Argumentative Rhetoric

"Barbarism likewise threatens when men cease to talk together according to reasonable laws. There are laws of argument, the observance of which is imperative if discourse is to be civilized. Argument ceases to be civil when it is dominated by passion and prejudice . . . when dialogue gives way to a series of monologues . . . when the parties to the conversation cease to listen to one another, or hear only what they want to hear, or see the other's argument only through the screen of their own categories; when defiance is flung to the basic ontological principle of all ordered discourse, which asserts that Reality is an analogical structure, within which there are variant modes of reality, to each of which there corresponds a distinctive method of thought that imposes on argument its own special rules. When things like this happen, men cannot be locked together in argument. Conversation becomes merely quarrelsome or querulous. Civility dies with the death of the dialogue."

John Courtney Murray, We Hold These Truths

It seems that many people simply don't know much about argumentative rhetoric, and they go into a discussion thinking that they can make bold claims with no substantiation and expect it to stand all alone against a critical world, while attacking their opponents in the discussion with extreme patsied strawmen. I thought it prudent to ennumerate some of these:

1: Argumentum ad hominem: This is the error of attacking the character or motives of a person who has stated an idea, rather than the idea itself. The most obvious example of this fallacy is when one debater maligns the character of another debater. A more typical manifestation of argumentum ad hominem is attacking a source of information. Argumentum ad hominem also occurs when someone's arguments are discounted merely because they stand to benefit from the policy they advocate. In all of these cases, the relevant question is not who makes the argument, but whether the argument is valid.

Nothing more quickly degenerates a discussion than when people start attacking those making the arguments rather than refuting the arguments themselves. The character, circumstances, or political ideology of the person has nothing to do with the truth or falsity of the proposition being defended.

It impacts traditionalists because novus ordos spend a lot of time attacking Traditionalists as though they are schismatic dissenters, rather than examining the tenability of their actual reasons for not being novus ordo, this is mostly from the novus ordo hierarchy but the majority of sheeple novus ordos follow in their lead, and attack based on labels, because that is one way that dishonest arguments are furthered and gobbled up by lots of people: someone who holds one opinion in one regard is misrepresented and then labeled something rather unlikeable, and so the majority condemns both the person and the ideology based on the labels and names aimed by the mainstream shepherds, and so the ideology is not heeded based on the ideology itself, not because it is erroneous or immoral, but because the mainstream higher-ups have disclaimed it. They condemn what they do not understand, they condemn because of the fact that it might mean it might place them in a bad light, not because of there being anything wrong with the argument itself.

2. Burden of proof "He who asserts must prove." The burden generally rests with the proposer, which means that only the opposition is in a position to make an accusation of argumentum ad ignorantiam with respect to proving the proposition.This is one of the most critical aspects of proper argumentation and requires that one carefully guard himself from making groundless statements. Every proposition should be supported by either logic or evidence.

This one is a continuation of the above discussion in that one side will say that the other side is wrong, but will not bother to demonstrate their argument, but rather simply make an allegation of error, with no basis in known fact.

3. The Red Herring: This means introducing irrelevant facts or arguments to distract from the question at hand. The term red herring is sometimes used loosely to refer to any kind of diversionary tactic, such as presenting relatively unimportant arguments to distract them from more important issues. The most common of these is the quibble over grammar, respond to the argument, not to the spelling, they spend more time on the opponent's spelling and person, in an ad hominum way in the usual, though it is good to point out significant errors that impact the validity of a claim, but not solely for the purpose of embarrassing or attacking the opponent.

This one is also a common thing in argumentation in that sometimes an opponent, rather than refute the argument at hand, will shift the discussion to an attack on the competency of the one presenting the issue to change the focus off of the issue being discussed to an attack on the person and competency of the latter, a dishonest tactic, but commonly employed. It is these that lead to misunderstandings and many unneeded issues between good Catholics.