Is it a "personal attack" to claim GG's reporting has been sloppy and/or hyperbolic?

[Orrex]

45. The difference appears to be on the definition of "personal"

If we suppose "personal" to mean "direct and in person," then you're correct, and in that artificially narrow context you can indeed "personally" attack only those people with whom you are interacting.

But if instead we define "personal" as "about the person," then any attack upon the person is personal. This is the much more generally accepted definition, in my experience. It doesn't matter if the person in question doesn't know that you're doing it.


Regardless, even if we abandon "personal" altogether in this discussion, it is still an ad hominem to attack GG as a blowhard or whatever. There is some dispute as to whether this constitutes the actual ad hominem fallacy, but I'm inclined to say that it does; any attack on the person's character will have the collateral effect of damaging the credibility of his argument, even if the argument is entirely valid. Therefore attacks on the person should be limited.