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Posted by on Feb 28, 2013 in Ethics | 15 comments

When is Intent ‘Magic’?

 

Justin Vacula has written about blame and intent in a recent post titled “Blame and Intent“. His purpose is primarily to argue against the claim that “intent is not magic”, the meaning of which is, according to him:

that the feelings and beliefs of a person who is a recipient of a message, rather than the intent of the individual, takes priority.

I gave this phrase a quick google (as I don’t recall ever seeing it in any philosophical literature) and it appears to have it’s origin in 2010 in post called “Intent! It’s Fucking Magic!” on a blog called ”Genderbitch: Musings of a Trans Chick”. As fascinating as the blog sounds, rather than argue specifically against it I’ll use it to spark some thoughts about the role of intent in meaning, and argue that while intent is not magic (and as far as I can tell, nobody is claiming that it is), at least according to one plausible theory it is an important part of the analysis of meaning.

 

Magic?

So what is being claimed? It is difficult to know from the Genderbitch article, since it seems to be more of a sarcastic rant than a coherent argument. Another article, this time from Shakesville puts it rather better:

Magical Intent is the principle by which someone who has said or done something offensive, hurtful, rage-making, marginalizing, and/or otherwise contemptible argues that the person to whom they’ve said or done it has no right to be offended, hurt, enraged, alienated, and/or otherwise disdainful because their intent was not to generate that reaction.

In other words: “I didn’t intend for you to feel that way, so if you do feel that way, don’t blame me! My intent magically inoculates me from responsibility for what I actually said and how it was received!”

Talk of ‘magic’ seems to be a straw man; the ‘intender’ in question seems to be saying that since the other person now knows what the intent behind the statement really was, it is a mistake to continue being hurt by it. Now, I think that this could be right or wrong, given certain conditions. So when might the listener be justified in remaining hurt, even if the intention of the speaker comes to light? Take the second example on Shakesville for instance. A thin person keeps calling themselves ‘fat’ and ‘disgusting’ in the presence of their friend, who is fatter than they are. The thin person did not intend to hurt the fat person. Nevertheless, we can agree that the fat person isn’t unreasonable in being hurt even knowing the thin person’s intent, since the thin person’s statements betray a willingness to see anyone of at least their size as fat and disgusting. Another similar example might be if someone tells me that studying philosophy is pointless since philosophy itself is just a load of bearded men in togas making things up. If they later find out that I’ve studied it and exclaim that they never meant to offend me, I am still perhaps justified in being a little peeved since their statement still betrays what they really think.

Now the fact that the speaker isn’t out to hurt the listener might have some effect on their moral culpability. A drink driver hitting a pedestrian is morally responsible for the injuries they cause, but surely they aren’t as immoral as a sober driver who hit them on purpose. Similarly, someone criticising their own weight because they know it will upset their fatter friend is acting more immorally than the person in the Shakesville example. Still, they are in some way responsible for the hurt their words caused, and I don’t think their intent removes that responsibility.

So as a principle, if A is justified in taking offence at something said by B, B’s intent to hurt A (or not) does not necessarily neutralise that justification.

 

Intent as part of the analysis of meaning

So does this constitute complete agreement with Genderbitch and Shakesville? No it doesn’t. Neither leave room for the idea that intent might be important to the meaning of the speaker’s utterance. I don’t have space in this post, but I’ll do a follow up and try to argue (with H.P. Grice) that intent is important to speaker meaning. So let’s for now just assume for the sake of argument that intent is important (I feel that the burden of proof here is shared: for one to argue that intent has no bearing on meaning is a claim that requires strong philosophical arguments backing it up).

