FALLACY FEUD
1. Juan is Hispanic, so he’s probably a Catholic.
2. Muffin tells Babbs, “You are a disagreeable person, and if you disagree with me on this, it will only prove what a disagreeable person you really are.”
3. A mother finds her son watching TV, after he was expressly forbidden to watch TV because of bad grades. “It’s not TV,” the boy says, “It’s HBO.”
4. Ms. Farnsworth tells her daughter Nellie, “You aren’t allowed to date until you’re sixteen. My mother made me wait until I was sixteen, and her mother made her wait until she was sixteen too.”
5. It is no more wrong to deprive a cult member of his/her constitutional rights in order to deprogram him/her than it is wrong to administer anesthesia to a cancer patient in order to remove a malignant tumor.
6. The National Enquirer reported that the government was harboring space aliens in Washington D.C., and no government official denied it, so it must be true!
7. I tried to play the Tuba and failed. Then I tried to play the trombone and I failed. Let’s face it, I’m just no good at learning a musical instrument.
8. Traffic court defendant: The sign said “fine for parking here,” so I figured it was O.K. to park there.
9. Capital punishment should be abolished in favor of intensive efforts aimed at rehabilitation. After all, a dog who bites once shouldn't be put to sleep, the dog should be sent to obedience school.
10. Ms. Farnsworth, a 3rd grade teacher, can’t believe Biff did so well on his math test. “Which student’s paper did you look at?” she asks him.
Fallacy Feud
11. Biff tells Rex, “I noticed a condom in Lulu’s purse, so I’ll bet she sleeps around.”
12. If Mark Furhman hadn’t lied about using the “N-word,” O.J. Simpson would have been convicted of murder.
13. Mom to son, “I’m not buying you a “Pokemon” lunch pail. If a brown paper bag was good enough for me when I was a kid, its good enough for you.”
14. Fifi has just tried a new cleaning product called Amazo Clean. “It worked great on my windows and my stainless steel countertop,” she says, “so it will probably work well on my leather couch too!”
15. If you have a passenger side airbag, a child can get killed. It you don’t have one, an adult can get killed. You can’t win.
16. A burglar is caught in the act of burglarizing a home. He tells the police,”Hey, its a good thing I was here. They left the iron on, which could have burned the whole house down.”
17. “The Sixth Sense” is a great movie. Roger Ebert and Rex Reed both recommended it.
18. Babbs got a laptop computer last fall and her grades went up. I think I’ll get a laptop too.
19. Southerners tend to be bigoted, and Biff is from Alabama, so Biff is probably a bigot.
20. If the government can ban smoking, what’s next? Will they ban hang-gliding, or bunji jumping too? Will they ban overweight people from eating Hostess Twinkies and Ding Dongs?
Answers to fallacy feud
Email: rgass@fullerton.edu
Home Page: http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu/rgass