yes.

When thinking about the limitations of this kind of building block, I am also reminded of all the people who respond with a “He was never like that with me” after any #metoo accusation. I mean, that’s their lived experience, but it’s not relevant to the case at hand. Basically people are individual, and so are our lived experiences, and you cannot argue with someone’s feelings, nor should you spend time trying to invalidate someone’s lived experience. But you can assess such accounts for what they do and do not contribute.

At the dawn of the social media age I advocated that seeking out first party accounts from all over the world vs. relying solely on what various media outlets prioritized was a universal good. I still think that, given that leadership in media continues to be more homogeneous than I would prefer. But I think you begin to see why such first-party accounts must also be disclosed and caveated for what they are.

3. History, fact, data

What are we to do when we want to build an argument and have our anecdotes and first-party accounts taken seriously? Find data to support it, naturally, but that trope about “lies, damn lies, and statistics” exists for a reason. Just as anecdotes can be cherry-picked, so too can data. And so too can history.

Again, using current posts I have seen proliferate online, some people are using history timelines that start in the 20th Century to erase the indigenousness of Jewish people in the Middle East and some people are using historical timelines to erase the existence or validity of a Palestinian people altogether.

I know it seems like a no-win situation. It’s become common to point out that in the US we don’t just feel entitled to our own opinions, we’ve come to feel entitled to our own facts…and there are certainly individuals, groups, and “media” outlets that will feed you the “facts” to support a pre-determined narrative that supports their ideology of choice.

But no matter what others are doing…you can search for the data and research the history and present your case and own your own responsibility to present it cleanly. With cites. In my early days on the Internet, nothing ended an online debate quicker than asking for a cite. Today’s polarized “media” environment complicates this certainly, but it’s worth backing up your own opinions with facts every time.

4. Analysis and perspective on history, fact, data

Finally, there is analysis and perspective on history, fact, and data. Research is part science, but it’s part art too…assessing the weight of the data, finding the statistical anomalies and outliers, and crafting storylines that can explain how and why such anomalies and outliers exist with the larger context we know from the data.

Consider that the 24-hour news channels are really 24-hour perspective channels…the majority of programming is talking about the possible, maybe even probable, reasons for the news, more than the news itself.

And we all know that social media sharing is 90% perspective, 10% cat videos. [Note: This is hyperbole…I have no idea what actual percentage it is; I’m just saying something that feels true and is amusing.]

It’s OK to analyze the facts as you know them and present your perspective. That’s how interesting conversations happen among people who care about what’s happening, but aren’t actually on the hook for solving problems. It’s OK to present your perspective in order to persuade others to agree with you, or to galvanize them to action. Hell, I co-authored an entire book about why everyone should triage their issues, pick a path, and become an effective everyday activist for their most prioritized concerns. [Road Map for Revolutionaries, just as relevant today, learn more here.]

What I personally find problematic is the lack of consistency of perspective depending on context, and the lack of acknowledgment of the lack of consistency. Almost always I would attribute a lack of consistency of perspective to some form of personal bias. I don’t even mean bias as in prejudice or any form of -ism or -phobia. I, in fact, more often observe positive bias, as in “…my perspective is inconsistent here because I identify more closely with the issue and am inclined to have more empathy for a perspective because of that identification…”

I recently saw a creator I follow talk about the indigenousness issue (you might be able to tell I’m a bit fascinated by this element of the discussion…I honestly never thought about my Jewishness as an ethnicity until I got my 23andme results, so I never thought about the concept of indigenousness as it pertains to Jewishness either).

He basically made the point that if we accept the Jews as being indigenous to the current area of Israel and surrounding areas, then why don’t European Americans go back and claim European countries as their own based on the fact that they’re indigenous to those countries? His argument was designed to erase Jews as anything other than White European colonial settlers, so he draws the parallel to America’s White European colonial settlers.

I mean, good on him for coming up with a perspective to rationalize the colonial settler position in a way I had not seen and would not have thought of. And it’s certainly worth thinking about…for how long does a people get to play the “indigenous” card?

Of course, given both my own analysis of the history and, let’s call it what it is, my own personal biases because of my own identification, I think the flavor of religious “persecution” that caused the Puritans to “flee” England was perhaps not the same flavor of persecution that led to the slaughter and expulsion and continued persecution of Jews from what are called the Holy Lands. And so much migration to this day is about economics and lack of opportunity, more than fleeing genocide. But the truth is there are many places around the world right now that are war-torn, resulting in mass refugee exoduses. And there are many indigenous peoples that I’m guessing this creator would not attach a time limit to, starting right here in the US.

