Hey what’s up Thinkers! Kathy Gibbens here…
Let’s start off with a quick review of a fallacy we covered earlier this season, the Naturalistic Fallacy. Do you want to hit pause real quick and see if you can remember what the Naturalistic Fallacy is? Ok, The Naturalistic Fallacy happens when someone says that just because something comes naturally to us or happens in nature, it’s therefore right & should be accepted as normal. Or, that because something doesn’t come naturally to us, we shouldn’t use it as a standard for morality.
So, the question to ask yourself if you think you’re facing the Naturalistic Fallacy is this: “It may come naturally, but does that mean it’s right?”
If you want to review or hear more about this fallacy, go back & check out Episode 162.
And I just want to pause real quick and give a little plug for my membership, Crazy Thinkers. I love that you’re listening to this podcast and no doubt are learning some good thinking skills. But, just listening to a 7 minute episode isn’t enough to really help you learn the fallacies. It takes practice! In Crazy Thinkers, we do exactly that. Every month, I send you a downloadable pdf with cartoons, memes, headlines, articles and I give you the questions that you can ask your teen and have a great conversation as you practice recognizing fallacies using real-life material. It’s a great way to practice what you’re learning here on the podcast! Plus, you’ll get free access to my 10-week course on the TOOLS of good thinking that can be applied to every other area of life. If you’d like to learn more, just check it out at filteritithroughabraincell.com/crazy and get the practice you need to become a Crazy GOOD Thinker!
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Alright, let’s dive into today’s new fallacy, the Nutpicking Fallacy. The Nutpicking Fallacy happens when someone finds the craziest or most extreme person in a particular group and uses them as an example of what everyone in that group is like. It can also happen when someone takes the weakest part of someone’s argument and makes it seem like that’s their whole argument, ignoring all the other strong points that they’ve given.
A funny version of Nutpicking happens at big sporting events. Have you ever seen big football games where the camera picks out the craziest fans to put up on the screen? Well, that’s sort of a funny version of Nutpicking! They’re finding the most extreme version of the team’s fans and highlighting them as though they’re representative of every fan.
Nutpicking happens all the time in politics…and both sides do it! It’s very easy to find some crazy person in a MAGA hat and make it seem like they’re representative of every Republican out there. And it’s just as easy to find some crazy climate activist and make it seem like they’re representative of every Democrat out there. But is that really true? Are ALL Republicans like that? No. Are ALL Democrats like that? No.
The problem behind Nutpicking is that it’s making a caricature of a certain group based on 1 person or a small handful of people that may not be true of the group as a whole. Sure, there may be a few people who fit this extreme caricature in any group, but they’re likely not representative of EVERYONE in that group. Nutpicking is a tactic used to make a group appear more extreme than they really are. And, if this fallacy sounds a little familiar, it should be…it’s pretty similar to some of the fallacies we’ve learned about in the past. Basically, the Nutpicking Fallacy is what would happen if the Strawman Fallacy and the Cherry Picking Fallacy had a baby. And why do people engage in Nutpicking? Because it works! In fact, Nutpicking is a great way to go viral in today’s social media world where 5-second videos that ‘prove a point’ get shared thousands or even millions of times. People enjoy seeing what they WANT to see and they want to see the opposite side as being crazy, so when someone shares a video that seems to show the opposite side as being crazy, they love it and are more than happy to share it over & over.
Another example of Nutpicking is the Man On The Street videos people do. You’ve probably seen them: Someone is out on a busy street asking random people questions about a certain belief, idea, policy, whatever. OR sometimes they’re even just out asking basic trivia or history questions. And in the videos that go viral, it’s always of the people who do a terrible job answering the question. For example, it’s a college student who doesn’t know some very basic historical fact and the headline will read, “Kids get dumber when they go to college!” And they’re trying to make it seem like every kid who goes to college doesn’t know even basic stuff that everyone should know and that all college is a waste of money and kids these days are idiots. Do you see the fallacy here? But let’s think about this a little more…how many people did they interview that day? How many people did they talk to who did know the answer to the question? Why don’t they show those people in the video? Why did they just pick the nut who had no idea? Because they know what sells. They know what will get the clicks and the views. You see how the fallacy works?
So, the question to ask yourself if you think you’re facing the Nutpicking fallacy is this: “Is it really true that this person represents EVERYONE in that group?” *repeat*
Remember: When you learn HOW to think, you will no longer fall prey to those who are trying to tell you what THEY want you to think and it all starts with asking one simple question: “Is that really true?”