Discussion Main / StrawManHasaPoint

What example are you talking about?

Then it's not a strawman.

I think the only way you can have an intentional Strawman Has a Point is via Show Within a Show.

What about the Overseers in Dishonored? In the game we have control of the magic-using Corvo but the Overseers and their religion demonizes all magic users as dangerous heretics. However, aside from Corvo and, to a lesser extent, Daud, we aren't given much else to the counter their arguments against magic users. Any people that end up getting magic end up either becoming assassins or forming covens like Delilah in the Brigmore Witches. From some conversations in between characters there it isn't hard to think the witches are, by and large, at least as fanatical as the Overseers if not more. As for the assassins, their assistance in the overthrow of an empress, resulting in the rule of the tyrannical Lord Regent just for the money, isn't exactly morally gray and while Daud does regret his participation in it all, the other assassins seem to be a bit more silent on this issue.

I think the Overseers fall into Villain Has a Point, maybe Gray-and-Grey Morality or Evil vs. Evil. People probably can' be trusted with the power of the outsider because well - just use the Heart on people and you'll see that nearly everyone is a sociopath in some way, many are outright murders who have. However books also indicate they essentially kidnap children to fill their ranks and kill the ones who don't pass their training so they sure aren't good people.

However having magic has nothing to do with your morality in itself even if it makes it more tempting to deal with all of your problems with rat swarms and violence. He also offer more stealthy and morally neutral blink upgrades and possession which kills only animals and sickens humans. The Outsider gives them to people that he finds interesting in some way. He tends to keep the number roughly constant so just killing every mage isn't a good technique - if anything only killing the murderous ones would be a better tactic since the outsider is likely to replace them.

TL;DR; They are right about magic being a threat they would be better off without, wrong about everything else.

Now that makes sense. Sorry for the trouble. It won't happen again.

It shouldn't be re-added period.

The entire comic is political in regards to a very heated subject. No matter whether agreement or disagreement, inclusion here is instantly biased. The entire comic is a summary of feminist/SJ views. You either agree with the message of the comic or you don't, but there is no way putting it here won't be biased.

A neutral tone is pretty much an impossibility.

A completely neutral tone may be impossible, but with some more input I think it may be possible to clean up the example enough to be presentable, at least. The page won't suffer greatly if it's not re-added, though.

I am highly skeptical on how one would "clean up" the example without demonstrating a bias.

Either you side with what the comic is saying about the issues presented or you think the title character is right.

Question: If potentially inflammatory examples can be removed, this means that the following example can be removed, right?:"Similarly, in "Bridle Gossip" the viewer is supposed to find the cast's suspicions of Zecora to be unfounded and based on misconceptions. The problem is that while they go a bit overboard, their suspicion isn't entirely unfounded as 1) Zecora lives in a forest that's infamous for being full of dangerous creatures, 2) Zecora is a zebra, a species that none of the cast members have ever seen before and have no frame of reference for, 3) Later episodes confirm that there are all sorts of dangerous creatures and persons in the setting, 4) Zecora's behavior doesn't exactly help her case; she shows up wearing a cloak with Glowing Eyes of Doom and when she comes around she just sort of walks around aimlessly rather than making any attempt to communicate. In light of that, it isn't really that odd that the townfolk are a bit wary of her. It's especially true in AJ's case; it's not exactly surprising that she'd want to keep her little sister from following a stranger into a dangerous forest."

Not seeing how that's inflammatory. It's also off-topic.

I'm sorry, is this page Strawman Has a Point, or Strawman Has A Point King Zeal Agrees With?

But seriously, though. Zeal, you need to stop this. You claim you're trying to fight against "bias" but you don't seem to realize this is a YMMV page... it's all about opinions, ie bias. By trying to silence every opinion you disagree with you are only creating further bias.

As for the comic, I read it and I can honestly say that it counts. Here's why.

First, yeah, Politically Incorrect Man is kind of a jerk. If you pay attention you notice that he doesn't actually resolve any of the problems in the beginning of the comic. He just swoops in, lectures someone, and then flies away. That's what makes him a strawman.

The thing is, though... the points he was making were all valid. Note that I said "valid," not "God's own truth." We could question whether those points are correct, but we can't just dismiss them as obvious BS. That's what we mean when we say he "has a point."

The further issue is that Mx. Respect For Others doesn't adequately prove that he's the bad guy. She argues that he isn't really trying to promote free speech, he's just trying to protect people when they're called out for being rude. Except... none of the people in question were actually being rude.

The guy in the first case was just trying to see his girlfriend, and the fact that he was talking with the woman outside the building proves that he was obviously willing to be reasonable. NOT RUDE.

The woman in the second case wasn't cursing or screaming or throwing racial slurs. She was sitting on a bench and calmly making an argument. NOT RUDE.

As for the third case, the guy with the hat was being very blunt, but the fact is - and I'm saying this as a person who has long been considered clinically obese - he is objectively right. NOT RUDE.

The issue isn't that PIC Man is perfect and the hero, it's that the comic failed to adequately prove that he's wrong. (And honestly, Mx. Respect For Others ALSO didn't actually solve anyone's problems. She just swooped in, lectured PIC Man, and then flew away.)

Yes, it is "Strawman Has a Point". Not "Strawman disagrees with a specific political opinion".

I edited the above, read it again please.

See, your definition of "valid" in this case is falling back on a subjective definition of "rude". In this context, the "rudeness" of the people in question is in their inability to empathize with the position of the other person and/or be dismissive other person. In fact, the third guy flat out uses the term "making excuses" in reference to the other debater; if that's not rude, it's certainly dismissive.

Also, your assessment that it "failed to adequately prove he's wrong" is ANOTHER subjective argument that requires that we unpack the political leanings of both positions. And unpacking said political leanings will inevitably bring politics into this, which the powers that be don't want here.

Likewise the argument that she didn't "solve anyone's problems"—PIC Man flat out interrupted persons speaking before they could make their case. At the very least, the woman can finish making her case about her weight.

While I'm at it, though, let me also address these personal attacks you insist on.

For example, here is me editing out an example that specifically attacks anti-feminists because the entry is flat out Flame Bait. Whether I agree with a position or not, I try to remove anything that can devolve into political or ideological debating.

That being said, though, SOME positions I don't see any way to mediate without falling into a Golden Mean Fallacy. For instance, I used the example of an edit that unironically and uncritically calls Holocaust Deniers The Cassandra. If a work does it, then we need to very carefully indicate that this is the work's position. However, this position doesn't apply if this is external logic and not in-universe logic—for example:

• The Cassandra: During the final battle, Dillan casually mentions the Jewish plot to promote Holocaust propaganda. Predictably, he is laughed off.

Assuming that no Jewish conspiracy is an actual plot in the story, that example is not referring to a fictional trope. It's using an opinion from OUTSIDE of the work to create an example. No amount of "mediation" or "neutrality" is going to make that work. It either gets cut or it doesn't.

Strawman Has a Point, by its nature, requires external logic.

But turning into political debate isn't "devolving." Political and ideological debate are important. They help us to grow and to learn, and to "evolve" into something more than what we are. By removing anything that can lead to a political debate all you're really doing is helping to propagate the dumbing down of society.

Though that's more of a problem I have with TV Tropes in general... and to be fair, I get it. This is an entertainment site, not a politics site.

That said, what you're still failing to realize is this: Strawman Has a Point is a YMMV trope. Yes, my arguments are subjective. THAT'S WHAT MAKES IT YMMV. It's opinion. She failed to prove to a significant portion of the audience, including me, that he's wrong. YMMV is all about opinions. Arguing that an opinion-based entry is invalid because it relies on opinion is like arguing that the ocean can't be comprised of water because it's too wet.

As for it being about politics... when we say that we don't want politics on the site, what we mean is that we don't want mindless political bickering on the site. Trying to proactively nuke any and all political things is idiotic, because in the end anything based on opinion could be argued to be "political" and could potentially turn into bickering.

And frankly, what's the fear? If it does turn into mindless bickering and edit-warring, well, that's what we have mods for. Do you know how much work it takes for them to fix such a war? NONE. Check it out - click - click - click - done. People are suspended, problems are reverted.

There's no need for this "shoot first, ask questions never" approach.

IIRC, the mods have made it clear that they A) do not want political debates on the site and B) that YMMV does not mean "everybody's opinion counts".

Also why are you using the term "what we mean"? Are you a mod or admin?

For what it's worth, I agree with you on the "any opinion can be political", but that isn't my call.

Really, all of this just sounds like stuff you should be asking/talking to site staff about. I'm just some guy.

You're the guy who's fighting to have a legitimate example pulled from the page. That's why I'm talking to you. If you don't want to discuss it, then feel free to back off and let the entry be re-added - with a re-write, of course, because the way it was worded was quite poor.

No, because what you're proposing still violates the rules and/or peace of the wiki as I understand it. Therefore, I will continue to oppose the re-addition of the entry until either consensus disagrees or a member of the staff intervenes. Besides, it wasn't even ME that started this topic. I'm not going to make a unilateral decision based a short-lived back and forth with one person.

Again, if you think this is the wrong call, feel free to bring in the staff.

And for the record, yes, YMMV does actually mean "everybody's opinion counts." That's why we have an issue notifier for removing YMMV items.

The only exception is if it's...

1. ...blatantly inflammatory. This isn't, it's just stating an opinion... and ironically, by trying to shut down all discussion of it you're doing exactly the thing Mx. Respect For Others was complaining about in the comic. :p
2. ...based on provably incorrect information. For example, "I believe Star Wars sucked" is a valid opinion. "I believe Star Wars sucked because I dislike the character of Jean-Luc Picard." is not valid, because Picard wasn't in Star Wars.

Also, I asked on ATT. We'll see what happens.

The ATT topic has slid off the front page; it's become clear that the mods aren't going to jump in with a ruling. Meanwhile, the general consensus (with the obvious exception of King Zeal, who has argued strongly against it, but seems to be alone in this) seems to be that while the original example writeup was needlessly partisan and potentially inflammatory, the example itself is valid.

If further discussion results in that consensus changing, the example may need to be altered and/or pulled down again, but for now, I've replaced it with a more neutral writeup and a note to come here before altering or removing it.

Looks good to me. Just because we may not like the strawman's position doesn't change the fact that the writer can completely bungle their strawmen.