So when might intent be ‘magic’ (i.e. remove the listener’s justification for being hurt)? We might begin by observing that the word ‘niggardly‘ often causes offence because it sounds like the word ‘nigger’. I take it as uncontroversial among reasonable people that this reason provides no justification for being hurt by use of the word. Suppose if someone ignorant of the word’s usual meaning intends to use it in a racially discriminatory manner. Are they being racist? I think that it is clear that they are. But surely this works both ways. If someone uses a word that is commonly racially discriminatory but they did not say it with that meaning in mind, I don’t think they can be charged with racism. Instead, someone should politely inform them that if they keep using that word, many people are likely to take it the wrong way.

The principle is this: A is justified in being offended at B’s utterance only if that justification applies to B’s meaning, which is contingent on B’s intent.

This is compatible with the earlier principle, since the intention mentioned in that refers to the intention not to hurt, which is distinct from the intention important to speaker meaning.

Anyway, I’ll follow this up soon with a post about meaning in the philosophy of language, and outline Grice’s view.

  • http://www.skepticink.com/justinvacula/ Justin Vacula

    Thanks for sharing your thoughts in relation to my piece. I intentionally didn’t link any blogs in my piece concerning ‘intent is not magic’ because I didn’t find them really getting at what I see as the core problem or some concepts really worth exploring. This idea of ‘having no right’ to be offended does not seem to be what is going on with a person with good intention disagrees with the person who says ‘intent is not magic.’

    Here’s an interesting quote by Oscar Wilde:

    “A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.”

    More later…I’m soon off to work!

  • Drew Vogel

    I don’t think it’s appropriate to pass judgment on the reasonableness of someone else’s emotional responses. I think intent is clearly relevant to culpability, as your examples ably demonstrate. But that’s not inconsistent with the “intent is not magic” thesis as you’be presented it. Intent is relevant, but it isn’t dispositive. It does not inoculate the speaker from culpability. It may limit culpability, and in specific circumstances it may even absolve the speaker entirely. But intent is not a universally applicable all-purpose get-out-of-jail-free card. In other words, it isn’t magic.

  • http://www.skepticink.com/notung Notung

    Isn’t that what I was saying though? It isn’t that intent (with regard to meaning) inoculates the speaker from wrongdoing. It’s that it helps define what they actually did, which is crucial to understanding whether or not they are morally culpable.

    By the way I don’t think intent is magic – but I’ve never heard anyone claim that it is.

  • RussellBlackford

    I don’t see why it can’t be appropriate to pass judgment on the reasonableness or otherwise of someone’s emotional responses. For example, if someone is very frightened by something that is not actually dangerous we might well think this response is unreasonable or even pathological.

    Closer to the topic, if someone carelessly or foolishly draws a false factual conclusion about what an interlocutor meant when she said certain words, and gets angry on the basis of that false and careless interpretation, I don’t have any compunction at all about saying that the angry response is an unreasonable one. Actually, it seems that there are many circumstances where we can quite reasonably (!) criticise a person for having an unreasonable emotional response. I can think of plenty of other examples.

  • Drew Vogel

    Yes, I mostly agree with what you’ve written here. But I think the quote you’ve provided from Shakesville does leave room for intent to be relevant, and that there’s no conflict that I can see between your view and the view you are critiquing. And I’ve never heard anyone claim than intent is magic, but I have heard lots of people refuse to take responsibility for the unintentional harms that they cause.

  • Drew Vogel

    You’re right. I need to significantly narrow what I said. What I’m trying to get at is that people don’t choose their emotional responses. If I say something which is misunderstood by someone who then gets angry over what he thought I said, I’m probably not going to feel about that. I might think that I should have been clearer, or I might think that he should have listened more closely, but either way that doesn’t make the anger illegitimate. It may be based on error, confusion, or misunderstanding, but it is nevertheless genuine. And I don’t think it’s necessary or useful to tell someone that they shouldn’t be feeling what they are in fact feeling. We don’t choose our emotional responses, we simply experience them, and that means we have to accept, at least to a certain extent, that emotional response as a given. To a large extent, and particularly in the midst of a contentious discussion, it’s irrelevant whether the emotional response is reasonable or not.

