Ad Hominem: When Personal Attacks Become Fallacious

Many people, if not most, have at least heard of the ad hominem fallacy. And, not for nothing: it is one of the most common type of logical fallacy – an error in reasoning that weakens an argument or trick of thought used as a debate tactic.

Although the name “ad hominem” is widely recognized, the fallacy behind it is perhaps not as well understood. For instance, it is often not mentioned that there are, in fact, several different types of ad hominem fallacies. Each of them works quite differently, however, they are all based on attacks against the person making an argument instead of criticizing the argument itself.

Ad hominem, in all its forms, is an extremely common offender almost everywhere – from disagreements among friends to debates between state leaders. Keeping this in mind, as well as that it often occurs due to a lack of argumentation skills, it is clearly important to understand it; learning about ad hominem makes you better able to identify and counter it, as well as avoid committing it yourself.

In this article, we will cover everything you need to know about this reasoning flaw.

What Is Ad Hominem?

👉 Ad hominem, short for argumentum ad hominem, is a logical fallacy that is based on personal and irrelevant attacks against the source of an argument instead of addressing the argument itself.

In other words, the attacker takes aim at their opponent’s supposed failings that are unrelated to the issue at hand rather than focusing on the validity of the argument or position they support.

The attacks can be directed toward someone’s character, background, past actions, intelligence, morals, physical appearance, or credentials. As such, this fallacy tends to appeal to people’s emotions and prejudices instead of intellect.

Here, Jamie’s response is not only insulting but also unrelated to Carly’s claim: pointing out that she didn’t go to college proves nothing about the truthfulness of her words. In other words, rather than address Carly’s argument, he simply dismisses it with an offending comment. This is an example of abusive ad hominem.

There are a number of different types of ad hominems, the abusive and the circumstantial being the most usual types. And, as mentioned earlier, although they are all based on criticism of the individual behind a claim, each of them does it in a different way.

Category

It belongs to the broad category of informal fallacies and falls into their subgroup of relevance fallacies. And, even more precisely, it’s also a type of genetic fallacy.

• Informal fallacies refer to arguments containing irrelevant or invalid evidence that renders the conclusion incorrect. They stem from an error in reasoning rather than an error in the argument’s logical structure.
• Fallacies of relevance occur when the evidence for an argument is not relevant to the conclusion and thus doesn’t provide adequate reasons to believe that the conclusion is valid.
• Genetic fallacy refers to attacks directed toward the source of an argument instead of addressing the argument itself.

Use of Ad Hominems

This logical fallacy is commonplace in a wide variety of discussions and situations. It is often committed out of desperation when one doesn’t have a decent counterargument or when one wants to avoid the topic at hand.

In the political arena, its use is also referred to as “mudslinging”, and it’s often the meat and potatoes of political campaigns. For instance, calling your opponent offending nicknames, such as “lyin’ Hillary and “crooked Hillary”, can be seen as fallacious ad hominems when they are used in an attempt to discredit the opponent’s arguments.

In many cases, criticizing your adversary personally is a powerful (although unethical) strategy if your goal is to pull focus off the real issue. Personal insults tend to have an emotional appeal, which can be effective in manipulating the audience’s opinion and possibly damaging the credibility of the opposing side.

Ad Hominem Fallacies

1. Abusive

Ad hominem abusive is probably the most frequently occurring type. It occurs when someone makes an abusive attack towards someone by criticizing their attributes such as character, background, morals, physical appearance, or hobbies. In other words, it’s an attempt to discredit an argument by insulting the arguer.

It is also known as “name-calling” and “damning the source”.

👉 Its logical form goes as:

• Person A makes argument X.
• Person A is an idiot.
• Therefore, argument X is false.

2. Circumstantial

Circumstantial ad hominem, also known as “appeal to motive”, arises when someone says that since a certain claim must be predisposed by the arguer’s personal circumstances, it is, therefore, invalid.