So one area of consistency to watch out for is whether you have some time limit you have intellectually assigned to all peoples after which they can no longer use indigenousness as a rationale, or just some? And another is whether you are hyper-focused on certain situations without ever having noted or commented on other similar situations?

Let me stress, again, that it’s OK…one should never do nothing because one can’t do everything. One should never hesitate to speak because of all the times you didn’t speak before. Maya Angelou said it best: When you know better, you do better.

But. Would it kill us to acknowledge our lack of consistency and what is prompting us to speak now, if not before? Why do we pop off like we’re expert on subjects of, yes, great complexity, when we objectively are not? Why do we judge people on silence, when we’ve been silent countless times ourselves. Does it invite people to speak whatever their truth is when we make it clear whatever they share is too little, too late in our now-expert view?

And yet, I am seeing this everywhere from every position throughout the online discourse. People call others out as though completely unaware that a review of their own timelines would show they could be similarly called out 100 times. Not everyone is going to scroll your timeline to check your bona fides, but I know I do. I can’t be the only one.

I understand that a review of my social media has changed a lot in the last couple of years…I speak my piece much more freely and frequently in this newsletter or in my podcast. My social is a series of Wordle posts and a daily habit tracker more than anything else. I cannot expect those who don’t know me well to know my heart if I haven’t shared it. And here’s the thing: I can decide that I am OK with this.

I’ve gone through many phases of online sharing. All of it authentic to me, because all of it was a conscious choice. And all of it is authentic to me because as I’ve said many times, everything I say is true, I just don’t say everything that is true.

I share the above building blocks of a position or argument because I know what it feels like to feel called to speak. And because I want you to take your platforms and the opportunity you have to speak seriously.

As much as our voices matter and our stories matter, your voice and your story can be so much more powerful if it is supported by data when possible, when it is vetted and disclosed, when it is reasonably consistent with your values, and when you accept that lots of people aren’t reading as carefully as you’re speaking, but you speak carefully anyway.

OK, this was a long one. Do you find it helpful? Pedantic? Not enough or just too much? Let me know.

What else is going on?

The Op-Ed Page podcast

Episode 98 of The Op-Ed Page podcast features an interview with my friend Jen Marples, she of the You’re Not Too Fucking Old tagline (and podcast of her own).

We talk about all the things, including:

• Jen’s hard-charging life and the revelation that led her to focus on midlife women

• Using the word “fuck” in your branding (do you feel some kind of way about it?)

• Gender determinism

• Positive and negative representation of midlife women in the media

Please take a listen, and if you enjoy I know Jen and I would both appreciate a share, and I’d appreciate a subscribe and a review.

TikToks this month

If you want to hear a bit more on my thoughts around the Hamas-Israel War I did speak about it on TikTok. I took an unintended month hiatus, and came back with that. What could wrong? Thankfully, nothing yet.

@elisacpAfter a month away diving back inwith the most controversial topic of the day. #MiddleEastWar #Gaza #Israel But i also want to talk about #SilenceVsSpeaking when it comes to #SocialMedia. I dont think anyone was sitting around wondering where my #3MinuteBookReview videos were in the last month, and no one’s waiting for our #hottakes in the War either probably. I wrote and podcast about it more at length: https://elisacp.substack.com/p/speaking-silence-social-media and https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-op-ed-page-with-elisa-camahort-page/id1493850023?i=1000621895577

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Out in the world

Back in the (BlogHer) day, I used to be famous for #Tweasing and #Teasebooking big announcements, so I feel like I need a hashtag for teasing here on Substack too. #TeaseStacking? #SubTeasing? Anyway, whichever it is, I’m working on a new project, and I’ll be sharing it with my hardy Substack subscribers during a soft launch in December. Stay tuned…

Until next time, please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts on any or all of the above. This is basically my blog now! And as always, I appreciate a share of this newsletter or my podcast.

If I can help you break through the things that keep you stuck (or if you are intrigued by the idea of securing my fractional leadership for your initiative), set up your first introductory 30-minute consult for free by booking it in my Calendly. And you can always check out my new LinkedIn Learning Course, Telling Stories That Stick, a 57-minute course on crafting your stories for different audiences (media, investors, prospects, hiring managers) and ensuring those stories stick…and convey exactly what you hope to convey.