  • http://www.facebook.com/axel.blaster Axel Blaster

    I read the post
    in Shakesville [in my own words] as follows: Person A is privileged relative to
    Person B in a particular scenario. Person A says something [sensitive,
    offensive, triggering] to Person B. Person B informs or reminds to Person A
    that what he/she said was [sensitive, offensive, triggering]. So far, person B
    has not taken offense and has been charitable in the interpretation, but has
    informed the other party how this subject makes them feels. But, Person A has
    framed the feedback as an uncharitable interpretation or an accusation. Person
    A now is defending themselves from the accusation, but may even be doing some
    counterattack. Then, both parties may aggravate the misunderstanding by escalating
    the matter. This is how “Intent is not magic” should work in theory.
    It should be a cautionary tale for Person A. In the Shakesville post, Person B
    is never an asshole.

    In practice, as I’ve seen it used online, Person B is on the attack from the
    start, assuming the less charitable interpretation and moral outrage, Person A
    must not defend what they said or claim a misrepresentation, but must admit the
    error as soon as it has been pointed out to them and apologize profusely.
    Person B, is from an oppressed group, and will vent for as long as he/she
    wants.

    The some practioners of “Intent is not magic” meme are using it as a
    form of justifiable “righteous indignation”, the worst misuse is when
    Person B uses it as a shield from what would be otherwise, constructive
    criticism or agaisnt a good argument from Person A. For example:

    Person A: “You should stop eating high fat and high sodium food now that
    you have been diagnosed with hypertension”

    Person B: “Check your priviledge! I was born poor and with a slow
    metabolism. Die in a fire”

    Person A: “Sorry, all I’m sayin’ is…”

    Person B: “Fuck you, and your orthonormative, sound dietary advice!”

    So, “intent is not magic” has morphed from a sound guideline to
    improve communication and prevent hurt feelings, to a mechanism to take offense
    even among the closest allies.

  • DrewHardies

    I’d argue that, in this context, intent is magic. The problem is that apologies aren’t magic. Often apologies aren’t even all that credible.
    When I say that someone insulted me, I’m not just saying that I’ve been hurt by their words. I’m saying that I’ve been hurt by someone’s contempt or disapproval.

    A scale, a doctor and a peer could all tell me that I’m fat. Any of these messages could cause mental distress. But they won’t all be equally insulting or offensive.

    The scale doesn’t have an inner life. So, I can say, “The reading made me feel bad,” but not, “the scale made me feel offended.”

    The doctor is an agent. But assuming his comments are medical, they don’t convey contempt. Again, I could be hurt. But I can’t claim to be reasonably insulted or offended.

    A peer could say “You’re fat”. This is going to offend. But it’s likely to offend because people will hear it as “You’re fat (and I disapprove of you for it)”.

    Beliefs about contempt/disapproval are why I think the apology won’t work in the friend case. The fat friend’s objection is, “I think you hold me in contempt.” An apology like “I didn’t intend to make you feel bad” doesn’t speak to that at all.

    For an apology to work, the thin-friend would have to convince the fat-friend that there’s no contempt. This is going to be really hard to with any kind of credibility.

    But, if the person someone could convince their friend that they’d wrongly inferred contempt (“No! I said I was disgusting because I spent the day cleaning port-a-potties, not because I think this jumpsuit makes me look fat! Wait. You think this jumpsuit makes me look fat?”) then I’d argue that clearing up the comment’s intended meaning would remove the insult.

  • An Ardent Skeptic

    The one point which you make in your comment with which I somewhat disagree is the following:

    And I don’t think it’s necessary or useful to tell someone that they shouldn’t be feeling what they are in fact feeling. We don’t choose our emotional responses, we simply experience them, and that means we have to accept, at least to a certain extent, that emotional response as a given. To a large extent, and particularly in the midst of a contentious discussion, it’s irrelevant whether the emotional response is reasonable or not.

