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Is there a name for this rhetorical move? “Here’s something you’re not gonna want to hear” “This is gonna make some of you mad but…” “People want to believe pretty lies, but the truth is…”

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ahhhhh i have also had the same question, i would love a label

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it feels similar but not quite exact to the 'painful update button', where the fact that information is painful is framed as a virtue and thus the pain is ignored as a potential signal of damage

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I think most of the time, what follows after a statement like that is *not* painful, the disclaimer is there to enable people to feel superior to hypothetical other people to whom it would be.

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yeah, maybe that's the difference? or actually i'm not sure. I think a lot of the time the painful update button is incentivized *by* the sense of superiority. maybe the difference is that the superiority is just *more* emphasized in the above example frames?

2:32 AM · Jan 28, 2023

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You feel like you get “adult points” for “painful copes” you grin and bear. However, since it’s such a powerful tactic on well-meaning adults, it’s easily used to create a false sense of authority where none exists. John Oliver’s entire show is based on this, for example.