I'm still really sorry for bringing it up.

Related to the "disrespectful man" - Mx. (pronounced "Mux") is a honorific for the non-binary (those who do not identify as male or female), so referring to the Designated Hero of the comic as "she" is probably misgendering them.

Them, it's a case of Jerkass Hasa Point?

Oh man, we have that trope? Then yea, he's definitely one of those.

I'd like to point out that Peck was actually in the wrong. He handled the situation very unprofessionally, was deliberately confrontational, and overstepped the bounds of his authority. It's been pointed out (mainly by SF Debris) that while if Peck was investigating for a fraud investigation firm, or maybe the Nuclear Regulatory Committee, he'd have a point but the EPA has no grounds to shut down the Ghostbusters. The chemicals they were buying were for a small scale operation, so they were almost certainly well within the bounds of EPA regulations. Basically he was exactly what most would see him as, a jackass with a power craze who cause a catastrophe because of his hatred of the people he was investigating.

Yeah. The junkie's argument is misapplied. Tim is arguing 'the law should be obeyed', so pointing out that alcohol and tobacco are legal while drugs are illegal isn't even addressing the point Tim is making, much less refuting it. Alcohol and tobacco are legal while drugs are illegal because the line had to be drawn somewhere, and the voters just chose to draw it there rather than somewhere else. (Indeed, it took the 21st Amendment to the US Constitution — the only amendment ever ratified by popular referendum rather than by state legislatures — to make alcohol legal again after Prohibition was passed). The junkie in that argument is basically saying that he should be allowed what he wants when he wants it even if it isn't what the majority vote wants, while simultaneously using examples of things that were indeed ratified by majority vote. His argument contradicts itself and makes no sense, and we could really use a better page image.

Well part of his point is that the lines are drawn backwards. "They allow more lethal things yet the far less lethal is illegal." Besides "the law isn't always right" and "unjust laws shouldn't be obeyed" are well established lines of thought. Ironically anti-drug aesops often use "think for yourself" as a moral. Still, regardless of which stance is right the issue is enough of a distraction that there are probably better strawmen with points out there that should replace it as soon as a better candidate image is found.

Disagreed, i think junkie make a pretty valid argument. When asked for reasons not to smoke Tim just says "it's illegal", keep in mind that the whole point of disscusion was drugs, not whether or not law should be obeyed. Junkie argued that by pulling "obey the law" card without any other arguments Tim basically says that everything allowed by law is perfectly ok, including more questionable things like alcohol, tobacco and guns. What's more Tim is working with vigilante, and vigilantism is also illegal, so Tim's argument(junkie doesn't know that but the audience does) is also hypocritical. Of course Don't Shoot the Message is present as well

I think it needs to go, in a democratic system you don't just ignore laws you don't like. Laws can be changed through democratic process. You can't just break the law because you personally disagree with it.

Which is exactly what Tim is doing by being a vigilante.

I think it is a decent image. It's not that we know that the junkie is wrong, it's that his argument looks harder to refute and more factual than the writer presumably intended. If there is an image that gets it across better, let's see it.

But if the point he's making is refuted anyway, why does it matter how compelling it is? Any number of people, real or fictional, have made compelling, but ultimately wrong arguments to justify their actions. If your point sounds compelling, but is ultimately wrong, then you may as well have no point at all. Can a straw man still count as an example if their point is disproven? Shouldn't all straw men be here then? Isn't this trope about when a work fails to disprove their straw men? Also Nithael, Tim isn't being a vigilante. He's a kid being offered drugs by a peer, something many highschoolers have experienced.

Tim isn't a vigilante in this specific scene, but we're talking about Batman's Sidekick here, in general he IS a vigilante. I haven't seen the comic in full but from this scene it doesn't seem like his point is refuted, and even if in author's eyes it would be refuted, what about it? If he convinced Tim he wouldn't be much of a strawman in the first place.

That being said what do you actually disagree with? The case he's arguing for or the argument itself?

In this case, both. I'd like to pint out that his argument is essentially "It's my body, so I can do what ever I want to it." Essentially, he knows it's dangerous but should be allowed to do it because it only hurts him. The problem is that he'd just offered someone else drugs. The argument falls apart because he's trying to get other people involved. You can't claim his argument of "I'm not hurting anyone but myself" if he just tried to get someone to try a substance that he admitted was bad for him. Also, even if you think Tim is being a hypocrite, that doesn't refute his actual argument. Also, I think the laws regarding superheroes are different in the DC universe. His other argument is that pot should be legal because alcohol, tobacco, and guns are legal. Guns do hurt other people but you can only do so in self defense. His other argument is that Pot is not as bad as Alcohol or Tobacco, a statement that is highly contested in itself. To use that to back up his statement, he must provide additional arguments. Since he doesn't, it isn't an effective argument. You may agree, but it isn't backed up so it's objectively a poor argument. Objectively poor arguments are the opposite of this trope. The whole "It's my body so I'm not hurting anyone else" argument also has a few holes. The biggest being that drug addicts put a strain on the economy and that buying drugs can help criminals fund more dangerous crimes.

You're being a bit overdramatic and confrontational, but I overall agree with you.

If i understood well, the points are a)the sacrifice of a person to save the entire world is something worthy, in other words, an argument based in utilitarism. b) The own character in question realized the crime in question.

And if they had asked the character "are you willing to make this sacrifice?" that would have been acceptable. Saying "screw it, give her up, just don't let them hurt me!" is NOT making a good point.

I do think you're being a bit confrontational over this myself, but I've seen this episode and I don't like it, but mostly it comes from the awful handling of the issue being discussed. The problem is of the Loonatics' own making, yet they act like unreasonable demands are being made of them when somebody they shot with heavy weaponry demands some kind of restitution. And yeah, if you think about it, they are completely and totally imperiling everyone in the world over something really stupid they did by insisting on battling it out. I also disagree that you can call Lexi and Duck "best friends". If you watch this show they're at each other's throats all the time, and the show makes it clear you're supposed to support her over him all the time. I might even argue you can't say the Loonatics have fought stronger villains because they never had to fight a full-scale alien invasion before, but that's neither here nor there.

I do agree you shouldn't hand over your friends the moment something unpleasant happens. But the Loonatics were absolutely at fault, and they absolutely did imperil the people they're supposed to be protecting over an idiotic thing they did. The problem is the show never stopped and actually presented them as being at fault, seeming to expect you to take their side in anything that happened because they're "the heroes". If it had done so, then it all would've gone down a lot more smoothly. As it is, it's mostly a case of Protagonist Centered Morality and just poor writing in general, and yeah, this isn't really an example that belongs on this page.

Upon further thought... it's actually been a while since I watched this show, so maybe I shouldn't argue it too much... even so, I don't see this as an example, for the reasons Star quoted.

I haven't seen the show in question but let me add my opinion to this discussion.

If i got the facts right Lexi accidentally attacked someone, namely Melvin, and guy was pissed off, and demanded Lexi as a repayment for what she did. Ace didn't want, Danger said they should agree, Ultimately the Loonatics just kicked Melvin's rear end, Danger was presented as wrong.

The way i see it from Lexi was clearly at fault, so handing her to clear mess she started isn't really THAT unreasonable. Either way the way i see it the example shouldn't be deleted on basis that wrm5 disagrees with it, because the trope is YMMV. You don't have to agree to make it valid example(as i was told several times despite never deleting any example on basis of disagreement), is people see Danger as being more reasonable that Ace then it's valid unless it's wrong for some other reasons.

This trope is YMMV so obviously no one has to agree. For one I do think what Marietta did was wrong but having her face permantly disfigured is indeed an overly harsh punishment. Cho says that it's a "mean trick", and that's the point that lot of people agree with. Yes Umbridge inflicts similar torture to Harry but it's likely that Marietta didn't know since Harry was to proud (or stupid?) to report the incident to anyone. I don't remember (it has been years since i last read HP) wen it's stated that the members of Dumbledore's army would have their wands broken.

The broken wands weren't mentioned in context of DA, but everywhen else when being thrown out was discussed. Ollivander immedaitely knew Hagrid's wand was broken when he was thrown out, and when Ministry wanted to throw out Harry for outside-school magic at the begginning of the Oot P the letter mentioned breaking his wand suggesting it's standard procedure. I know Entry is YMMV that's why i'm not saying i disagree (nor do i say that i agree) but that entry simply got the facts wrong. The entry said that Marrietta was "not as strong-willed" when in the book she willigly went to Umbridge to tell her about DA. If she didn't know Harry was tortured, then that makes entry is even more invalid for using it as justification for her actions. About Cho every definition of this trope i've seen is Strawman making better argument than his opponent. Like i said Cho didn't even attack enchanting the list, she attacked hiding it from DA, calling it "mean trick" hardly qualifies as argument and no other argument was used. how can there be better argument if there wasn't any argument in the first place? Hence the misuse which was my reason for deletion.

Cut since, content aside, Weblinks Are Not Examples.

Already cut. Just bringing it here since I've gotten a lot of flack for my choices lately.

Good cut. As near as I can tell the "good points" he thinks are being made by Ross boil down too...

• Slavery is okay as long as you're a government employee.
• Rage-fueled super-soldiers who live only to smash are a good thing.

While there is a depressingly high number of people who would probably agree with those two points, neither is something I would call "a good point".

Sorry. I just noticed this. As the person who wrote this entry originally, I think you're both missing the point.

The issue isn't that Banner should be a "slave". The problem is that Banner made himself the government's responsibility. What Banner did was the equivalent of helping the government make a new form of drug, then permanently and willfully testing it on himself, and finding out that it turned him into a biological weapon.

Although Banner should NOT be forced into government "slavery", the problem is that he shouldn't be on the loose either. General Ross makes a strawman villain because all he and his superiors care about is harnessing the Hulk's power for themselves and mass-producing it. The issue is that Banner's entire body is now a military-grade weapon.

Ross may have phrased his point wrong (Banner isn't "property", per se) but he's right that the government has a say in what Banner is allowed to do.

Would Triton be a Justified Trope or a subversion? It's not that he's naturally rascist or is spiteful no reason; he's grieving. That's why he has an unbearable hatred of music and humans now, when he was fine with them before his wife's death. It's why he hates things for unjustified reasons. That's the point of his character development. In the prequel movie, he learns that music and dancing is a good thing after all. In the original, he learns that there are good humans in the world.