    We can choose our emotional responses if we learn to control our emotional responses until we think a particular emotional response is justified. Moreover, we should all be willing to reconsider our emotional response in light of new evidence, most especially, if that emotional response wasn’t carefully considered to begin with. It is most especially important to reconsider our own emotional responses in contentious discussion where emotions tend to run high.

  • Clare45

    Here’s an interesting quote by Oscar Wilde:

    “A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.”
    Exactly. Isn’t it OK to deliberately hurts someone’s feelings in some circumstances? How about the polite (or not so polite) brush off. What about the famous British (or Aussie) sarcastic”put down”? What if the person has previously insulted you? Are you not entitled to defend yourself by “giving out as good as you get”?

  • http://www.skepticink.com/notung Notung

    Yes indeed – we might not control our initial reaction but our outlook on how we discuss and reason (which can be carefully considered in advance) can shape where our emotions go from there.

  • http://www.skepticink.com/backgroundprobability/ Damion Reinhardt

    It’s good to bear in mind that intent to offend (or lack thereof) may not be obvious to everyone reading along at home. The hashtag #stupidbitch, for example, is almost never used in an ironical or self-referential way, so it is generally construed as hate directed against women.

    That said, I think you’re spot-on to point out that this meme has transformed from sound advice to an offensive rhetorical weapon, just like “check your privilege!”

  • OirishM

    In the context of discussing/criticising feminism, I find intent suddenly becomes magic when feminists magically know your intent and it conveniently happens to be misogyny (no matter what your actual intent may have been)

  • athyco

    There have been plenty of people in my life who have, in my opinion, had an unreasonable emotional response to something I’ve said or done, when an intention to hurt them hadn’t come close to crossing my mind.

    My options were to criticize them, to stay away from them (until they forgot about it or forever, whichever suited me), explain my position, or to apologize. If any of those were founded on my “intention” or lack of it (scare quoted because I’d usually have little evidence it), I was actually weakening my position.

    For example, The Atheist Asshole wrote in comments to his video “Ophelia ‘Creep’ Benson” that “his sources” told him that Ophelia Benson was making fun of his visual impairment. Although he neglected reading for himself, he tried to use that information to “win” on another point by saying that she had no “moral high ground.” To argue that it was not her intention would be useless. He held/holds a low opinion of her. But it was effective to point out that his exact words in that video of “nearsighted” and “colorblind” did not link to a visual disability that required shades and that his choice of the edgy name “The Atheist Asshole” could lead to a belief that he’d choose to present in shades, “(in coolio glasses)” as Ophelia said. Therefore, it was he, not she, who was assuming “the worst.” He’s not mentioned her “insult” since.

    That is why I don’t fear the idea that “intent is not magic.” (What skeptic would try to say that anything is magic, after all?) It will remain a small shield against someone who simply wants to assert that they’ve done nothing hurtful without presenting reasonable circumstances otherwise. (And it alone will be flimsy; there’s got to be explanation with it.) It cannot be a weapon if reasonable circumstances are available. (And if someone’s saying/doing something with that little thought behind it, isn’t it time for some thinking before speaking/doing?) Its misuse can be pointed out; it’s correct use is strengthened. The use of the phrase as a scary accusation of shutting down the conversation can be recognized as a trite slogan trying to shut down conversation in its own right.

  • badum

    Here’s a real life anecdote concerning ‘magic’ intent. Back in high school I was a skateboarder, and one day wore a T-shirt with a Flip company logo on it. I had to deliver a message to a teacher who was also the supervisor of the Asian-Pacific Islander club. When I gave him the message the club was in session and he said, quite loudly and in front of the assembled members, “you know ‘flip’ is a derogatory term for Filipinos, right?” Instant persona non grata.

    Not only had I not heard that particular slur before but the shirt had a completely different and neutral meaning for me. The projected intent had no relation to the actual intent, assuming there was actual intent beyond ‘I like this company’.