A really annoying fallacy: "If you are a hypocrite your facts become false"

[Odin2005]

I ran into this fallacy a lot lately in the offshore oil drilling threads and in threads on the Afghan War ("If you support being in Afghanistan go enlist, you CHICKEN-HAWK!!!", "If you do not support expansion of offshore drilling why are you still using oil-based products, HUH!?!"). It is a really pathetic form of ad hominem used to prevent rational discussion.

[ZombieHorde]

1. I agree, that is a fallacy.

I think most fallacies are done on accident, I try to politely point them out. I know I make logical mistakes from time to time.

[Silent3]

2. Of course, there is the fallacy fallacy too...

...that just because someone employs a fallacy, that they're wrong. :)

Obviously hypocrisy doesn't absolutely negate correctness, but it certainly can call correctness or sincerity into question. In an issue like a war, where know one can really be sure which choices will save the most lives, produce the greatest security, where people can't even agree with the most desirable goals -- lives lost now vs. freedom later, just how much life and limb a given degree of freedom is worth, whether imposing order is more important than freedom, whether you gain more via creating goodwill or fear, "right" is a very difficult thing to pin down. With issues like that hypocrisy relates more to a person's consistency -- do they employ a consistent set of values, or a conveniently shifting set of values?

Your example of offshore drilling vs. use of oil-based products isn't so much an example of someone calling another person on hypocrisy as it is a tactic of applying a ridiculous, artificial standard for would or would not be hypocrisy.

When it comes to supporting a war and whether or not someone enlists, that may or may not be hypocrisy. People simply might be too old to fight, or otherwise physically incapable of fighting, and it hardly means they aren't allowed to have any opinion on the subject of a war, including a pro-war stance. If they can fight, or could have fought in a similar previous situation, but have done everything they can to avoid fighting themselves, I think it's fair to question at least whether or not such people are properly accounting for the cost of war in human lives when they give reason to suspect they're more willing to put other people at risk, but not themselves or their own loved ones.

[onager]

3. In a similar vein - Godwin's Law...

The first person to mention Nazis automatically loses the debate.

Baloney. Often, invoking Godwin is nothing but a cheap way to try and shut off debate. e.g., when a poster is pointing out a valid current equivalent to the way the Nazis did business. Or maybe even pointing out that Certain Major Religious Figures once actually belonged to the Nazi party.

Though I'll concede it can be valid, when somebody drags the Nazis out of left...er, right field into a discussion in which they don't really belong.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

4. The terms "fascism" and "socialism" are employed way too often

Often by people who have no clue what they mean. When people use terms like fascism to describe the Unrec function, I despair.

[iris27]

6. Eh, no one listens even when Godwin's law *is* an appropriate criticism of their argument.

They just quote the section of the wiki that says "the rule does not make any statement about whether any particular reference or comparison to Adolf Hitler or the Nazis might be appropriate", and then repeat themselves as though that makes them more correct..."see, Hitler WAS a vegetarian, and you ARE trying to say blame global warming on beef production, so my comparison is totally appropriate!"

Besides, the original GL just says that the longer a discussion goes on, the more likely it is that someone will drag the Nazis into it.

[laconicsax]

5. IMO, it's not as annoying as "my opinion is just as valid as your facts" or "anecdote=evidence"