Talk:Kansas City Shuffle

Miscarriage

The Song Kansas City Shuffle from the film "Lucky Number Slevin" IS NOT THE ONE written by Bennie Moten...! Please correct, i'm Italian and my english is not so good. --94.36.87.185 (talk) 10:23, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

• That is correct. The two songs have nothing to do with each other! 95.118.60.170 (talk) 17:33, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

They don't sound alike at all, for one thing, anf the Bennie Moten version doesn't have any words to it either. 173.180.89.129 (talk) 05:17, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Neologism

As far as I can tell, the below explanation (formerly on the main page) is made up. --The Cunctator (talk) 19:47, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

In order for a confidence game to be a "Kansas City Shuffle" the mark must be aware that he is involved in a con, but also be wrong about how the con artist is planning to deceive him. The con artist will attempt to misdirect the mark in a way that leaves him with the impression that he has figured out the game and has the knowledge necessary to outsmart the con artist, but by attempting to retaliate, the mark unwittingly performs an action that helps the con artist to further the scheme.

The title refers to a situation where the con man bets the mark money he can't identify what state "Kansas City" is in. The mark, guessing that the conman was hoping to trick him into saying Kansas, identifies Kansas City, Missouri as his answer. The con man then reveals that there is a much less well-known Kansas City, Kansas meaning Kansas was actually the correct answer.

Pretty sure that is pretty much the information you get if you search for "Kansas City Shuffle" as a con game or grifter trick in any given search machine.--U'et (talk) 18:54, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

As described, at least, it makes little sense, since the mark should not lose the bet by the correct statement that "Kansas City" is in Missouri (the existence of another one in Kansas doesn't negate the existence of the first). JudahH (talk) 12:04, 17 May 2022 (UTC)

That's an in-universe argument you could make with the conman if you lost the bet, but other than that, it's not a valid retort to its presence here in the article, which is describing how it is operated, not advocating how foolproof it is. It's also, only arguable, because the con relies on there always being a way the mark can still be wrong - the sense (Frege's "Sinn") of both Kansas Cities is the same, but the conman claims another reference (Bedeutung). His claim would always be the other one not said as the mark can only say one and the conman, unlike a stage magician, did not, say, write the answer in an envelope first. JesseRafe (talk) 13:18, 17 May 2022 (UTC)

Only the last sentence in your reply gives clarity to the issue being discussed -- namely that the conman strategically designed the wager to be able to claim victory by asserting the correct answer is whichever state was not said by the mark, regardless of the mark's answer. This strategy is not sufficiently articulated in the current revision. The bolded text in the excerpt "there is a much less well-known Kansas City, Kansas meaning Kansas was actually the correct answer." heavily implies that a "correct" answer is defined at the inception of the wager, and it remains immutable such that the conman is not allowed to dynamically redefine the "correct" answer based on the mark's given answer. Also, as JudahH mentioned, the conman depends upon the mark fallaciously applying exclusive disjunction (i.e. believing one of the two answers must be correct and the other answer must be incorrect). This is likely the biggest point of contention people have with the example, since "Kansas City is in Missouri" is not a false statement. The mark isn't being "tricked" as much as he is being "cheated" which violates the spirit of a con.

Editing the example by adding all of the supporting clarifications would make it excessively verbose and possibly more confusing to readers. However, that challenge can be avoided altogether because the OP of this comment chain (The Cunctator) is correct with his accusation that the example is entirely made up. The phrase "Kansas City Shuffle" in this context seems to have first been coined by Bruce Willis's character in the movie Lucky Number Slevin where it simply described as a misleading double bluff. I was unable to discover any sources that associate the con with a location named "Kansas City". My assumption of the etymology is that it was chosen arbitrarily by the screenwriters because it sounds a bit whimsically absurd, fitting with the overall mood of the Slevin film.

And for the final nail in the coffin, the entire premise of the con is invalid because there is a third Kansas City just outside of Portland, Oregon. 2601:2C6:4A7F:8D40:A4E3:9C8E:8503:4427 (talk) 15:41, 5 October 2024 (UTC)

Golden Age

Looking for and members to recreate great times CachondaSimp (talk) 05:48, 21 August 2023 (UTC) CSimp