Not to mention Dorothy did not organize a gang; the others were just random friends she made who joined together to see the Wizard. Their goal was never to kill the Wicked Witch, but to get her broom in hopes that Oz would give them what they needed most.

That's Space Whale Aesop.

Can you please take a less confrontational tone and not personalize the wiki? Saying things like "your example" is more likely to lead to unnecessary conflict.

Can you please take a less confrontational tone and not personalize the wiki? Saying things like "your example" is more likely to lead to unnecessary conflict.

I have to strongly disagree. In the first and second games Shepard can't prove any of his claims (his visit was simply to follow Saren, he never was able to prove that Saren was under the control of any Reapers), and the people who are supposed to be so trustworthy are:

A krogan mercenary and criminal.

The daughter of a traitor and who is in her species' terms barely out of her teens and infatuated with Shepard (and who becomes a shady semi-criminal 'information broker').

A random quarian who came out of nowhere and then went back to her fleet.

A cop who abandoned his job and then went off the grid.

One of Shepard's subordinates.

There was no independent evidence provided by anyone else, nor did anyone more reliable witness it.

This just seems to me to be disliking characters from their attitudes rather than their arguments.

In case you don't notice this at the moment since the discussion was made a while back, I will send a PM to alert you to give you a chance to argue your view.

Edited since one of the lines could be too harsh.

"I have to strongly disagree. In the first and second games Shepard can't prove any of his claims (his visit was simply to follow Saren, he never was able to prove that Saren was under the control of any Reapers)"

Factually incorrect. His mission was to deal with Saren. Plus all of this? He had other reliable witnesses who could vouch for seeing the Reapers, seeing the Protheans, seeing the beacons, etc. At this point, trying to say "Well that's not RELIAAAAABLE" is going out of your way to dispute his evidence. Also, they are incapable of explaining....oh...how the hell Shephard teleported all the way across the galaxy and landed on the Citadel, which was now on fire and being attacked by the very thing he kept telling you was going to attack you. Thus proving that, oh, hey, maybe the guy that did all that can in fact be taken at his word given that he's clearly done more to keep the very people disbelieving him alive than they ever will. Oh, and he was explicitly hired as a Spectre based on their trust in him to do the job he's supposed to be doing for them, so dismissing him because what he says is politically inconvenient (and yea, the game isn't subtle that this is exactly what is going on) does not make them have anything approaching a valid point.

You give no reason why any of his teammates should be dismissed out of hand. Just that they work with Shephard, therefore, they should automatically be dismissed because "reasons."

Neither character has any point, and you've kind of proven that.

In retrospect, this might honestly prove that these characters are juggling Idiot Balls since otherwise Bio Ware had written themselves into a corner.

No, it is not. My point was about Shepard going to Ilos, the prothean homeworld (and as a bit in game canon, Ilos wasn't the prothean home world). Shepard never went there as any effort to provide evidence for the existence of Reapers, and Ilos was already known the galaxy in general. Nothing about Ilos proves that Reapers exist.

None of the characters who would ever have an opportunity to be present for the conversation with Sovereign would be at all reliable. I even gave you the details of why they would not be reliable. Please don't claim that I didn't give details when I explicitly did. Anyone can look at my comment and see those details. It seems downright dishonest to pretend otherwise. I even have a screen shot of my comment proving that I did not go back and edit in those details after you commented, they were there beforehand.

And nothing about the attack proves that Reapers exist. If you were not there to actually witness the conversations there really isn't anything to prove that it wasn't just the Geth and Saren. The Beacon is destroyed. Vigil is gone. Getting there from Ilos does nothing to prove that Reapers exist, all that shows is that Saren and then Shepard used an experimental mass relay.

And I don't believe that I've have in any way proven that the turian councillor or Udina have no point, and I feel that you haven't actually read my arguments (shown most by your claim that I gave no reason for why Shepard's teammates aren't considered reliable) but rather chose to dismiss them out of hand. Please provide stronger reasons for why anyone not on Shepard's team should believe that Reapers do exist and reasons for why people should consider Shepard's team reliable (beyond incorrectly claiming that I do not give any reason) or I will decide to restore the entries you removed in the next two days.

The problem is, the only reason any of those witnesses are "unreliable" is if the person listening to them is determined to find something wrong with them so they can handwave anything they say.

"Oh, we can't believe this guy, he's a KROGAN!" "I don't care how respected a scientist she is in her field, her mother was a bad guy therefore anything she says is obviously a lie!" "Oh, sure, s/he's a decorated war hero, but take anything they say seriously? Pfffft, of course the most logical answer is no, they were a subordinate of him at one point and of course all military soldiers will lie under oath because it's not like there's any kinds of repercussions for that!" "A Quarian? Oh, suuuure, she's literally the reason we had hard evidence of the conspiracy in the first place and trusted so much on her word that we even fired Saren, hired Shepherd, and sent him to go KILL Saren....but it's not like THAT'S a reason to trust her on anything else! She went home, that makes her untrustworthy because she...went home!"

Just like they're willing to disregard what Shephard has to say about the Reapers when he's...oh...the guy they hired to look into it. If they're not willing to trust him when they themselves hired him because they trusted him to look into this, then how do they have anything close to a point in not trusting him?

Yea, great details there. Real convincing argument in the favor of the Council - "Well of course they have a valid point, they're apparently racist and willing to completely disregard the work of the guy they hired because they think what he says sounds stupid even though everything he's said up until now checks out given that our entire base is now on fire and thousands are dead because we ignored him the last time he pointed this out! What poor misunderstood strawmen are we!"

By the way, you don't get to set a time limit on when entries are "okay". That's just a straight up edit war.

I think you are deliberately ignoring the points I outright laid out. Let me lay them out again, just as a reminder.

Wrex. Besides being a krogan, which means that most of the galaxy considers him unreliable at best, he is a known mercenary and criminal who has outright committed murder on the Citadel. Besides that, he has absolutely no connection to Citadel politics and after Shepard's death went back to Tuchanka. So we have three separate reasons, any one of which would be more than enough for why the Council wouldn't believe him even if he did try to tell them.

Tali. A quarian which, like the krogan means that she is automatically considered a bit suspect and being an admiral's daughter never helped her before, why should it now? Besides that, she has no credibility. She's an almost complete unknown to the Council. And Shepard's the one that provided the information to them, I don't think the Council ever actually acknowledged her.

Garrus. A turian C-Sec officer, which might help his case, but for two problems. The first is that he just went and left his job to go with Shepard. The second is that even before then he was known for butting heads with superiors and taking reckless risks, which is a serious problem for both turians and officers.

Kaidan/Ashley. A human soldier who is subordinate to Shepard and neither of which has any special status of their own or contacts. If their superior is saying something, it is not that surprising that their subordinate might decide to back them up.

Liara. She is, as I've pointed out before, barely out of her childhood/teenage years, not an established scholar (she actually notes that she doesn't have much respect yet so there goes that part of the argument) and set herself up on Ilium in a dubious line of work where she made death threats to debtors and made the ruling asari so nervous they sent Aethyta to spy on her. So yeah actually, it's made pretty obvious right from the start that Liara was never considered credible.

And those are the only characters who would have ever had a chance to see Sovereign speak or hear Vigil. No one else. And yes, the species does matter. Because, if you played Mass Effect, you might notice that the Council has problems with the Migrant Fleet and krogans in general. It might have something to do with the fact that the krogans tried to enslave the galaxy and when that failed they settled into self-destructive wars with themselves while the quarians first managed to cause an AI uprising that destroyed their power and after that wandered the galaxy strip mining and, in the words of Hackett in ME 3, at least in the past few decades caused many naval incidents. So obviously if a random quarian or krogan shows up and claims they know that something absolutely insane is actually true, the Council will drop everything and listen.

And on trustworthiness, let's examine exactly what Shepard is saying. If Shepard said "Saren discovered ancient prothean technology that gives revolutionary ship building techniques and was swayed by his anti-human prejudice to ally with the Geth and take over the Citadel so he could destroy humanity" the Council might plausibly listen. But Shepard is saying "there is a species of ancient ship monsters that appear once every 50,000 years to exterminate all life in the galaxy and the only evidence I can present to you is a single person mentioning them once vaguely with no context". For context on how ridiculous that is, change it to "American marine tells UN Security Council that a Chinese soldier and his submarine crew haven't gone crazy and decided to preemptively launch nukes on America in a joint strike with North Korea, they've actually been taking over by a species of cyborg squids that live deep in the ocean who appear once every three thousand years to destroy human civilization and that's what actually destroyed the ancient Mittani empire". And your evidence of this is the word of a man who shot himself, one of his computers which got blown up, and an odd ship that was part of an attack on Hawaii that was so destroyed that salvage and investigation is physically impossible. Yeah, I'm sure that the P5 would take you seriously.

And what does Shepard do in ME 2 when s/he meets the Council? Why, Shepard shows up on a ship carrying the markings of paramilitary xenophobic human organization that has been responsible for multiple murders and bombings, including the assassination of an Alliance admiral just for investigating them and Shepard provides no new evidence. Shepard should be grateful that the Council doesn't just order the Spectres and C-Sec to arrest Shepard as an obvious traitor.

And I set that limit because I don't intend to just get into an ad nauseam argument or indefinite wait. It seemed to me that if you couldn't check at least once every few days and give at least some argument, it would be ridiculous to constantly wait in the vain hope that you might respond. That was just a friendly notice.

Been having log in issues at home. Still am, actually, so my access to the site right now is going to be limited. Anyway.

So, for Wrex and Tali, you still opened up with "Well, they're a krogan and a quarian, which automatically makes them unreliable." Again, you're claiming the poor maligned strawman with a valid point is a guy that is literally willing to disabuse the testimony of other people on the basis of straight up racism. I really shouldn't have to explain to you why that's not helping your argument. Furthermore, Wrex may be a lot of things, but if he's literally saying the same thing everyone else who is considered more trustworthy is saying, you would be a complete idiot to go "But he's a krooooooogaaan!"

