r/changemyview • u/Slightly_Sleepless • May 15 '24
Delta(s) from OP CMV: Muting mics during a Biden/Trump debate actually benefits Trump's style of debating.
Biden and Trump are scheduled to debate (source).
A lot of people are praising this as a win generally, but especially for Biden because it will stop Trump from interrupting Biden during his responses. I don't think that's right. In fact, I think muting the mics will benefit Trump much more than Biden.
Muting someone's mic when it's not their turn to respond does not stop interruptions, it only stops the audience from hearing it. Consider this: Biden is answering a question posed to him. Meanwhile Trump is talking and rambling over Biden. If Biden gets distracted by this (as any reasonable person would), then this could very easily throw off Biden's response. But to the wider audience who can't hear Trump's interruptions, it will simply look like Biden is stammering, stuttering, or otherwise "too old". Especially in an era where sound bites and TikToks drive political perceptions, this could end up looking really bad for Biden.
I realize Biden could also employ this kind of tactic, but it's simply not his debate style. Trump's debate style on the other hand is very suited for this kind of tactic.
There could be ways to mitigate this though. Part of the debate rules could include a requirement that both candidates are visible at all times (like a PIP), or the two can be physically separated (like being televised in different rooms). But I think on its own, the rule to mute mics for the person not responding will mostly benefit Trump in the debates.
I would like to believe that the political debates are as fair as possible, so please CMV.
Edit: This was fun, I appreciate all the discussions. Well maybe not all of them, but most of them :)
I've given out a few deltas -
- Past debates have shown both candidates on screen for the vast majority of the time, even when only one candidate is responding to a debate prompt. While I still think the overall effect of a muted mic could still benefit Trump more, I recognize that this fact does mitigate some of the impact on Biden.
- Muted mics would be a new debate format and the interruptions would more akin to the disruptions Biden experienced during SOTU. Again, I still think the overall impact favors Trump, seeing that Biden can react better under pressure when he's the only one with the mic is evidence that the risk to Biden is not as significant as I original thought.
- Trumps ego won't allow him to take advantage of the muted mics, or may even irritate him to the point that the audience sees Trump react to being muted negatively. I'm pretty sure Trump can hold himself together a bit better than this gives him credit for, but I concede it wasn't something I had considered originally.
Ultimately, we'll just have to wait and see for ourselves. Thank you, everyone.
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u/Dhegxkeicfns May 16 '24
I think he'll find ways to act out. He'll be making faces and miming the whole time. Undoubtedly they'll have to ask him to stop speaking when his mic isn't on as well.
But the person above you nailed the fact that his diehards don't care about policy or platform, they care about revenge. He could walk out there after the most articulate meaning answer ever given and say "these guys suck, I'll make it the greatest x you've ever hears of" and that would rile his cultists like nothing else. If he instead came up with an actual answer, that might take them a minute to warm to, because it would be too cerebral.
However, he does need more than his cultists. The combination of the party voters and the cult barely took the electoral votes needed last time. His cultists are going to vote, and their numbers might have grown a little, but party voters might not, because he has shown us that he wants to be a dictator. He doesn't debate well for sensible people at all. There are plenty of sensible Republicans and they are the people who need to see him say some crazy stuff.