Politics Filtering and Higher Standard Discussions

a method to hold a risky political discussion while excluding mindkilled dialogue and naively cynical accusations

I'm wondering why you would want to. Any contentious political issue can usually be disassembled into non-political ones, usually some combination of economics, history, physics, logic and cognitive science. Start with something like "Is Obama a Muslim?", "Is smaller government better?", "Is global warming real?", "Is assisted suicide murder?" and break it down into non-political or less obviously political components, like the measurable effects of faith on job performance, a comparative discussion of the role of various levels of governments, from family council to condo owners association and up, in various countries and cultures, and so on. There is no point in explicitly discussing an issue which triggers affiliation- and identity-based biases.

Talk to people you've already filtered for open-mindedness and intelligence

Can you give more examples of the kind(s) of political discussion you want to do better in?

I mean, I understand what you want to avoid, because you list many examples of that, but I'm not sure what you want to have, other than a political discussion, with some group of people of some size in some circumstance.

For instance, the kinds of advice I might consider suggesting for internet discussions on your site, internet discussions on other sites, town meetings, door to door canvassing, discussions with friends and family, and discussions with political opponents when you are running for office are somewhat different, and they also involve different amounts of risk.

I think you'd get better answers if you more fully specified the context.

Who? Where? How? How long? How often? What topic? What's the risk? Do you have a particular topic in mind? What are you hoping to accomplish?

I think there isn't really a problem with people discussing 'political' subjects, because the problem isn't politics. Really, anything that involves 'philosophy' and the word 'should' can be a potential problem, even if this is only implicit in the conversation. If you don't want to feel angry or to have people angry at you, the solution is simple--only talk to people you already agree with.

In fact, people can happily discuss politics and philosophy all day long, and do so all the time--as long as both parties already agree with the other's conclusions.

Now, I am assuming what you actually wanted to know was how to discuss politics with someone you don't already agree with. In order to do that one has to be able to separate the argument the person is making from their emotional response to it. if you can't do that, then anything that is significantly meaningful to you will be something you cannot meaningfully discuss with anyone you disagree with.

The goal of such discussions shouldn't be to convince someone that you are right, but to find the root cause of the disagreement to begin with. It's very important to make logical arguments and not use fallacies as arguments. When you feel strongly about a subject, this may be difficult. Also, if the other person has already made an argument for their case, you need to respond to the points they made. Otherwise you're just talking past each other. I agree that you shouldn't be obscure--that is a way to create a monologue, or perhaps talk with people who know whatever linguistic password you've set up, which may mostly be people you already agree with. I guess that works in the sense that one avoids confronting people they don't agree with.

The truth of the matter is that if you want to discuss anything at all important with someone you disagree with, there's going to be strong feelings involved. If someone presents a logical argument, regardless of the emotions involved, your response needs to address their argument, and not their or your emotional response. If you can't do that, then you might try understanding your opponent's side by choosing to read work from the most intelligent people who hold the same opinion they do. If you think those people's arguments are worthless (not merely wrong, but unintelligent and without any logical scaffold) then you probably won't be able to have a logical discussion of the subject with people you disagree with. And that is because if you think that, you are probably having trouble putting aside your own emotions on the subject. There is no such thing as an argument that cannot be argued using logic, or that has never been argued using logic. The question merely becomes what that logical infrastructure has been built on. Somewhere in there is the basic component that you and your equally logical countepart (who nevertheless believes the opposing viewpoint) disagree on.