A word for all our volcabularies; “ad hom·i·nem”
adjective.
1. Attacking a person’s character or motivations rather than a position or argument:
2. Appealing to emotions rather than to logic or reason.
Look out for adhominem and you’ll find it all over the place.
“conspiracy theorist”, “far right”, “anti-vaxxer“, “tin foil hat wearing”, “racist”, “anti-semetic”, “ -phobic”, “nut-job”, “climate denier”, etc, etc are typical adhominem favourites.
Using put-downs and being critical of people is easy. Thinking critically about information on the other hand, requires particular skill and effort. The loss in society of vital critical thinking skills and what we can do about it is explored in the book “Light Bulb Moments and the Power of Critical Thinking”.
When someone resorts to using adhominem, it’s likely their beliefs, information or actions have been challenged. However, the use of adhominem shows weakness and indicates that they are reacting emotionally and unable to use critical thinking to examine the evidence or to explain their position in a convincing or logical way. Instead of providing facts which are credible against the opposing idea they resort to name calling and attacks. This is to try to shame or discredit those making the challenge, in order to try to make the questioner and therefore the questions go away;
The proliferation of these types of labels over the last few years, applied by journalists and politicians in particular, to attempt to discredit just about anyone asking inconvenient questions, or presenting alternative facts, has been quite incredible.
What do you feel about people who have been given these labels and slurs by those in power or the media? Does it make you want to discount them, or do you want to dig deeper and actually consider critically if what they are saying has real basis or credibility? The terms have also been repetitiously seeded into the public consciousness and we are all encouraged to use them against those with opposing views. Victims of adhominem are often people expressing legitimate personal experiences, deep knowledge or scientific proof and they have done nothing to warrant such attacks.
People who are sure of their information and actions should have no difficulty in welcoming calm and open debate with others. Encouraging different points of view and having open and reasoned debate, allowing critical thinking and free speech without slinging fake mud at the character of another person, is the only way in which we can ever make any real progress.
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