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OrphanWilde comments on In Defense of Tone Arguments - Less Wrong Discussion
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That presumes they care to argue about it with themselves at all, a rather faulty assumption relating to a philosophical doctrine which discourages such questioning.
Additionally, I've yet to see a logically valid, based-on-true-premises argument against deism. (Certain -versions- of deism, yes; deism generally, no.) The strongest argument I've seen is that a god is unnecessary/possesses no explanatory power - which as far as I am concerned is as much of an argument as you need, but hardly an argument against god, per se.
What would you regard as an argument against deism, if you wouldn't regard that as one? If such a god is unnecessary and has no explanatory power, then it follows that there's no evidence for it (evidence being observations that are more likely in light of the truth of a proposition than its falsehood, a proposition should always help "explain" why you make observations that are evidence for it.) And we should not believe in complex propositions without evidence, not because it defies some etiquette of rationality, but because they're probably not true.
Most theists are, if not acquainted with arguments against the existence of God (although many are familiar with some formulations of such arguments,) but have a number of arguments for belief in God, which they will rehearse whenever they encounter arguments against God. Being entirely sheltered from thinking about the reasons for believing is the exception rather than the rule.
Note that Luke claims a single logically sound argument against God (for which you can check the video ElGalambo links in this thread,) but in his experience with actually deconverting people, he has not found any particular argument as effective as creating an impression of being a smart, likeable, good person, while treating religion as low status and uncool.
That presumes a complex god.
Your second paragraph only applies to deists who in fact engage in arguments about belief, rather than ignore them. There's a selection bias at play there.
Additionally, given that there is (can not be?) evidence against god, any evidence for, however weak, is pretty substantial.
As for what an argument against deism would be, it would be an argument which demonstrates that god is unlikely, which is not necessarily the same as unnecessary. (To distinguish between the two, I will point out that from a deist perspective, evolution is unnecessary.)
And before we continue, I will add that I have met deists who believe that the universe itself is god. Deism is so broadly defined that a complete proof against it would also be a proof against the aforementioned universe, duck eggs, and wombats.
I address the argument of a simple god in this comment.
How do they distinguish believing in a god that is also the universe from believing in the universe, but no god?
As opposed to Gods that can be described in only a few bits. I am not sure what the lower limit on information complexity on a God is, but if it is going to do the sorts of things people generally claim a God does, it is going to be a complex proposition.
Saying that "the universe is God" is disprovable without disproving duck eggs and wombats. If the Universe is God, then there must be some classification "God" that is at least epistemically different from "Universe" or else the statement is meaningless. Saying that the universe does not fit into the class "God" is not saying that the universe doesn't exist.
Which people, and which claims? Complexity is not necessary to beget complexity; evolution, for example, is a remarkably simple process.
One deist's position was that the universe as god had a particular goal in mind, cohesion. His particular god was impersonal and disprovable (as he claimed the contraction of the universe to a single point was the purpose of that god, if that were not the case, it would be a contradiction), and had a particular theistic ramification; the dead joined the universal consciousness, which was, as far as I could tell from conversation with him, a strictly experiential existence, devoid of thought and possessing only purpose - the aforementioned cohesion.
Have you ever questioned him on whether the discovery that the rate of universal expansion is accelerating, suggesting that the universe is unlikely to end in a Big Crunch, affects his beliefs?