The Argumentative Disintegrity of JP Sears
Noun
disintegrity (uncountable)
I’ve been following the popular and Ultra Spiritual YouTuber JP Sears (2.6 million subscribers) for almost a decade, since 2013. I’ve enjoyed many of his videos, had some hearty laughs and appreciated his thought-provoking perspectives on a wide variety of topics.
A few years ago I observed his veering into extreme right wing political opinions, interwoven into his comedy videos, which eventually went deeper into the murky world of conspiracy theories. His content has long since left the realm of spiritual awakening and is now fully devoted to promoting far right wing political ideology.
I don’t want to get lost in a discussion of political opinions, because that is not the focus of this article. In fact, I reveal no specific political disagreements in this article. This article is about critical thinking, something that is inherently an aspect of political discourse, whether people are well-versed in the rules of critical thinking or not. Everyone making a political point attempts to use evidence and employ various argumentative tactics to support their opinions and claims.
JP has just created a new YouTube channel named JP Reacts, and posted his first video, a reaction to the recent speech by President Joe Biden in response to the Supreme Court decision to strike down Roe v. Wade. Although I don’t follow JP’s content regularly, it does pop up sometimes and I’ll occasionally decide to watch something. I came across this video randomly, started watching it and immediately had problems with his logical arguments. I decided to watch the video through in its entirety and critique his various statements, casual remarks, claims and arguments. Below is the video, and then my commentary, starting with the time stamp of the specific point being referenced in the video.
0:12 “Woke BS?” Not an important point, but undoubtedly ironic considering that his other channel is Awaken With JP.
0:36 A “Let’s Go Brandon” reference? (In other words, “F You Joe Biden”.) Not exactly intelligent political discourse.
1:07 Flippant sarcasm in the face of the real life challenges that many pregnant women will now face? This is one of the many problems with his video response, is that he never indicates any sense of compassion or concern for the incredibly difficult situations that many women will find themselves in as a result of the Supreme Court’s actions. This fact is apparently irrelevant to him.
1:15 “Technically abortion is not a constitutional right.” True, but of course it was protected based on the Right to Privacy in the 14th Amendment: “Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973),[1] was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States generally protects the liberty to choose to have an abortion.”
2:06 “Killing babies is super important.” This is a big one and an argumentative fallacy regularly used by those opposed to abortion. There’s a profound lack of argumentative integrity taking place when someone chooses to ignore the distinctions between a baby, a fetus and an embryo. Facts matter and if you agree that facts matter, then this is a crucial fact to be clear about when choosing the words you use in discussing this topic. Obviously “killing babies” sounds much more shocking than “aborting embryos”. An embryo and a baby are, of course, not the same. Anyone who is genuinely serious about this issue should make their case one way or another based on dealing with correct facts and accurate words. Illustrating a basic understanding of what an embryo is seems like a rather pertinent fact to get right in this debate.
3:07 “Demented head?” Really?
3:15 Yes, presidents use teleprompters. All of them. Was their a point to this observation?
4:20 True. Fifteen years later his views on the issue have shifted. Again, a lack of argumentative integrity to accuse someone of hypocrisy based on their differing opinions in the past.
5:40 Again, why the teleprompter reference? Has JP ever brought this up as a point of criticism against Trump? Maybe he has. Otherwise, surely he can’t be unaware of this as a clear case of a double standard. Again, more lack of argumentative integrity.
6:49 Insurrection? I wonder how deeply he has considered in realistic terms the many ways in which our daily lives might change if the US government was overthrown and replaced with an entirely different form of government. Pandora’s Box comes to mind. Be careful what you wish for, because you might get it. If I were to bet on what would happen if the US government was overthrown, my money would be on some serious global chaos taking place.
7:30 Only .6% of abortions are a result of rape. How is this relevant? Tell that to a victim of rape: “Yes, it’s terrible what happened to you. But you’ll be glad to know that you’re in the extreme minority.” This is a really horrendous argument to be making on this issue.
7:47 Again, referencing the rape statistic. What was the lie by the Biden administration? Once again, a lack of argumentative integrity. He has not revealed either an exaggeration or a lie. But he is willing to make that accusation regardless.
