The Gamma identifier

There were a lot of good guesses, many of which were indeed phrases popular with Gammas, but no one landed precisely on the phrase that I have observed to be most useful in correctly identifying a Gamma early in his argumentative process. Aquila Aquilonis came closest when he said: "I'm pretty sure the phrase is a re-framing phrase that is blatantly dishonest." Slarrow was also in the neighborhood with "I think what you're saying...."

The actual phrase, however, is "You seem to be saying" or its variants "It appears you are saying" or "So you're claiming/telling me"

This is subtly, but significantly, different than what slarrow guessed, as it is NOT a statement about what the Gamma thinks, which would be perfectly legitimate even if incorrect, but rather a dishonest reframe of what the other party has already said. What the Gamma is doing when he uses it is setting up the strawman he intends to attack in lieu of what the other party actually said.

Notice that it appeared in the Gamma example from the other day: "However, you seem to be repeating that claim again, despite having the contrary evidence up front. So, you're pretty close to providing me with adequate support for my earlier claim."

Of course, I did not repeat the claim again, in fact, I pointed out that I had never made the claim in the first place. My response: "You can't repeat that which never existed in the first place."

Then, in another post made after I mentioned how this phrase is a useful early identifier, another Gamma utilized a variant of it twice in precisely the same manner.

1. "So you're claiming that Iraq attacked Iran and started the war?"
2. "So you're telling me a coup d'etat that the British used to establish control of Iran during the days of British colonialism is justification for the medieval regime of the Ayatollah?"

Both of these characterizations were false. My response: "I wrote what I wrote. I said what I said. Stop this "so you're telling me" and "so you're claiming" bullshit. If you can't address exactly what I wrote, not some idiotic revision of your own device, then you're not tall enough for this ride and you don't belong here." This led to the customary Gamma verbal deluge.

"Yeah Ok. So the British overthrew the Iranian Government for stealing the oil wells they drilled in Iran by themselves, and the Iranians had no use for without Western Technology like cars and electric generators. Oh no! Those evil oil companies that steal the resources of backward natives that don't even know its there to make those evil industries that feed the world and provide lifesaving medicine and technology! Are you sure you're not a Liberal Democrat? Evil Oil Companies? Really? What the fuck were these Iranians going to do with this oil without Western Technology? Were they going to build another House of Saud like Saudi Arabia?"

I wasn't the only one to notice the blatantly dishonest reframing. As it happens, I never said anything at all about oil companies, evil or otherwise. All I pointed out was the simple, easily confirmable historical fact that the United States was in part responsible for the 1953 coup that toppled the democratically-elected Iranian government.

And here we have another perfect example of a Straw Man argument. Joshua invents the claim that Vox is saying "Evil Oil Companies" were behind everything, then proceeds to flail at the straw man.

And thereby anecdotally demonstrated that the use of the phrase "You seem to be saying", and its variants, is a reliable Gamma identifier, and therefore the individual resorting to it is probably an individual who merits a purely rhetorical dismissal rather than a honest dialectical response.