Jeff feels obligated to respond

From: Jeffrey
To: waynereview@yahoo.com
Date: April 19, 2004
Subject: Logical fallacy lesson

Joe,

Judging from your email, I don't think you actually know what a strawman is. I direct you to the following website:

http://www.cuyamaca.net/bruce.thompson/Fallacies/strawman.asp

You see, a "strawman" occurs when you don't accurately represent the views and opinions you're trying to refute. I'll give you a couple of examples. The first is when you invented this "quotation"...

"African Americans are unable to succeed on their own. They need special care that will be provided by their elite white benefactors so they will have their proper place in society. After all, they cannot survive on their own as well as white Americans can."

...which you then claimed was actual "rhetoric used today by 'progressive' Democrats". It's not, and you know it. (Please prove me wrong -- I'd love to know where you pulled this quote from other than your own ass.)

You have another strawman argument later on in the editorial, when you claim...

Liberals want you to believe blacks do not have the same opportunities because white Americans are holding them down, preventing them through racism from succeeding. The interesting thing is the liberals can only point to a little anecdotal evidence, as well as a mysterious force called "institutional racism" as the evidence of this oppression.

...which is completely dishonest. I've heard plenty of other backing evidence for the continued existence of affirmative action -- it's not all convincing, but it does exist. But you decided that attacking institutional racism was easier than attacking the fact that inner-city schools don't prepare children for college as well as suburban schools. THAT'S how a strawman works.

Since your mission statement declares you seek to be the most "intellectually honest and ethically just" paper around, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the basic rules of argument and common logical fallacies. One of my evil, pathetic, lying, traitorous, unpatriotic, hypocritical, radical, incompetent liberal professors made me buy Introduction to Logic, Tenth Edition, by Copi and Cohen. I'd be happy to lend it to you, if it means I'd be able to read through a single article of the Wayne Review without breaking out a red pen.

Cheers,
Jeffrey

P.S. "Your" is a possessive adjective. "You're" is a contraction which replaces "You are". I had that nailed down back in middle school.