9:25 This is a really big one. JP’s words:
“The Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade which makes the right to abortion a federal law. That doesn’t mean you can’t get an abortion, that just means now it’s state law, whether abortion is legal or not. And funny thing about it being a federal law, if that were the case, if it was still the case, then you have unelected representatives, which is everybody on the Supreme Court, dictating a law, which is not what the Supreme Court is designed to do, which is tyranncy (sic: tyranny). A democracy is your elected representatives become state legislatures (sic: legislators), and then they pass laws or they shoot laws down. That’s called a democracy. So, for communism to take root you need unelected officials in the federal government making up laws. That’s what Joe’s advocating.”
I’m trying to figure this one out. There’s a lot to unpack here and it’s really convoluted what the ultimate point is. First, using this as evidence of a trend towards communism is a complete non-sequitur. Basically, he seems to be suggesting that having a Supreme Court of unelected members who make decisions is in itself communist. Huh? So is JP now stating that he doesn’t accept any rulings by the Supreme Court because this is inherently a communist form of government? That’s quite a statement to be making. Will he now reject all rulings by the Supreme Court as illegitimate, including the ones that he agrees with? Or is this another case of a double standard in which this only applies to conclusions that he disagrees with?
But I don’t want to get lost on that bizarre point, because the main problem with his statement is that he seems to have gotten it literally, completely backwards.
Here is what Joe Biden said:
8:55 “The only way we can secure a woman’s right to choose and the balance that existed is for Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade as federal law.”
So Biden is referencing the Congress. And yet JP is referencing the Supreme Court. I’ve listened to this statement several times, and I can’t make sense of it.
First, at 9:25 JP said: “The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which makes the right to abortion a federal law.”
Maybe he misspoke there, because that is undoubtedly, categorically false. When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, that did not result in the right to an abortion being a federal law, which is what he seems to be saying. When did it become a federal law? Prior to 1973? No, it didn’t. Prior to 1973 it was legal in some states, but not nationwide. If the right to an abortion was a federal law, then Roe v. Wade would have never happened. This entire discussion of the issue would be irrelevant. There would be nothing for the Supreme Court to rule on. If the right to an abortion was a federal law then it would be legal nationwide and that would be the end of the matter.
Making it a federal law is in fact exactly what Joe Biden is advocating for at 8:55 in the video. He’s saying that the elected members of Congress need to pass a federal law making access to an abortion legal nationwide, which would overrule state laws that are currently banning it. Again, maybe JP misspoke there or perhaps I’m missing something in what he was attempting to say.
Regardless, ultimately he is clearly attempting to make some tenuous point about communism by talking about the unelected members of the Supreme Court, when Joe Biden isn’t referencing the Supreme Court in that statement, but is actually talking about the elected members of Congress passing a federal law that would legalize abortion nationwide. Yet JP’s criticism is directed at the unelected members of the Supreme Court. Again, at 8:55, the statement that JP is responding to, Biden isn’t talking about the Supreme Court. Biden is talking about the elected members of Congress passing a law.
So JP is making some point about Biden being a closet communist, not in favor of democracy, when in fact Biden’s statement is about asking the elected members of Congress to pass a law through our democratic process. As much as I’ve sincerely tried to see a valid point in JP’s statement, regardless of whether I might agree or disagree with it, I cannot see any point here that makes any sense.
Here’s my paraphrase of what JP said:
The Supreme Court consists of unelected members, which is reminiscent of communism. Therefore, Joe Biden advocating for the elected members of the United States congress to pass a federal law legalizing an abortion is proof that Biden is a communist.
I fail to see how this makes one iota of logical sense. It’s a complete non-sequitur.
Moving on…
10:34 Joe Biden: “No executive action from the President can do that. And if Congress, as it appears, lacks the votes to do that now, voters need to make their voices heard.”
See my point in the section above. Biden is rejecting the idea that he can make abortion legal through his own executive power, and instead advocating for voters to elect representatives to Congress who will support passing a federal law making abortion legal. That is the democratic process. Yet JP is talking about the Supreme Court and communism. I’m genuinely wondering if I’m missing something. I don’t see how he could have made that bizarre statement, as well as left it in the video during editing, because it comes across as completely nonsensical.
11:15 Another “killing babies” reference. Again, severe lack of argumentative integrity to so flagrantly conflate an embryo with a baby, as if that isn’t a valid distinction in this very serious topic on an issue that he will never have to directly deal with as a man.
11:17 “Giving the federal government more power.” Honestly, how can he make this argument in seriousness? It’s clearly an act of governmental power either way, whether it’s banning abortion or keeping it legal. He is apparently in favor of the federal government actively intervening to force women to give birth against their will, an unavoidable reality of banning abortion and the fundamental consequence of this issue which, incidentally, he seems to want to avoid. So how can he then bring up governmental power to make a criticism of the effort to make abortion legal through federal law (utilizing the democratic process)? This is lazy critical thinking, a double standard, hypocritical in the true sense of the word and once again lacking in argumentative integrity.
