Fighting Fair

Something for which I am always grateful is that discussions here at treppenwitz tend to remain quite civil, even when potentially incendiary topics are discussed.  I have a bunch of theories as to why I've (we've) been so lucky, but I'm pretty sure it boils down to a few basic factors:

1.  First and foremost, I try to limit the number of overtly political topics I introduce here.   I don't enjoy constantly discussing politics any more than I enjoy the idea of constantly discussing hair loss.  Both topics are inexorably tied up with my life... but I don't have to allow them to dominate or define me.

2.  I try very hard not to speak/write in absolutes.  If I've learned nothing else in my 44 years of life, I've learned that there are very few black or white absolutes in the world.  Let's just say I've made my peace with shades of light and dark gray.

3.  I try very hard to write (and sometimes revise) my posts so as to leave open the possibility that there are other points of view worthy of consideration.  Even when I am quite sure of my position, I have found that I learn far more from (and about) others when I leave room for their opinions.  Simply put, if I leave the door open, someone is more likely to walk through it than try to break it down.

4.  I try to encourage those who comment on treppenwitz to address themselves to the opinions being discussed rather than the people expressing the opinions.  This is the most basic form of intellectual honesty and it feels good being on both the giving and receiving end of such honest treatment.

5.  While this isn't a debating society (by any stretch of the imagination), I do try to encourage (sometimes with a little behind the scenes arm-twisting) some semblance of fair tactics when arguments arise.  Chief among the tactics that I will not allow here is the introduction of deliberately flawed logic / 'straw man' arguments.

Nearly everyone instinctively recognizes fallacious logic when we encounter it, but many may not be familiar with the terminology.  For example there is a straw man argument which is "a rhetorical technique (also classified as a logical fallacy) based on misrepresenting an opponent's position". (i) 

A good example was offered in a comment on yesterday's post:

"If almost everyone in Israel serves in the military, and the military trains people to turn off their conscience and become mindless automatons, doesn't that create a fascist or totalitarisn [sic] society?"

Besides being a classic 'Are you still beating your wife?' type question intended to put the opponent (me) hopelessly on the defensive, what the commenter is really doing is taking a weak and unsubstantiated supposition that "... almost everyone in Israel serves in the military" (far from true), combining it with a weakened and deliberately distorted aspect of the topic we were discussing; "... the military trains people to turn off their conscience and become mindless automatons" (we were discussing the mental conditioning that is required of effective soldiers), and then presenting her bright-eyed conclusion; "... doesn't that create a fascist and totalitarian society?"

[blink]

In a comment she left on an earlier post she used similar logical fallacies to present her 'facts' and again drew a fatally flawed and illogical conclusion:

Example 2:

"Correct me if I'm wrong--but didn't suicide bombings increase as Israeli presence in the West Bank increased? The settlements grew during the 90s, the by-pass roads grew, finally the second intifada erupted and then you had lots of suicide bombings..."

Let's leave aside for a moment that the comment had nothing whatsoever to do with the topic of the post.  Here she isn't so much attacking my position (since we weren't discussing suicide bombers) but rather she is setting up the case that suicide bombings were a direct result of Israeli settlement activity, and she bases this on unrelated factoids that are true, but only within very narrow context. 

She states that the settlements increased in the 90s (true, but it ignores the fact that settlement activity was fairly constant throughout the 80s, 70s and late 60s as well).  She points an accusatory finger at the bypass roads as if they were an attack on the Palestinians rather than a way to minimize the exposure of Israeli traffic to the nearly constant attacks they had encountered while traveling the existing roads through or near Palestinian towns.  Then she connect the dots by saying "... finally the second intifada erupted and then you had lots of suicide bombings...".

Ah yes... if only life were so simple.  The second intifada spontaneously "erupted"... and suddenly there were "lots of suicide bombings". Why not mention Sharon's visit to the Temple mount, Palestinian dissatisfaction with the terms of the Oslo accords, or even sun spot activity, all of which occurred around the same time and had equally little to do with "lots of suicide bombings"?

So, while the overwhelming majority of you play nice whenever you come here, I wanted to write a post to which I could link whenever someone decides to employ deliberately fallacious logic to grind an ax or further an agenda.  This is that post... and here is the logo/link I will be putting up on my site as a constant reminder to fight fair.

(feel free to lift it)

Update:  A sharp-eyed reader pointed out a similarly flawed tidbit from this same commenter's web site:

"A footnote to yesterday's post: I googled Elie Wiesel to find out if there is anyone besides myself who thinks this man is an ass. I discovered that not only am I not alone, but there is some evidence Wiesel may also be a fraud. Apparently, it's not clear that he was actually in the camps he claims he was in. Evidently honesty is not a criterion for choosing guest Op-Ed writers for the [New York] Times." (ii)

Oh my... I wish I had a time to parse that one.

(i) Source

(ii) Source

More info on straw man arguments and other logical fallacies.