You also again are undermining the Council and Udina when you claim that Tali being an admiral's daughter wouldn't make a difference because they hate her for her race anyway. That's not a valid point. That's being a dick who is deliberately endangering lives and scraping the bottom of the barrel for excuses why it's okay.

Garrus only went "rogue" because nobody would listen to him regardless of how much evidence he put together even when following the law to the letter, including the Council. And why didn't they listen to him? Because they just didn't want to listen to anything inconvenient to their narrative. In otherwords, they already drove him off in the first place for stupid reasons, so their stupid reasons don't suddenly become valid two years later.

Kaiden/Ashley do not only report to Shephard - they're representatives of the Alliance military and are required to report to people above him. By the time 2 opened up, they don't even work for him anymore and it would actually look better for them to throw the guy under a bus the second they detected conflict for it, which actually makes their word *more* valuable, not less. There's legitimate repurcussions for them if they fabricate reports to make their boss look good. And seriously, if you're going to disregard the word of people simply because they work for a guy saying something you don't want to hear, you're not the poor maligned victim in the scenario.

Liara is explicitly recommended by the Council to Shepherd for her expertise. In other words, they literally trust her with one of the most sensitive and dangerous operations they've had to send a Spectre out to handle. So isn't just a wee bit hypocritical for them to recommend her as this brilliant expert on the very subject that you're claiming they have every right to disregard her on? And for that matter, they have no reason to think she wants to jump Shepherd's bones unless she's actually dumb enough to tell them...and again, she'd only be saying the same thing *everyone else on the crew would say*, which makes it less likely she just made it up to protect her dreamboat.

And that's not even getting into the fact that Sovereign stormed the damn Citadel himself, which is pretty damning evidence that even Shepherd points out would be stupid to ignore. They promptly ignore it and declare it a Geth vessel...based on zero evidence. They literally hited Shepherd because they have no idea who the Geth are, how they operate, or even what the hell their chain of command is. But after Shepherd does exactly what they hired him to do AND after their catastrophic fuckery has killed a few hundred thousand people and cost unestimable economic damage...wait, why is the Council or Udina even remotely trustworthy on anything at this point? They let the damn Citadel burn. No, they didn't just LET IT burn. They were told the Citadel would burn, refused to listen, and actively tried to prevent the guy they hired to stop things like letting the Citadel burn from doing anything about it. Frankly, the fact that anyone in the chain of leadership in that game has a goddamned job is kind of an amazing plot contrivance really. Oh, and that's even assuming that Shepherd also saved the Council's lives when he had no motivation to do so and they still consider him untrustworthy and are still scraping for reason why some two years after they've pretty much secured political power in spite of massive failures to actually do their damn jobs. Arrest Shepherd as a traitor just because his ship has markings of an enemy ship? Uh, he's a Spectre. He's explicitly authorized to do whatever he needs to do to get his job done. THEIR authorization. For all they know, he's deep under cover or running a false flag operation. If anyone should be grateful, both the Council AND Udina should be grateful Shepherd the great hero hasn't gotten them all fired, imprisoned, or worse for all the people they actively got killed because it was seen as politically feasible to do so.

What I'm trying to get at in all of this is, this trope covers people who are portrayed as having a wrong position simply to make the good guys look better...except the "wrong" position is something the reader would actually find more compelling. These guys aren't going to make that cut because they've been such colossal morons from the start that their behavior continuing to the point it does through the series snaps suspension of disbelief in two because it's so catastrophically wrong. Seriously, why would any sane viewer go "Yep, that guy that's disregarding a threat we all know to be true is absolutely right to ignore the hero because of racism and trust issues!"

My point was (which you seem to be deliberately ignoring) that they've had serious problems with both species in the recent past. There's a massive difference between "they hate all of them" and "in mundane politics this is the sort of thing we're used to seeing and now you want us to believe that the cyborg ship apocalypse is at hand?" And you've completely ignored me repeatedly pointing out that Wrex is probably the single weakest member of the team to say that people should listen to. Besides being from a species that is literally genetically inclined towards violence, is there something not clear enough about the word "murderer"? Because that's what he's openly on the Citadel to do, and what he does if Shepard brings him to the club. He murders the owner. Can't make any claims about necessary for galactic peace or anything, it's just cold blooded murder. The fact that the guy tried to set Tali up doesn't change what happened to him.

On Garrus, not really changing at all the point that he just went rogue because of C-Sec's red tape, even when that red tape means things like "don't shoot at ships that are actually on the Citadel" and Garrus is taking shots that a Paragon Shepard will point out seriously endangered the hostage. Notable that the writers don't actually tell us what he laid out to his father between ME 2 and ME 3, probably because they couldn't think of anything that could be laid out.

On the Virmire Survivor, when the subordinate is making the same exotic claims as Shepard, it tends to hurt their credibility, especially since they weren't promoted or sent anywhere in ME 2 based on their knowledge of Reapers but to investigate Shepard.

And no, Liara was mentioned because she was Benezia's daughter. Seriously, that is the reason Udina gives you for why you might want to look into her. And when it next comes up, the Council openly wonders about her reliability. And Liara outright says that because of her very young age she's still not considered a major figure on the protheans despite her knowledge on the subject. Between that, what we see of Liara in ME 2 and the revelation from ME 3 that the matriarchs had her under observation with the real threat of assassination, and it's incredibly clear that they never once considered her someone to trust. See this video starting at roughly 8:50: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9ArPfuVfrc

And the next point makes no sense. It was flying along with a Geth fleet. No one alive and out of stasis in Mass Effect has seen the Reaper fleet. Between assuming that it was an advanced Geth warship or assuming that it was an omnicidal cyborg ship at least 50,000 years old that had just decided to go into hiding between the disappearance of the protheans and now, which would anyone on Earth ever consider more likely? Again, using my previous example this is like saying that because the North Koreans had a single powerful warship during an attack, it must mean that there is a race of cyborg squid that destroyed the Mittani, instead of the possibility that the North Koreans themselves somehow built it. And it is made very clear by Anderson in ME 2 that Sovereign was too badly damaged to investigate.

And no, Shepard does nothing, absolutely nothing, to ever make the Council think that the apparent reason for showing up on a Cerberus ship isn't the actual reason. Shepard never communicates to them any secret plan or anything. From the Council's perspective, Shepard abruptly disappeared two years ago, then showed up in a terrorist vessel making the exact same claims as before, with the same total lack of evidence as before. This is really no different from saying that a SEAL makes those claims about cyborg squids allying with the North Koreans, then the SEAL disappears for two years and when they reappear it's with a company from FARC. Somehow I don't think anyone in reality would think they were anything other than a traitor. Note that when Virmire Survivor is given the chance (the same one you think should be given excessive trust by the Council) they outright cite Shepard's company as the reason they're refusing.

Here is all the evidence that Shepard has before ME 3 that Shepard is ever permitted to mention to the Council (so I'm not counting the Collector Base because the writers wouldn't). In ME 1 a single mention of "Reapers" with no clearer context, a broken Virtual Intelligence that isn't functioning by the time the Council can check it, a broken Beacon and an advanced ship that was too badly damaged to actually inspect. In ME 2 I think the only extra thing you can mention is that colonies are disappearing. Colonies that happen to be in the most dangerous part of known space, and when in the prologue Joker points out that something destroyed multiple ships, your own XO points out that it was probably slavers. That's the evidence. Machines that have a tendency to be too broken for anyone to check Shepard's story and people missing in a part of space where people have a tendency to go missing. With that information provided, the sensible thing is not to assume that there is an ancient species of monsters that kill other species and then go off somewhere leaving no traces. The sensible thing is to assume that the apparent answer, that Saren really was just working with the Geth, is the correct answer.

May I recommend to make shorter arguments? No debate here needs this kind of Wall of Text posting.

I'd like to, but that's really not easy considering how much there is.

No, there really isn't that much there. You just keep repeating yourself over and over again while ignoring my key argument - the only reason to be racist or scream about Shepherd suddenly piloting a terrorist vessel or declare a ship that Shepherd has just told you is not a Geth vessel on zero evidence is because you are deliberately looking for reasons to dismiss anything he says that you don't like. Let's not forget that the Council also blatantly ignored the massacre on Eden Prime in spite of dozens of witnesses and officials witnessing it simply because Saren was a turian and the Council is so racist they dismissed all witnesses to the massacre as being hysterical or liars. Even assigning Shepherd Spectre status wasn't so much a way of admitting wrong doing as it was a way to make their problem become someone else's problem (and thus absolve themselves of all consequences.)

Seriously, you actually suggested that had Shepherd lied to them about what Sovereign was, the Council still only might have believed him. This is not an issue of a strawman with a flimsy argument being used to bolster the main character's obvious point. Why would the reader ever sympathize with the racists who actively got hundreds of thousands of people killed purely to because they thought it looked better politically?

Now stop wall of texting and trying to start an edit war and address that point about why these guys are strawmen and what they are being used as a foil for and why the reader should be sympathizing with them instead of Shepherd. Because I'd out that until the third game when Shepherd commits an act of genocide, there is absolutely no reason to distrust him no matter what flag he's flying given everything he's done for the Council and the Alliance.

And since your example only goes up to the second game (where you again ignored my point that the Council not only dismissed his evidence, but openly mocked him with rude gestures), well, Batarian genocide isn't really relevant.

This is ridiculous.

You've accused me of Wall of Texting while nicely ignoring the your own posts. And trying to start an edit war? I was kind enough to actually send you a PM to let you know that I was disagreeing with your points and then I went to the length of actually giving you over a week to respond to a post. I could have simply put the entry back in. I deliberately didn't because I was hoping for something a bit more than what I've seen. So far my hopes have been dashed.

I note that you haven't really responded to my point that the hard evidence tends to get destroyed before it can be shown. You just simply set that aside, as if you're hoping the problem of ruined computers and fragmented ships will disappear if no one mentions them. Much like refusing to acknowledge just how insane a species of omnicidal cyborg ships that appear and disappear once every 50,000 years is if you don't actually see it. And there was a reason why my evidence only went to the second game. That's the last time Shepard tries to tell the Council about the Reapers. I don't think Shepard ever tried to contact the Council during Arrival and it's a moot point in Mass Effect 3 because there's hard evidence of the Reapers everywhere.

And lastly, no, you have a grand total of a single person, a self-confessed smuggler at that, to tell you Saren was ever on the planet. There were no dozens of witnesses or officials. One smuggler. Shepard never even saw Saren before going to the Citadel the first time. The Council never suggested the Geth weren't responsible. The Council just pointed out that Shepard doesn't have any proof Saren was ever there. By this point I have to seriously question whether you have ever actually played Mass Effect 1.

Regardless, I'm just giving up in disgust. You've claimed things about characters that directly contradict major parts of their backstory and character development, decided that 'rude gestures' is incontrovertible evidence of no attempt to consider the situation, refused to consider why anyone would have reason to believe what the main character is saying, suddenly criticized me for things you've done yourself with no hint of self-awareness and now are just claiming that characters saw things when the fact that they didn't is brought up in the game itself. There is no chance of any rational discussion of this, and it's a pity.

So you gave up in disgust without ever answering the only question that actually matters - why are these people strawmen? Why is anything they say a deliberately weak argument to make Shepherd look better that backfires because the reader finds the straw argument more reasonable?

Because that's really all that matters in this trope.

I have responded. I've gave up because of the apparent response. If you're really willing to look at this, then one more go (and these were in the original entries that were removed as well):

The first, on the turian Council member (and really the Council in general). He and the other Council members are right in ME 1 and 2 that it makes more sense to assume that Sovereign was a Geth ship than an agent for a species of cyborg ships that simply appear once every 50,000 years and wipe out all advanced life. We're meant to think that they're just being obtuse and obstructive, but in reality they were never with Shepard and no other individual working for the Council like another Spectre saw any of the things Shepard saw. The Beacon that gave Shepard the images of Reapers is broken and can't be inspected for anyone to figure out what it really was for (in ME 3 Shepard outright says to Javik that no one could understand it in time), the VI Vigil lost power some time between ME 1 and 2 so they couldn't go to it for information and even Anderson will tell Shepard in ME 2 that Sovereign, the best evidence, was too damaged to confirm everything.

Now, there were things Shepard could have done to try to convince them that the Reapers were real, like asking Liara to use her Shadow Broker persona to tell them, or to provide them with evidence of the Collector Base. But the story deliberately ignores things like that. So, working purely with what the story allows Shepard to say, the turian Council and the Council in general actually have a point when they tell Shepard that it sounds ridiculous and that they believe Sovereign was a Geth ship.

Udina (from my own entry): Udina is clearly meant to be taken as a bumbling bureaucrat who ungratefully takes advantage of Shepard and ignores or yells at Shepard whenever convenient and his statements are supposed to be those of a willfully blind person. The problem is that Udina is pointing out that Shepard's actions in the first act of ME 1 are causing a serious amount of political damage. Shepard had just made accusations towards the Council's most trusted agent without any proof beyond a smuggler's word, and Shepard then shot up a bar and was possibly an accessory to the murder of its owner. Shepard doesn't have much authority at this point, and if Shepard wasn't lucky enough for Tali to happen to have that information, Shepard probably would have just set back the Alliance's efforts by years if not decades.

Incidentally, sorry for the previous comments. They were really uncalled for from me.

And you're still ignoring me - the only reason Shepherd's credibility is called into question is because the people in question are looking for reasons to doubt him.

What evidence do they have that Sovereign was a Geth vessel? None of them have ever seen a Geth nor know what their vessels look like. If Shepherd tells them it isn't, the only reason they have to doubt him is that they inherently don't want to listen to him.

And yea, I brought up the rude gesture because that makes the Turian councillor's motivation quite clear (and the fact that he isn't censured for gross unprofessionalism should tell you what the other two Councillors think). The fact that even into Mass Effect 3, they're still stonewalling even as the galaxy is going dark just because they don't give a crap about humans shows that yea, they really are obstructive bureaucrats, the interpretation of them is reasonable, and why should the audience side with them when they never give a reason beyond "Screw you, we don't like you and you're annoying?"

I mean, seriously, this is a reasonable position:

"Hey, we want to work with you on this Reaper thing, and you've already prevented or solved a lot of crises related to to the Geth and the last time we doubted your word, our station got infested with Geth. Still, we can't deploy every military in the galaxy on your word alone. Since we explicitly hired you to handle this kind of crap, we'll give you the resources to do your job and you'll bring us the hard proof we need to take action."

This is not:

"Oh, yes, those *air quote* "Reapers" you keep blathering about. Oh, how droll. Why would we ever listen to a silly human anyway? Our opinions are infallible, as you can see from the giant smoldering whole in the Citadel, the mass grave left behind from the last time we blew you off, and the hundreds of thousands of human lives lost to save that we're disregarding because we can."

The latter is the argument that was made. Now, you could well have a case if this is the alternate Council that got put in power because Shepherd murdered the previous one, since they have a real good reason to see him as an opportunistic guy not above manipulating circumstances to his or his species favor. But we're not.

You also still keep ignoring that the Council and Udina both look really bad going into ME 2 given that they actively worked to stop Shepherd from doing his job explicitly because of political implications. And for that matter, it was heavily implied that even the hard evidence of Saren and the Geth on Eden Prime was only barely enough to overcome the outright racism they had towards humans (not to mention their utter unwillingness to help those murdered on the planet because they hated humans.)

Really, the failure in the storyline isn't that these guys are anywhere close to in the right, but that's out of the scope of this trope.

No, they are saying it because saying that there is a species of cyborg ships that kill every interstellar species once every 50,000 years is a very improbable thing. I have pointed out more than once that if some soldier came forward and made the same allegations today, no one on Earth would take them seriously. There are people who claim the pyramids were made by aliens, or that Jews and Freemasons control the world economy or that Atlantis actually existed. The vast majority of people ignore those kinds of claims.

The Council has never seen a Geth ship? That is demonstrably completely incorrect. Not only does the entire galaxy have records of what Geth and Geth ships look like, you repeatedly fight them on planets and see their ships in the first game and Sovereign was leading a fleet of Geth ships and the Geth made up the majority of the attack forces.

And in Mass Effect 3, no they aren't. Heck, the turian Councillor you say is so bad is the first of the Council to offer any kind of support if Shepard can get his leader to a safe place to negotiate.

And 'hated humans'? The only one to ever suggest any actual anti-human opinions is the turian Council member. The asari and salarians? They never do.

And for the last time, no there was never any hard evidence of Saren's presence on Eden Prime until you provide the audio recording, at which point the entire Council believed Shepard about Saren.

Again, this is why I am saying that this seems more like the defense of them not being strawmen is based more on hearsay about the game than actual gameplay. Bits of the story such as Liara's backstory and relationship with the asari government, Wrex's legal status, whether anyone has seen a Geth ship, when you get evidence about Saren and what the Council does, what the turian Councillor is like in ME 3 and all are not things that are easy to miss in the game. So if you honestly don't remember or know these things, I'm just walking away.

First, Sheperd isn't some random soldier. He's a Spectre. It's his job to look into crazy shit like this and tell the Council what he saw. As it is, he's done a crapton of work for them that prove his reliability and lack of need to lie. And by ME 2, he's also saved their butts from an untimely death that is technically their own fault. Bit of a difference between a redneck in Arkansas swearing aliens built the pyramids and a guy who's been storming the last guys you refused to believe existed providing you critical intelligence. I already provided to you a contrast between how Shepherd could have been treated to make their position legitimate, and how their position in the game is actually presented.

Second, the Geth hadn't left the Perseus Veil for 300 years. Nobody outside the veil had seen one, to the point that it was already unbelievable to see them in Citadel space. So yes, it's logical that the Council already can't tell the difference between a Geth ship and a Reaper ship and in spite of a lack of any evidence proving so just call it a "Geth ship" and refuse to do anything else (like at least assign a classified team to study the wreckage of Sovereign so as to prevent a panic.)

Third, the audio recording from Saren and Benezia also included a reference to the Reapers, so there's two more people to verify at bare minimum that pursuing the lead was vital (and two people who the Council irrefutably knows were pursuing it strongly enough to rally an army against the Citadel.)

Fourth, you keep ignoring that the only reason to keep dismissing things like the smuggler's testimony and the witness accounts of the VI is because the listener is actively trying to disbelieve Shepherd.

And fifth, this is the umpteenth time you've ignored both that the Council and Udina actively stopped Shepherd from doing his job in the climax of Mass Effect by containing him on the Citadel and relieving him of his ship entirely because they don't want to believe him. And that the result of this action was Shepherd was incapable of reaching Ilos in time to stop an invasion of the Citadel that left hundreds of thousands dead.

And seriously, stop with the insults and stop with the threats to take your ball and go home.

No, I don't think you get it. I really am done with this. I even gave it one last chance, on top of multiple efforts spent giving you all the time you needed to respond that I didn't even really need to do.

I've seen you criticize me for doing the exact same thing you did without even a hint of reflection on your part, I've seen you state things that directly contradict well known canon facts that are very hard to be ignorant of (we aren't talking about things only present in the books, we're talking about what major characters say and do in the actual games), and I've seen you repeatedly bring up points that I've already pointed out are weak.

There is no chance of resolution of this because you either need to stop and go replay the games, or you aren't actually arguing seriously but to be contentious. I'm not sure why you even put this in discussion if this is how it's going to be treated.

Either way, there's no way to resolve this and this is the sort of thing that I'm worried is going to ruin the entire system if people have to refrain from correcting incorrect edits for fear of edit wars with people who apparently aren't even checking to see what canon material says.

Sometimes I hate feeling prescient.

Sometimes I hate feeling prescient.

The real irony is that the most direct example you quoted wasn't even what sparked the argument...the Dragon Age editor never came by O_O

Oh no, the Dragon Age editor did come by. It's just that I had already been told that I made a mistake in my posting, and that it was more a Grey-and-Grey Morality or Evil Versus Evil situation as opposed to Strawman Has a Point. I didn't really get the spirit of the trope, so I was told I made a mistake, and I understand it better now. That said? Being an asshole about it was uncalled for. "you know you failed in your example." That confrontational tone is deliberately insulting. I did not, in fact, know. And it's one thing for someone to make a mistake. It's quite another to imply they were stupid for doing so as opposed to not understanding it. If you want to correct a mistake, correct it. Insulting someone in the process only makes you a jerkass.

Disregard. Misread.

I took off all of the Harry Potter examples because none of the examples are Strawmen. Umbridge might have had a point if her goal was to remove incompetent staff, but the story never makes the argument that she is doing so. She is a racist purging people she finds unclean. Furthermore, the entry actually made the book's case by accident because firing Trelawny actually put her life in danger. In other words...no. She does not have a point. She is a terrible person.

As for the Cho Chang double bitch off, Harry isn't supposed to be justified. He's being incredibly cruel to Cho in this scene because he believes he's right and he does that to a lot of people in that story before eating a pile of humble pie when his antics cost him a loved one's life. Cho isn't a strawman, she's arguing a valid point and Harry isn't being put on a pedestal of righteousness, thus, no straw argument.

Finally...Filch complaining about mud? Really? There's not even an argument in the scene.

Actually Filch's complaint is valid, because as he says, "It might be a little mud to you, but to me it's an extra hour scrubbing." You have to remember he's a squib and has to clean up after hundreds of magical students by himself with nothing but elbow grease. His views on punishing the students on the other hand...

I may be stirring up a hornet's nest here, but I'm bringing back 2 of the 3 Harry Potter examples because I believe they are legitimate examples of Strawman Has a Point. I believe it just as strongly as Rebochan believes they're not.

Where is the evidence that Harry isn't supposed to be justified here? We see noboby in-story agreeing with Cho or being swayed by her arguments. While at the end of the book, we see Harry eating humble pie about several things, "being incredibly cruel to Cho" isn't one of them. He never once pauses to reflect that he may have been a bit too hard on Cho or concede that she had any kind of point here. Another way to look at Harry in this book is that while his temper may make him unpleasant to be around, most of the things he's angry about (being kept out of the loop, the Ministry's smear campaign, Umbridge's tactics, etc.) are things he's justified to be angry about. His anger at Marietta and Cho could be seen as one of the things Rowling meant Harry to be justified in.

There are 3 occasions after this argument where an opinion, or something like an opinion, is expressed about Marietta, the subject of the Harry/Cho argument. One each from the Power Trio:

• In the chapter after the argument, Harry mentions it to Ron and Hermione. This prompts Ron to launch a big angry rant about Marietta (most of which we don't read because Harry's busy brooding about Snape's Worst Memory).
• In Book 6, at the start of the next school year, Harry sees that the jinx is still on Marietta's face nearly half a year later...and the sight of her continuing deformity amuses Harry enough that he smirks at it. I find this quite significant because at the start of Book 6, Harry is calmer, more reasonable, and less likely to fly off the handle than he was in Book 5. But his smirk doesn't suggest his attitude towards Marietta or Cho's defense of her has changed in the slightest.
• In Book 7, Hermione refers to her in passing as, "that stupid Marietta".

None of this suggests any softening of attitude towards Marietta, not even over the space of two years, or suggests that Cho's defense had any effect.

Finally, there's Rowling's own statment on the matter. When asked in a fans' interview about what happened to Marietta with Hermione's jinx, Rowling answered the question then added an unsolicited comment, "I do so loathe a traitor!" I find that a pretty strong clincher that Rowling loathes Marietta as much as (or maybe even more than) Harry does, that in the Harry/Cho argument, she fully sided with Harry against Cho. That she thinks permanent facial scars is a just, appropriate punishment for Marietta's "betrayal" and that Cho's defense was supposed to be a weak argument Harry easily refutes. Harry's summing up of Cho's words of Marietta as "a lovely person who made a mistake" could even be seen as a caricature of the more legitimate position, "Marietta doesn't deserve to be physicaly scarred on her face for the rest of her life over one failed attempt at snitching."

When you take the complete lack of anyone in-story agreeing with Cho, or of any softening in attitude towards Marietta, along with Rowling's statement of loathing, my conclusion- that Harry is supposed to be justified in this argument, that Cho is not supposed to have a valid point, but that Cho's valid points come through in spite of not because of Rowling's intentions- is a valid, reasonable conclusion to come to.

And while I feel less strongly about the Filch example, yeah, what ztyran said. And of course it's an argument. Harry argues that it's just a little bit of mud, Filch argues back that it's an hour's clean up for him, hence, an argument. And Filch, unlike Cho, is usually meant to be nothing more than a Flat Character Jerkass whom nobody has a good word for. We're not supposed to take his complaints seriously, yet this one has weight once we learn he's a squib.

These aren't real examples, just things that pissed you off. Removing. Please don't put them back up.

"I believe it just as strongly as Rebochan believes they're not."

You were told to stop putting them in the repair shop thread, after you derailed the crap out of it. Please stop dragging up this edit war.

Filch doesn't have to clean a damn thing, that's the house elves job.

Then why is he there? I think the House Elves job is to attend to the fires, cook the food and other things like that. The janitorial work is his which is why we see him constantly cleaning.

Because characters having different opinions is not this trope?

For that matter, there's no strawman being set up here - Joanna made a choice in a board game and her ex-boyfriend inexplicably threw an over the top temper tantrum, humiliated her, then quit the game in a huff. When even the example has to note that his behavior is the problem and not his perspective, it's a bad example.

Okay, where's the Strawman argument that is being debunked by the morally superior heroes then? This isn't a page where you sit here and argue over storylines. If the show is technically agreeing with them or presenting them as even partially right (as you note, they were invited entirely because they were outsiders who would liven up a boring party), they're not Strawmen.

And seriously....calm down. Your defense of the trope doesn't sound like a defense so much as your personal ranting.

Villain Has A Point just sounds like Designated Villain.

Also, the point of the trope is that the author tries to set up a strawman, but either it's not weak enough or he's not strong enough for him to tear it apart.

This trope page has devolved into nothing but tropers arguing with stories they don't like. Many entries don't even have an actual Strawman invoked - it's the troper saying "But, you know, in this circumstance, it might have been totally different!" I've been waiting for a slot on the Trope Repair Shop forum to get this one reworked.

^That's the whole point. "Straw" simply means "set up to be defeated", it doesn't mean "weak argument"

A straw man is simply a false argument constructed to be easily demolished by the "right" person. I just took out a huge stack of Harry Potter entries that didn't contain a single straw man.

I think a lot of people are simply venting disagreements with plot points and not checking to even make sure there was a Straw Man being railed against in the first place.

I think the trope name is fine.

A strawman argument means creating a weaker or more vulnerable version of the opposing point of view so that it's easier to attack. This trope happens when the author fails to make his strawman weak enough. His "easy to attack" parody of the actual opposing opinion still winds up sounding more reasonable than (or at least as reasonable as) his chosen position.

If the author presents a villain's argument and then fails to show it to be wrong, he's either failed in his attempt to create a strawman or he was doing it intentionally to create morally ambiguity. As long as the examples don't include those, it's probably fine.

If you're saying that some of the examples don't show any sign of having been weakened in the first place (that is, the opposing view is more or less what is actually believed by people he disagrees with), the trope probably still applies; the author should have created a strawman and didn't, or he tried to and failed.

She's not a prostitute, she just dresses like one. Actually I can't remember what her day job is. Waiting tables maybe?

I'm not sure I get what the "strawman's point" was here anyway. The strawman says Sheila is a disgrace to women for dressing sexy and focusing on raising her children rather than improving her social standing (or whatever). I don't see how that point is proven right by her kids having some close scrapes. Is a single mother supposed to stay home and never ever go out because the kids might get in trouble?

Even if there were some correctness behind that point of view, it still doesn't speak to the strawman attack, which was "you are a poor example of a woman because you dress like that and have no ambition".

So, yes, they are countered by those in the wrong, but those in the wrong aren't supposed to have a crappy argument to begin with.

Yes, but it probably makes her target a Strawman Has a Point.

But her target didn't say anything. He meekly stood down.

Dude, take a breath.

Really, no Real Life examples belong on this page, since a strawman is a fictional character — indeed, a caricature — by definition

I have a real life example me responding to this page; I expected the strawmen to all have compelling arguments, but in some cases it seems that the tropers just agree with the strawmen's ideologies.

Does the strawman really have a point if you just agree with his ideology? And If you agree with the strawman is he really a strawman?

I'm not sure about the removal of Real Life examples. Though I understand your point, there are plenty of Real Life examples of people using other people as strawmans. (Strawmen?) For example, Ted Kaczynski is often used as a shortcut for "crazy, dangerous loner". If you are compared to him, it is almost guaranteed not to be a compliment. Yet, if you read the Unibomber Manifesto, he actually makes quite a bit of sense in his analysis of how technology can isolate people and fracture society. There's no question that his solution was full-bore nutjob, but it is a little disconcerting to read what is supposed to be the ramblings of a lunatic and find yourself nodding in agreement.

This happens in politics, as well, especially at election times. Political attack ads can easily backfire if you aren't targeting the right demographic.

Your point about Wall Street is understandable. You're saying that Gecko may not be a straw man at all in the first place. And you're right, there are examples which really seem to be about the heroes being wrong and the villain being right. Such examples do fit this trope, in my opinion, if the text intends for the audience to see the villain as obviously wrong and the heroes as obviously right.

I actually agree with you about Wall Street. Gecko is not intended to be a straw man. He's written as someone with a legitimate point of view who goes too far. If no one wants to argue for Wall Street as an example at this time, I would suggest removing it from the main page while preserving it in a comment on this page with an explanation for its removal. (This was already done, more or less, except the comment didn't quote the text of the example.) Because even though I agree with you, it's possible that someone else might disagree, and I think unilaterally erasing someone else's example when the trope is inherently subjective is not a civil or sensible way to handle situations like this.

I'm embarrassed to admit that I don't know how to quote text. Not trying to be an Orwellian Editor. Can someone edit so that the removed text is visible?

No need to be embarrassed. I don't know how to bring text back after it's been erased, but I can tell you how to quote text. Just put these symbols: - > or these symbols - - > before the quoted text, but without the spaces. (Using two hyphens indents it further.)

Giving it a try:

Removed

—>Wall Street was intended to be the Ur-Example of an anti-market tract. Except its iconic scene is the famous "Greed Is Good" speech, which perfectly argues the benefits of a free market economy.

Maybe you do need two hyphens. If all else fails, you can always use quotation marks.

It seems to me that, much as "Uncle Tom" has acquired a cultural meaning that is separate from the actual literary character, "Gordon Gecko" has acquired a cultural meaning, and that even if the people who created the "actual" Gordon Gecko didn't intend him to be a strawman, the cultural conception of "Gordon Gecko" is a strawman. But if this is too fuzzy an idea, I'm not terribly disappointed if people delete it.

They are an example of the trope Google The Wiki for pc vs mac.

They are an example of the trope Google The Wiki for pc vs mac.

Huh. Sorry, I seemed to have been struck by a sudden burst of idiocy.

And yes, I am well aware of my own sins in this matter, but my problem is the blatant white washing people do of Repliforce in the Megaman X games. There's refusing orders when you're a second class citizen unfairly forced to by the government to obey at gun point, and there's refusing legal and reasonable orders when you joined of your own will an organization that requires you to obey legal and reasonable orders.

I don't think there would be as many Justifying Edits if people realized that this trope wasn't "The Strawman is 100% correct and the "Good Guys" are morons." I was involved with the Star Wars Natter, and that was my problem, that someone was implying that things would have been better if the heroes hadn't fucked with Palpatine's ineffable plan to save the GFFA (c). If this article was just about strawmen with better arguments than the author intended, (as opposed to all the people trying to invert the canon of whatever they're putting here), this page would be pretty orderly and not at all full of justifications.

I think we need to distinguish when a character is a blatant bad guy who uses a good point as a means of manipulating people, and when they are actually strawmen. I think Palpatine is a good example of the former. I haven't really read most Star Wars Expanded Universe material, but I never really got the idea that Palpatine believed for a second that he was going to be invaded by an extra-galactic force. It was just a means of instilling paranoia in the people he needed to approve the funding. Tom Zarek also came across like that to me. He wasn't a villain who sold his point poorly, he was a Manipulative Bastard who knew how to inflame public opinion, and deliberately invoked his points to make himself sound reasonable, all the while using it as a smokescreen to up his position, even and especially if that meant killing anyone in his way. The fact that he was so viciously self-serving at a time when humanity was nearing extinction was what made him repugnant.

When I first wrote the entry, I focused entirely on the library point. Someone else added in the stuff about decent teachers and lesson plans, which I deliberately avoided for the reasons you mentioned. If you want to delete everything between "library" and "has serious problems," go wild.

I'm wanting to remove the Megaman X example that got put back in, because it creates a Strawman Has a Point for the Maverick Hunters. Repliforce did not do nothing. They were implicated in an atrocity, and rather than help diffuse the situation, they acted in a manner that would exacerbate it. Complaining about Reploids being unfairly judged Mavericks because they won't obey orders is one thing, but when you're an army you lose a certain amount of your freedom to choose what orders you obey. And "disarm and come in for questioning" is not "open fire on those protesters". And somehow, I don't see the Repliforce stopping the war either once it became apparent they were indeed framed, especially since an army that disobedient would probably be disbanded anyway, and the Repliforce had proven they would fight to the death to maintain their pride.

But it's neither mysterious nor sudden. That form of transmutation is done in a controlled environment developed through years of scientific research. I know you really want this to be an example, but you're reaching...

By your standards, almost every example could be considered reaching. After all, saying that someone has a point is an inherently subjective issue. On top of which, saying that something is "mysterious" or "sudden" is also subjective. Radioactive decay is governed at least partly by the weak nuclear force. How well do you understand that force? Can you honestly say it's not at all mysterious to you? Do you think it's unreasonable for others to consider it mysterious? Also, radioactive decay is always sudden. Whatever the half-life of a given substance, the decay of any given individual nucleus happens instantaneously. I know you really want this not to be an example, but you're reaching....

OK, you win. I'm not getting into an argument about semantics or metaphors.

I'm deleting the whole shebang. The point of the shirt is that alchemy as a proto-chemistry discipline (not the adjective, which can be applied to anything including the odd formation of a sock from lint that apparently happened last Monday...) is bunk and no amount of hedging will get you a magical formula to make lead into gold. It. Will. Not. Happen. Bringing in other disciplines like nuclear and particle physics is Completely Missing The Point (that is, that alchemy(the discipline) is not a scientific discipline, no ifs, ands, or buts.).

I'm deleting the whole shebang. The point of the shirt is that alchemy as a proto-chemistry discipline (not the adjective, which can be applied to anything including the odd formation of a sock from lint that apparently happened last Monday...) is bunk and no amount of hedging will get you a magical formula to make lead into gold. It. Will. Not. Happen. Bringing in other disciplines like nuclear and particle physics is Completely Missing The Point (that is, that alchemy(the discipline) is not a scientific discipline, no ifs, ands, or buts.).

I'm not putting it back, at least not right away, because I'm not interested in an editing war on a wiki. I might put it back later. First though, let me submit that it is you who are Completely Missing The Point. The point is not that the discipline of alchemy is a completely valid scientific discipline. That would itself be a straw man for you to knock down. The point is that the Strawman Has a Point, not that the Strawman Is Completely Correct In Every Way. The issue here is that the straw man, alchemy, actually does have a point: it is possible to transmute lead into gold, even though medieval alchemists obviously had no idea how to do it. But really, do you want to go through every example listed on the trope page and remove every single one someone could argue with, or every single one where the straw man is not completely correct, or where the straw man's point is only a technical one? There may not be much of a trope left at that point.

I wanted to comment on the geocentrism t-shirt and your points on it. Given that its a pro-evolution, anti-creationism joke, I'd bet that the t-shirt has a lot to do with geocentrism being promoted for religious reasons during the middle ages/renaissance. By way of analogy, people claim we should "teach the controversy" regarding evolution, because they oppose it for religious reasons, just as people advocated geocentrism and attacked heliocentrism for religious reasons.

Similarly, it's not really a strawman, because science classes do tend to mention discredited earlier theories and what they got right/wrong. "Teaching the controversy" would be like pointing out some things Galileo got wrong and then using that to argue that geocentrism was right (substitute Darwin and creationism/intelligent design). It's not a strawman to say that would be ridiculous.

Also, I really have a loathing for this trope, because it's generally an excuse for tropers to saying that a villain was right and the heroes were wrong, because their political views better align with those of the villain.

It's like we're pitching balls at each other and missing the catch. I never said you said that alchemy was legitimate- that was said as counterpoint to the "what about other definitions?" thing that was going on.

As for gold into lead- yes, but not at all in the way in which they intended- that is, not involving extremely large, complex, and precise machines but instead chemical formulas and such. By analogy, thinking that you can reach the moon by building an extremely tall pyramid is still extremely wrong, even if you later find that rockets do the trick, or that you later find that if you applied enormous amounts of force you could change the orbit and rig up a space elevator. The process is still extremely different, and alchemy was still extremely wrong to think that it could get gold its way. Period. The strawman did not have a point. I believe your error is ignoring the journey for the destination.

@Jordan: While I don't loathe it, the deficiencies you mention are why several times in the past I have gone through this trope and cleaned out a lot of it. It used to be several pages longer. It's been a month though, so perhaps I should whip out the broom again.

It's like we're pitching balls at each other and missing the catch. I never said you said that alchemy was legitimate- that was said as counterpoint to the "what about other definitions?" thing that was going on.

As for gold into lead- yes, but not at all in the way in which they intended- that is, not involving extremely large, complex, and precise machines but instead chemical formulas and such. By analogy, thinking that you can reach the moon by building an extremely tall pyramid is still extremely wrong, even if you later find that rockets do the trick, or that you later find that if you applied enormous amounts of force you could change the orbit and rig up a space elevator. The process is still extremely different, and alchemy was still extremely wrong to think that it could get gold its way. Period. The strawman did not have a point. I believe your error is ignoring the journey for the destination.

@Jordan: While I don't loathe it, the deficiencies you mention are why several times in the past I have gone through this trope and cleaned out a lot of it. It used to be several pages longer. It's been a month though, so perhaps I should whip out the broom again.

To be honest, I'm not sure if some of the examples that really bugged me are still on the page- but thanks for deleting some of those.

Regarding alchemy and geocentrism- both do have something of a point (alchemy is proto-chemistry and geocentrism does kind of fit the frame-of-reference from Earth), but that still shouldn't be an example, because the t-shirts aren't strawmanning them.

Look, of course the context is this whole debate about evolution and creationism. And boy do I not want to step in that one. But is it possible you're overthinking this a little bit? The shirts are making a fairly straightforward joke: "Ha, ha, isn't it silly to believe that the sun orbits the earth," or "Ha, ha, isn't it silly to think it's possible to transmute lead into gold." My point is that, well, yes, Copernicus and Galileo made major contributions to astronomy, and yes, alchemy deserves to have been discredited, but there is a sense, even if only a technical one, in which the sun does orbit the earth and it is possible to transmute lead into gold. Which as I see it, fits this trope.

Now look, this is inherently a subjective trope. What one person will see as a straw man, others might see as a well reasoned position. The Wall Street example is all about this: some people see Gecko as a straw man form of capitalism, others don't. Likewise, some people will see a point in the straw man's argument where others don't.

What I don't understand, Jordan, is why you and Westrim feel you should go through the page all the time and remove examples just because you don't entirely agree with them. It would be one thing if it's an example that couldn't possibly fit the trope, and no one is prepared to argue that it does. Otherwise, I think this is just a case of your mileage varying.

see below

see below

Well, lost the first version so I'll do a second version.: It's called Strawman Has a Point because Strawman Has A Valid Point is awkward. If you read the trope description its clear that if you have to really reach (say, into entirely different disciplines and centuries), it doesn't fit the trope. Or, to reverse your apocalyptic view of a gutted page, we'd have to include every example where the strawman could, by some tortuous stretch, be right. (eg. "all humanity must die because it eats kittens!" Well, since kittens shed fur and skin and that wafts around the atmosphere that's probably technically true. Doesn't make it this trope.) We don't want the trope page bloated either.

I won't get into Wall Street since I haven't seen it.

You are welcome to look at the page history and see the edits I made. Most of it was Conversation In The Main Page, IGBM, and bitching not fit even for IJBM, several of which never actually said what the point was. I left many in that I did not agree with or changed the wording to be less confrontational.

Pages collect detritus- that's a fact of every wiki but especially this TV Tropes, and it needs periodic sorting out. It's not that Jordan and I do it to this page, its a wiki wide thing. Editors find the pages they think need work or maintenance and overhaul them periodically, since most edits are with their one bit in mind, not the flow of the page as a whole. And I think that's it.

