On Not Responding to a Tar Baby
Yesterday, I wrote an article that was a response to an attack on me. It was an attack on my views on free trade. In what is quite unique, the author actually said that mercantilism increases national prosperity. Usually, those people who are in fact defending mercantilism will not admit that this is the system they are defending.
I wrote an exposition refuting the piece, but then I called a friend who had interacted with the same individual who would attack me. A couple of years ago, my friend wanted to know whether he should respond to the individual, and I told him that it was probably not a good idea. The individual represents a very tiny screwball movement, and the website is not well known.
Before I began my refutation, I checked the Alexa.com rating. It is 1.5 million. That means it is essentially invisible. If I were to write an article against the essay, it would probably build traffic for the site.
Then there's the question of the tar baby factor. If you get into a debate with the true tar baby, he will eat up your time. You never want to be in a position where the individual says that you are incapable of answering him. On the other hand, when you get involved with the tar baby, he will eat into your time. The fact that anybody with a public reputation responds to him will encourage him to keep responding back. A person who has received no publicity in his whole life, all of a sudden is receiving considerable publicity.
I decided not to respond. The arguments were not that good. I have dealt with similar arguments elsewhere. I figured that my own advice to the other individual was probably good advice. I checked with still another friend, and he told me the same thing. He warned of the tar baby factor.
It is always difficult to know if you should respond publicly to an attack that has been seen by almost nobody. Furthermore, if the website is truly a form of crackpottery, you gain no brownie points with the general public for having refuted one of the representatives.
I do think it is a good idea to respond to anybody who has a decent public reputation. I also think it is fine to go after somebody who has a large following, but who is spouting utter nonsense, and thereby is confusing a large following.
In other words, it is a matter of tactics. Responding to such a website does not prove much of importance as far as the critic's handful of followers are concerned, and the followers of the guru also are immune. This is why it is usually wise not to respond.
A few of a person's followers may have come across a site like this, but unless several of them contact you to tell you that you just have to respond, it is probably not a good idea to respond. The busier you are, the truer this is.
Never assume that the person whose opinions you trust is incapable of responding to a particular critic. Assume that the person whose ideas you trust has a reason for not responding, other than this one: he has not seen the critic's attack.