11:30 It’s tone deaf and a bad political strategy for Democrats to discuss abortion rights in their political campaigns. FYI, polls show that a clear majority of Americans support the right to an abortion.
11:43 Why, once again, the communism reference? Where in this video has he ever made a point that in any way, shape or form reveals actual communist tendencies in Joe Biden or the Democratic party? How can he so casually make such a wildly extreme accusation, while providing literally no evidence to support it? If he wants to make that a serious argument against the Democratic party and accuse the Democrats of having communist tendencies or some sort of stealth mission to turn the US communist, then make an in-depth video with solid arguments supporting that claim, that can be dissected, rather than making flippant casual remarks implying Democrats are communist. This is a completely false and highly offensive accusation. The Democratic platform simply does not support positions that could be characterized as communist. The US government is a long, long ways from being communist, and attempting to steer the government in that direction would involve massive changes, which Democrats are not taking or advocating for. There is no legitimate case to be made that the Democratic party is secretly communist. It’s incredibly lazy and once again lacking in argumentative integrity to throw around such an extreme claim with such utterly flimsy evidence to support the claim.
12:12 If you like personal freedom you should vote conservative. Backwards logic and a pretty stunning case of both irony and hypocrisy. Keep in mind that JP is making this statement about the Republicans being the party of personal freedom, in a video in which he is supporting government interference to force women to give birth against their will.
13:04 “Treating.” One thing that I think we both can agree on, is that neither of us have ever been pregnant, nor will we be likely to become pregnant at any point in the future. But I really don’t think it’s necessary to have been pregnant or to be a woman, to be able to comprehend the fact that there are lots of instances in which an abortion would be considered a necessary medical treatment for the health and safety of the mother.
13:55 I know nothing about this drug. But it seems obvious by what he said that it must be effective in two completely separate circumstances: inducing an abortion and somehow helping in treating a miscarriage.
14:57 This is the first point that JP has made in fifteen minutes which I will concede may be a fair point, although I would need to know more about the specifics. I do not support the government going through mail and confiscating legal medications. I’m not sure why he is so convinced that the medication he ordered, which shall go unnamed, helps against the virus, but that’s his business.
I do think it’s relevant to point out however that despite the conspiracy claims, the pandemic is practically over and restrictions have been lifted across the country…while Biden was president. Any chance that JP will be making a video thanking the Biden administration for supporting ending the lockdowns, opening up businesses and schools and movie theaters and festivals, dropping the mask mandates and the testing and vax requirements? I’ll keep my eyes open for that video…but I won’t hold my breath waiting for it.
17:04 It’s hypocritical for Biden to advocate for a right to privacy, while supporting the actions taken during the pandemic. I will also concede this is a somewhat valid point. But I would say that it’s highly debatable. And ultimately, it’s a false equivalency. These are two vastly different scenarios. Because having an abortion does not potentially risk unleashing sickness and death on everyone you come into contact with afterwards. The actions taken during the pandemic were not arbitrary measures simply for the sake of government imposing control on people. They were taken based on the advice of medical professionals for the sake of preventing more people from getting sick and dying. One can debate whether those actions were appropriate, effective, an abuse of power, etc., but there should be no debate over the fact that this is a wildly different scenario compared to the issue of abortion.
18:15 Does Biden’s objection to Clarence Thomas’s statement have anything to do with the fact that he’s black? Utterly invalid point. Biden is responding to the substance of Clarence Thomas’s words, which could impact the lives of all Americans. He is equally criticizing all of the justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade: black, white, male and female. There is zero reason to bring up the issue of race in this particular instance.
20:58 Biden doesn’t know what a woman is. This is another big one, which I had to look into further in order to understand what he was talking about, because I missed this in the news. As best as I could figure out, JP is referencing the senate confirmation hearing of Ketanji Brown Jackson for the Supreme Court, in which Senator Marsha Blackburn asked Jackson if she could define what a woman is, and Jackson refused to answer the question. This then led to Fox News asking the Biden administration to define what a woman is, to which they also got no answer.
Now, it isn’t entirely clear why JP is bringing this up other than to basically accuse Biden of stupidity or senility or not being willing to answer important questions or hypocrisy for advocating for women’s rights while not defining what a woman actually is, or all of the above.