This is logically fallacious specifically because it asserts that an argument must be false if there is such a connection between a person’s circumstances and their claim that could possibly affect their decision-making. In reality, however, it doesn’t disprove the logic or validity of the claim; a car salesman may really believe that the car he is selling is an excellent vehicle.

👉 As such, its logical form is:

• Person 1 makes an argument X.
• Person 1 has a personal interest in X to be true.
• Therefore, X is false.

However, note that if there is strong evidence for a conflict of interest and enough reasons to believe that the individual’s position is indeed biased, it is reasonable to call them out on it.

3. Tu Quoque

Also called the appeal to hypocrisy, tu quoque (Latin for “you too”) is based on the claim that a person’s argument must be invalid because their past actions or words are not consistent with it.

In essence, rather than trying to refute the logic or evidence the person is using, one responds by pointing out that he or she has acted in the same manner themselves.

It’s considered to be a flawed line of reasoning because, even though it may show the opponent’s hypocrisy, it doesn’t really address the actual substance of an argument.

The logical form of a tu quoque is:

• Person 1 makes an argument X.
• Person 2 points out that X is also true about Person 1.
• Therefore, X is false.

4. Guilt by Association

Guilt by association is a type of ad hominem fallacy in which someone is discredited due to their supposed association with something negative; since the characteristics of something negative, such as a bad person or an evil idea, and the characteristics of the person that it’s associated with are said to be the same, the person is therefore viewed as “guilty” too.

👉 The typical form for this argument is:

• Person 1 supports position X.
• Person 2, who is evil, also supports X.
• Therefore, Person 1 is evil too.

When this type of fallacious connection is made in a positive context, it’s called honor by association. The reasoning behind it is the same, only the person or a group is associated with something that is seen as positive.

5. Poisoning the Well

Poisoning the well is a fallacy that arises when negative information about someone is presented preemptively in order to discredit or ridicule following claims made by that person.

It is also known as a smear tactic; rather than having to counter a claim in legitimate ways, one resort to smearing their opponent’s reputation and thus making their words less credible.

6. Ad Feminam

Ad feminam (Latin for “to the woman”) is also a specific form of ad hominem argument, albeit a lesser-known one.

It uses female stereotypes to attack a woman’s position. For example, suggesting that someone’s (who is a female) claim must be false or irrational because of pregnancy or menstruation hormones.

Not an Ad Hominem

Not every insult or criticism of a person is an ad hominem, or fallacious for that matter. Essentially, the distinctive factor is that, in every fallacious personal attack, the criticism is irrelevant to the actual issue under discussion.

• Relevant Criticism – An argument against a person is not fallacious when it’s clearly relevant to the discussion, i.e. when a person’s characteristics, credentials, skills, or such are directly related to the topic.
  For example, if someone who is in a position to enforce the law has acted against the law, then pointing it out would be relevant. This, of course, also applies in a case where the actual topic is about someone’s personal attributes.
• Conflict of Interest – As noted earlier, it is also relevant when to point out a clear conflict of interest; if there is reasonable evidence to believe that the arguer is predisposed to take a certain position, calling them out on it may not be fallacious.
• A Simple Insult – If the attack is not being used as evidence to support the counter-argument, then it’s simply an insult, not a fallacy.
  For example, if someone makes a sound counter-argument and simultaneously throws an insult at the other person, it wouldn’t be seen as fallacious (even though it would be rude and unproductive).

How to Counter

Ad hominem arguments are often committed emotionally because one lacks the skills and knowledge to legitimately refute opposing claims. As such, it can be difficult to prevent people from using them; we can’t have too much control over other people and how they will behave. However, despite this, you still may be able to lower the risk to some degree – and, as the saying goes, prevention is better than cure.

In order to achieve this, try to make your point politely and with consideration to your opponent’s point of view. When you come out as respectful and non-judgmental, the odds of your opponent wanting to offend you are lower, even if they disagree with your viewpoints. This applies especially when you are about to criticize something that the other side has a strong interest in.

Now, in a case where your opponent has already launched an ad hominem at you, you have a few different ways to approach the situation: