Learn English – Term for a technique intended to draw criticism to an opposing view by overstating that view as your own (often emphatically)

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The reason I'm asking is this: I have a relative (real 60s hippie) who does this all the time on Facebook (note audience: Friends only), and FB doesn't understand that it's not his own opinion that he's expressing (albeit in an inflammatory way, subjectively) because FB is not a person…who either knows him well or has humanlike perception capabilities.

I'm going to just make up an example (because actual quotes are not FB Public or SE-ready). Based on a recent topic in "the news" (women serving in the military, esp. combat arms), here is a faux quote (i.e., a false quote, usually attributed to a famous person, or a personified viewpoint):

'Pack up your eggs and go home, ladies. We're busy shelling over
here!'

On the surface of it, that's not good (for so many reasons), but I think the intent is obvious–to hold that view up to criticism (and perhaps, to provoke introspection or open debate), not to disparage any group in any way (except, quite possibly, the ones actually having that point of view).

But some people don't get it, and FB is not the appropriate forum for reading comprehension intervention (IME). With that being said, the question is this:

What would you call that technique, if you will, specifically?

I don't think it qualifes as playing devil's advocate (Wikipedia). I'm not sure, but I'm hoping for a more definitive term for that, even if it's informal.


Update (21MAR21)

I found pasquinade (Wikipedia) by way of satire, lampoon, and caricature (literary). I'm not sure how closely it would actually be associated with the latter, specifically, versus the first two synonyms, generally. And it's a little fancy; we just call it "mocking" here, but I didn't want to lead with that, or end with only that.


Best Answer

I don't know if this is really what you're referring to, but there is a part of the Socratic method often referred to as "Socratic irony" where you attempt to expose the flaws of someone else's argument by initially agreeing with them with the express purpose of exaggerating them to underline their absurdity.

According to the article "Socratic irony" in The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy (Simon Blackburn. Oxford University Press, 2008), a Socratic irony is "Socrates's irritating tendency to praise his hearers while undermining them, or to disparage his own superior abilities while manifesting them."

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