Continuing our series on how to survive the holiday season, it's time to address an issue likely to arise at any family gathering. Here are our tips on how to win any argument. If cornered, feel free to use any or all of these.
| Technique | Example |
|---|---|
| Correlation equals causation | “I drink coffee all the time because I get my best ideas when drinking coffee.” |
| Godwin’s Law | “That’s like something Hitler would say!”1 |
| The Outlandish Analogy | “Allowing bikes on the highway would be like surfing the Web with a Swiss Army knife.” |
| The Slippery Slope | “If we allow any regulation of guns, next thing you know we'll have jack-booted government agents to searching our homes at random.” |
| Made-up Statistics | “Actually, 97% of people don’t want to watch Amazing Race.”2 |
| Ad Hominem | “What do you know? You watch Amazing Race!” |
| Overgeneralization | “Suppose everyone did that? We’d have a nation of people wearing mismatched socks.” |
Don’t argue with anyone who has read this list.
1 Except he’d say it in German, and it would pertain to the Third Reich, and … well, he’s dead.
2 Actually, 73.1% of statistics are just made up.
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