Maggie's Farm

Everyone is familiar with this very common fallacy, most often used in politics and informal debate  but rarely in formal disputation because it is so transparent.

When you use a straw man fallacy, you argue off the point, or with a distorted, exagggerated or extreme version of your adversary. Thus one creates an easy target to demolish. It is so quick and easy to do, it is often used on TV.

It is well to always bear in mind that fallacies are used to manipulate and to trick the minds of the listener or reader. As a rule of thumb, one can assume that they are rarely used out of ignorance or by mistake.

Example: "I am opposed to a border fence because America needs low-wage workers."  That is an example of arguing off the point, making it seem as if someone is opposed to access to unskilled labor.

Example: "We should let Iran develop nukes because other countries have them, like Israel and France, so why shouldn't they have them?" That is another off-the-point argument - it does not explain why Iran in particular should have nukes.

Example: "Bush wants to be a dictator because he wants to listen to my phone calls."  That is a classic straw man - that is a case of reacting to an invented position.

Example: "The NRA wants hundreds of children and teens to be killed annually." That's another classic straw man, akin to "The swimming pool companies want hundreds of kids to drown annually," or "The ladder manufacturers want hundreds of guys to break bones annually."

As in the last two examples, straw man fallacies often use demonization fallacies, a subset of straw man arguments. Demonization has some effectiveness in argument, since we all know that evil does exist in the world, and we are always happy to be able to locate evil outside of ourselves. Thus the typical election year theme: "The Republicans want to starve women and children, take away your Social Security, pollute your air, and ruin your life."