This “controversy” is utterly absurd. If you can’t figure out why someone wouldn’t want to answer a question about what exactly a woman is, in front of the United States senate and the rest of the world watching, then I don’t know what to tell you. Because defining a woman would necessarily involve a discussion of female anatomy. Can you really blame a Supreme Court nominee for refusing to open up that can of worms in the United States senate, and engage in a very public and inevitably contentious discussion of female body parts? Get real.
As for the Biden administration also refusing to answer the question, this is equally understandable. The question of who exactly is a woman is a hugely sensitive topic, a political minefield and something that simply has not been unequivocally clarified anywhere by anyone. So why would the Biden administration decide to answer a question which, on one level, everyone in the world already knows the answer to in the basic sense, yet which has never been clarified in explicit terms? This is not something for a presidential administration to define. This is a question that society at large is asking right now and the answer at this point is far from being determined.
21:06 Accusations of sexual assault and harassment against Joe Biden. An absolutely valid point to an extent, although whether it’s actually relevant in the abortion debate is highly questionable. I believe there was one accusation of sexual assault and several complaints of inappropriate behavior, that basically involved some creepy touching while taking photographs. All of this was widely covered in the media. The accusation of sexual assault was investigated and dissected extensively, with no clear conclusion ever being made one way or another. There’s a very comprehensive page dedicated to the incident on Wikipedia:
The problem with JP bringing this up in the abortion debate, is that for one thing it isn’t directly related other than to make a general criticism of his character and/or to suggest it’s a case of hypocrisy that Biden claims to care about women’s rights when he has been disrespectful of women.
But a much clearer case of both hypocrisy and a double standard on his part is to attack Joe Biden’s character on the basis of a sexual assault allegation, when meanwhile there are literally dozens of very serious and credible sexual assault allegations against Trump. I haven’t seen a lot of JP’s recent videos, so perhaps he has equally questioned Trump’s character on the basis of these many very serious allegations. But somehow I doubt it.
22:00 The apparent discovery of Joe Biden’s daughter’s diary. This is some very shady, unverified stuff to bring up to make a general case of questioning Biden’s character and commitment to women. Does it deserve to be looked into by the media and perhaps aired in the court of public opinion? Certainly, with respect for the privacy of those involved. Is it a relevant argument, especially being unverified in terms of its authenticity, in criticizing a president’s political positions? No, it is not. Is it really something worth bringing up in the context of arguing for or against the issue of legal access to abortions? That is debatable, but in my opinion it’s a clear no. It’s an ad hominem argument, questioning his character in a very dubious way, rather than focusing on the issue at hand.
22:20 Accusations of incest really shouldn’t be made or brought up in this situation. This is the most extreme of allegations, which comes across as a smear attempt based on very flimsy evidence. I’ve never heard of these accusations before. If there is any truth to them, then I am all for allowing them to be revealed and investigated in the appropriate context of serious journalistic inquiry. But as far as I know this hasn’t been discussed widely in the public sphere, other than in the dark corners of right wing conspiracy theories, and so it’s a completely unverified claim that shouldn’t be included in a serious discussion of the issue at hand.
In conclusion, I am not impressed by JP’s commentary. Notice that I never attacked him personally and never explicitly revealed any political disagreements with his views. I simply focused on the substance of his arguments. And I find his logic, critical thinking, evidence and observations to be lacking in a commitment to argumentative integrity. His commentary comes across as, basically, throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, regardless of how solid the argument is, how verified the evidence is, how relevant the point is to the topic he’s discussing.
I’m still scratching my head over what he said at 9:25 and wondering if I completely missed something. If he was actually trying to say what he appears to have said, then it’s utterly nonsensical. If it was a matter of getting something mixed up, then it seems incredibly sloppy to have not caught that while editing and allowed it to be included in the published video.
JP has a huge audience with 2.6 million subscribers on YouTube, more than 300 million total views and many more followers and views of his videos on other platforms. Since he has departed the original focus of his channel on spirituality and devoted his content to news and politics, he is now part of the media, that same media which he regularly criticizes and ridicules.
I also believe in freedom in the general sense, including his freedom to dispense information and express his opinions. It is up to JP and his own sense of integrity to determine what his personal responsibility is in delivering information and opinion to a large audience and influencing public discussion in a big way. If integrity is in fact important, then it seems that a good place to start would be in illustrating a command of the facts and a commitment to verifiable evidence, logic, critical thinking and argumentative integrity that is equal or better than that same media you constantly criticize.
