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From: brower@fortune.UUCP (Richard Brower)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: inappropriate debating tactics
Message-ID: <5306@fortune.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-May-85 14:41:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: fortune.5306
Posted: Wed May 29 14:41:54 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 30-May-85 06:09:20 EDT
References: <682@mtx5d.UUCP>
Reply-To: brower@fortune.UUCP (Richard brower)
Organization: Fortune Systems, Redwood City, CA
Lines: 19
Summary: 

In article <682@mtx5d.UUCP> hbb@mtx5d.UUCP (H.B.Braude) writes:
>> Replace all references to homosexuality and homosexuals with "Judaism"
>> and "Jews", and replace "Jews" with "Christians" or "Americans" or
>> some such word, and the paragraph above sounds awful hateful, doesn't it?

>This is an example of a type of debating tactic that I have  seen
> ...
>The example we have here is another form  of  straw-man,  but  in
>this  case, the person takes an exact quote of the other person's
>words and demonstrates that by substituting some of words in  the
>sentence, the statement can be turned into something idiotic.

In this case though, I would argue that the author was attempting
to show that racism and sexism (particularly orientationism) are
very similar.  Anti-semitic tirades are ugly and should be opposed
by all reasonable people.  Anti-homosexual tirades are just as ugly,
and should be opposed by the same reasonable people.  It is sometimes
usefull to show people how the same sort of "logic" that they use
to condem others can be applied to themselves also.