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It's a fallacy we've heard all too often: reductio ad Hitlerum. When you run out of things to say in a debate, simply link your opponent's beliefs to Nazism.
At the Darwin Day debate hosted by the USC Pastafarians Thursday night, Christian apologist Kyle Butt pulled that one out, and it was all downhill from there.
The event - intended to promote an intelligent discussion of the topic "Does God exist?" - pitted Butt against Dan Barker, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation.
I had my doubts before the debate even began. Churches from around the state were sending congregants by the busload to pack out the Russell House Ballroom, and I feared they were here to gang up on Barker.
The Hitler comparison was just one of the low blows Butt delivered. He threw in a complete non sequitir that equated Barker to a baby killer. He set up an outrageous scenario involving mass rape and alien invasions just to prove his opponent was immoral.
Even more embarrassing for me, as a Christian, was the chorus of "amen"s that echoed around the room when he delivered these comments.
True, Barker made his own shots below the belt, though they were softened by a disarming sense of humor. But as I watched Butt, who was supposed to be defending my side, I was ashamed - not of my beliefs, mind you, but of the logical contortions and absurd lengths to which he was resorting.
Surely, I thought, there is a better way.
And as I watched these two men attack each other, I thought back to Tuesday on Greene Street, where street preacher David Hallman stood at the gates handing out his flyers.
Hallman, 62, is not your average fire-and-brimstone sidewalk sermonizer. With him, there are no loud confrontations and no personal attacks. His voice is gentle, and he would much rather talk one-on-one than give a speech to a crowd.
"When someone says, 'I don't believe in God,' that's the end of the conversation," he said in a phone interview Saturday. "We're not supposed to convince anybody He is. That's not our job as believers."
Hallman has been coming to campus with his message since 1986. He reflected a great deal of patience and noted that he didn't become a Christian until he was 36 years old.
His thoughts on the Darwin Day debate? "I thought about going, and I said, 'What for? It's only gonna be a bunch of confusion.'"
Here we have a man whose beliefs are probably not far from Kyle Butt's. But his method of advancing those beliefs could not be much different.
Inside the gates that same Tuesday, behind a table at the Healthy Carolina Farmers Market, USC First Lady Patricia Moore-Pastides had a strong conviction as well.
Pastides, who is a serious advocate of healthy eating, was handing out free paper bags full of lentils, along with a recipe for lentil soup. At previous farmers markets, she has handed out homemade spanakopita and apples from a local orchard.
"It really doesn't work to just get up and sort of pontificate to people," she told me later in a phone interview. That is, in a nutshell, the problem I saw with Kyle Butt's debate fiasco.
Yes, Christians are called in 1 Peter 3:15 to "be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have." But what I saw Thursday night was not reflective of hope, nor did it exemplify the second part of the verse: "But do this with gentleness and respect."
I do not mean to disparage the Pastafarians for putting on the event. They had a noble intent, and it is always healthy to step back and take an honest inventory of your own belief system.
But I guarantee nobody left the debate last week with a changed heart. Events like this are great for making people think, but it takes more than rhetoric for someone to alter his or her entire way of life.
Want to change a life? Get out there on the sidewalk like Mr. Hallman and Mrs. Pastides. Before you try to convince somebody of what you believe to be the truth, get to know that person. Share what you can, whether it's fresh produce or a bit of fresh perspective.
And have patience. Let the way you live your life bear witness to the veracity of your claim, and that will speak volumes more than any statistic or talking point.
And whatever you do, don't bring Hitler into it.
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