Argument

Once again I am the centre of vituperation. Once more a person has decided to employ an ad hominem argument instead of focussing on the issues.

Ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is a fallacious argumentative strategy whereby an argument is rebutted by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.

However, its original meaning was an argument "calculated to appeal to the person addressed more than to impartial reason".

Fallacious ad hominem reasoning is categorized as an informal fallacy, more precisely as a eugenic fallacy, a subcategory of fallacies of irrelevance.

[Eugenics

noun

The science of improving a population by controlled breeding to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics.]

Ad hominem tu quoque (literally: "You also") refers to a claim that the source making the argument has spoken or acted in a way inconsistent with the argument. In particular, if Source A criticizes the actions of Source B, a tu quoque response is that Source A has acted in the same way. This argument is false because it does not disprove the premise; if the premise is true then Source A may be a hypocrite, but this does not make the statement less credible from a logical perspective. Indeed, Source A may be in a position to provide personal testimony to support the argument.

For example, a father may tell his son not to start smoking as he will regret it when he is older, and the son may point out that his father is or was a smoker. This does not alter the fact that his son may regret smoking when he is older.

Apart from the mindless frippery of using words that do not exist in the English language but which are designed to hurt, a failure in this case, one wonders at the level of under education that might drive someone to that end.

There is also just the tiniest point that we all have different ideas, opinions and beliefs. We are, all of us, entitled to those differences without being subjected to an onslaught of bile and hatred.

Indeed, there are several people with whom I communicate that have different views on President Trump and gun control.

They are solidly behind those views and have telling arguments on why they hold those views – as well they should.

There is no reason, that I can think of, why I should pour vitriolic comments on to their posts within social media. I am, however, equally entitled to state my views whether I am a native of that country or whether I come from and live in another country.

America has been described as the economic engine of the World; if it misfires the World slows down or stops – financially. Ergo, anything that affects the USA affects us all thus we have a right to an opinion of it.

I note that the American Department of Justice has an opinion of the financial happenings amongst the leadership of Malaysia; several countries have an opinion of what is happening between Israel and Palestine; there are some countries that are watching South Africa and Zimbabwe closely.

What happens in these countries will, quite possibly, have a farther-reaching impact than what is happening locally.

My opinion is small. It is, in the Global sense, irrelevant but it is mine and I am allowed to speak it. You may not like it, I may not like your ideas or beliefs, but we should not need to be at one another’s throats because of it.

America may be, internationally, important but in spite of what Hollywood and the media tells us it is not the centre of the universe.

That honour goes to ‘Furato’!