There’s a new format of student excuse that I’m getting these days that relies on credibility but really doesn’t do a great job of audience adaptation. It’s worth talking about because I have been seeing it so often and it is an outcome of a facts-only reasoning epistemology, where the only reasons one can give are factual, without any sort of adaptation for the situation.

I have a student who hasn’t been to class once yet in the first two weeks; he claims to have had a medical procedure, and now wants me to fill him in on the class. I audio record everything and post it on Canvas for them, so I pointed him there. He hadn’t listened to any of them, so I asked why. He replied, “well I have to catch up with biology and chemistry which are taking all my time.”

This argument is based on the idea that biology and chemistry are really hard classes, opposed to my speech class. It is also based on the idea that these classes should be prioritized as they are more serious because they are time consuming and difficult. I wouldn’t say speech is a difficult class – I usually say it’s a real challenge, mostly because I like that perspective – it’s based in reality and it’s always challenging to do it well. It always requires thought and preparation, so it’s work but it is probably not difficult.

When I point out that this creates a hierarchy between the classes that might not be in the best interests of the student to set up, they always reply “I didn’t intend to be insulting.” They didn’t have to think about the degree, feeling, or angle of their statement because to them it is simply factual – these classes are difficult and important. But this is the major problem with the facts-only epistemology or the fact-as-reason approach – one’s preferences and perspective cannot be included, and neither can the perspective or preferences of the audience. There is only one thing that can be said.

When I tell them about phrasing it differently such as, “I’m overwhelmed with make up work but I will take a look as soon as possible” or something to that effect, they agree it is better, but it’s very disturbing that it never crosses their mind that “important classes” isn’t a universally agreed upon judgement. They really do think that there are classes in the university that everyone – including the instructors – realize are not important.

Last semester I had a student who resisted all my advice on assignments and received a pretty mediocre grade. He protested: “I am going to medical school and need the best grades.” I asked him whether learning and applying the principles in public speaking mattered. He assured me that they do not as there are much more important classes for physicians. I tried to explain to him that one of the biggest areas of preventable loss in medical expense is patients either not following or following post-procedure instructions incorrectly. The doctor must try to explain the importance of the at home care in terms and ways that the patient can understand the importance. He told me that patients (and people) are generally stupid if they cannot realize the importance of the things the doctor says.

This is where we are with all this attention to facts. They do not help you communicate or create action motivated by values. Such things are not important if you have the facts. In fact (!!) they are irrelevant. There’s zero responsibility for the speaker or the instructor if the facts are in play.

I feel like resisting this notion is one of the most vital and important things rhetoricians can do in their pedagogy today. And yes, it is a fact that Elon Musk was not elected. How is repeating that fact working out to change motives and attitudes?