Sorry about the double post.

Well, lost the first version so I'll do a second version.: It's called Strawman Has a Point because Strawman Has A Valid Point is awkward. If you read the trope description its clear that if you have to really reach (say, into entirely different disciplines and centuries), it doesn't fit the trope. Or, to reverse your apocalyptic view of a gutted page, we'd have to include every example where the strawman could, by some tortuous stretch, be right. (eg. "all humanity must die because it eats kittens!" Well, since kittens shed fur and skin and that wafts around the atmosphere that's probably technically true. Doesn't make it this trope.) We don't want the trope page bloated either.

I won't get into Wall Street since I haven't seen it.

You are welcome to look at the page history and see the edits I made. Most of it was Conversation In The Main Page, IGBM, and bitching not fit even for IJBM, several of which never actually said what the point was. I left many in that I did not agree with or changed the wording to be less confrontational.

Pages collect detritus- that's a fact of every wiki but especially this TV Tropes, and it needs periodic sorting out. It's not that Jordan and I do it to this page, its a wiki wide thing. Editors find the pages they think need work or maintenance and overhaul them periodically, since most edits are with their one bit in mind, not the flow of the page as a whole. And I think that's it.

Sorry about the double post.

Yes, wikis collect detritus. It's one thing to remove natter or examples that clearly could not possibly fit. It is another thing when you just have a legitimate difference of opinion over an example. Also, you do understand that whether or not the straw man's point is "valid" is a matter of opinion? Hence, YMMV?

I did read the trope description, and it doesn't say anything about how far it's reasonable to reach to find the straw man's point, which would still be a subjective issue in any case. (From my point of view, I didn't have to reach far at all, since the relevant information was right there on the shirt.) It does say "the reader realizes," indicating an inherently subjective issue. It also says "the straw-man argument turns out to not be as weak as the author planned," indicating that the straw man's point doesn't have to be overwhelmingly strong, just not as weak as planned.

In short, your entire argument boils down to saying "I don't agree with the straw man's point in this case." What you're doing has nothing to do with responsible wiki editing. And I'm done arguing about it, because we're just going around in circles.

I cut this because it feels very wrong to me:

• Related to the whole Copernicus/Ptolemy debate, in modern times it is quite common to use the theory of the geocentric universe as an example of an obvious falsehood that only ignorami or madmen could believe. Except that, according to Einstein's general theory of relativity, all motion is relative, so Ptolemy's theory of the geocentric universe is correct from the earth's (and humanity's) frame of reference.
  • But Einstein's model doesn't say that the sun revolves around Earth, while all other planets still circle the sun. Besides, EVERY point of the universe but Earth could be seen as the center of the universe as well, according to relativity.

@Richard AK: "[...] it is still the case that from the frame of reference of an observer standing on the surface of a rotating planet, he is at rest and the rest of the universe is revolving around him."

I think it is not true. If there are two observers, A and B, and A is rotating around B there is a way for them to determine which of them is rotating and who is not. A rotating observer is accelerating, which creates centrifugal force, (undistinguishable from gravity because of the equivalence principle), possibly making him slightly nauseous. Observer B is not accelerating, so no centrifugal force and no gravity (or nausea) for him. Which means that frames of reference are not interchangable, so that it would be false to say that it's B who's rotating around A. Same here. In other words, Sun definitely is NOT rotating around Earth, because it's we, who experiences admittedly infinitesimal centrifugal force, and not the Sun.

But! - and this is a huge 'but'. I am a poor physicist. If I made any mistakes you may persuade me and we will put it back.

I don't mean to be rude or flippant, but you are indeed, as you say, a poor physicist. First of all, what we call centrifugal force is just the way one experiences, in an accelerating frame of reference, what is usually called centripetal force in classical physics. Physicists usually speak of centripetal force, not centrifugal force, just as they usually speak of the earth revolving around the sun, not vice versa. The point of Einstein's general theory of relativity is that both frames of reference are equally valid.

From the sun's frame of reference, the earth and everyone on it is accelerating centripetally toward the sun, that is, revolving around the sun. From the earth's frame of reference, the sun is accelerating centripetally toward the earth, that is, revolving around us. (An object rotates on its axis; it revolves around another object.) You'll note that we don't feel any centrifugal force pushing us toward the ground, just gravity, just as, if you could stand on the sun, you would feel no centrifugal force pushing you to the surface, just (much greater) gravity. You would not be able to tell the difference based on centrifugal force.

The reason you don't experience any centrifugal acceleration toward the ground, incidentally, is that you, like the earth, are also caught in the sun's gravity, and are centripetally accelerating at the same rate as the earth. The reason you experience a sense of centrifugal force when you are sitting in a car that makes a sharp turn is that what causes you to centripetally accelerate in that case is not gravity, but either your seatbelt or the side of the car catching you and carrying you with the rest of the car.

I'm putting this example back. Please do not remove it.

Couldn't one argue against the geocentric model by ignoring the motion of revolution and focusing on the gravitational field? You could argue against the Ptolemaic model simply by showing that the other planets revolve around the Sun instead of around the Earth. In that sense, Copernicus was objectively right and Ptolemy was wrong.

Hi, Richard! Thank you for trying to explain these things to me.

Unfortunately, I can't say I understand you completely. Are you trying so suggest that centrifugal force can not be detected, and therefore can't help us distinguish between to frames of reference, because it's always completely balanced by the force of the gravity (Gravity of the Sun, from Earth's point of view, gravity of Earth, for the observer on the sun), that vectors of these to forces point in the opposite directions and have the same lenth, thus there sum is zero, and that you do feel centrifugal force while sitting in a car, because your seatbelt or whatever doesn't and can't act on every atom of your body equally, like gravity does? Is that what you are saying, or did I get it wrong? Clarify it, please.

Also, while I am not going to cut that example again, it would be nicer of you if you put it back after we finish our conversation, not before.

You're welcome, gg, and thank you for not erasing it again. Also, I'm sorry if I offended you. I feel, however, that it would have been nicer of you not to erase the example at the beginning of the conversation. Also, please allow me to take another shot at explaining some of the physics involved.

Centrifugal force can be detected, and it can be used to distinguish one frame of reference from another. Suppose you swing a yo-yo around your head. From one frame of reference, the yo-yo is, at any given moment, moving in a straight line tangential to its orbit, but a centripetal force provided by the string keeps it turning toward your head. From another frame of reference, the yo-yo is flying right at your head, and a centrifugal force is keeping it moving in a circle around your head. In yet another frame of reference, the yo-yo isn't moving at all; you (and the rest of the universe) are. Einstein's point was that all of these frames of reference are equally valid. There is no one right, true frame of reference. So centrifugal force an be detected, but it can't be used to say which frame of reference is truer or more valid, because there's no such thing.

I fear that the whole thing about cars and seatbelts ended up obscuring a point I was trying to clarify. I was just trying to explain why we don't feel a sense of centrifugal force because of the earth's revolution around the sun. We are moving with the earth, which is to say that we are at rest relative to the earth, and so are in the same frame of reference. When we're in a car and the car accelerates, we feel a sense of acceleration because it takes a moment for us to accelerate to match velocities with the car. We are, from a certain frame of reference (not ours), experiencing a centrifugal force pushing us away from the sun. We just don't feel it.

Also, Matthew The Raven, no, because you're assuming the very thing you have to prove. You're assuming that that's how gravity works, and, of course, it is how gravity works, in certain frames of reference. Remember though, we detect forces in the first place because they cause motion. Remember the Newtonian definition of force is mass times acceleration. So the whole idea that the heliocentric model is more valid because we know that gravity causes less massive objects to revolve around more massive objects doesn't work because gravity only works that way from the frame of reference of more massive objects.

Does that clear any of this up?

Alright, minor misunderstanding. When I wrote: "Are you trying so suggest that centrifugal force cannot be detected, and therefore can't help us distinguish between to frames of reference,... yadda-yadda" I meant to say - "specifically in one particular situation we are talking about, from the point of view of an observer on Earth as it is revolves around the Sun". (Of course, situations it can be detected in all kinds of different, just not in this one.)

Then, you say: "I was just trying to explain why we don't feel a sense of centrifugal force because of the earth's revolution around the sun. We are moving with the earth, which is to say that we are at rest relative to the earth, and so are in the same frame of reference." Would you agree that we don't feel it because it's cancelled out by the force of the gravity of the Sun, just like the force of the string is cancelling out the centrifugal force acting on yo-yo, not letting it fly away?

I might agree with this speaking of this particular example. I am not sure it's true generally speaking. A (somewhat unrelated) example: suppose we have a ball rotating around its axis. First frame of reference: ball is rotating and the rest Universe is not. In this frame of reference an observer on the ball is expected to notice great unbalanced centrifugal forces. If the ball is big enough to stand on and is rotating quickly enough, a person standing on it might be just thrown away from it. In this example, unlike the one we were talking about, centrifugal force can really be detected. But if we decided to use the second frame of reference: where the ball is not moving and the rest of the world is rotating around it, then the rest of the world - you, me and aliens on Alpha Centauri should be able to detect great unbalanced centrifugal force pushing us all away from the ball, because this time we are moving in circles around it, and there is no string holding us, no car door, no gravity to cancel out this force. Since this is not what happens every time you make a marble spin, I feel that the second frame of reference is simply invalid.

In other words, there definitely is no absolute motion by straight lines (it's impossible to say whether the train is moving forward or is it standing still and the world is moving towards it), I might agree (now) that there is no absolute revolution, but I still insist that there at least is absolute rotation.

In answer to this question: "Would you agree that we don't feel it because it's cancelled out by the force of the gravity of the Sun, just like the force of the string is cancelling out the centrifugal force acting on yo-yo, not letting it fly away?" No, I would not agree. We don't feel any sense of centrifugal force because, in our frame of reference, the earth isn't moving. It's the same reason why, when you are flying in an airplane, and the plane is at cruising speed, it feels like the plane is standing still. In your frame of reference, it is.

The problem with your example of the person standing on a spinning ball is that if you're talking about, let's say, a circus performer balancing on a spinning ball no more than a meter across, the thing holding the acrobat at rest relative to the ball is just the force of friction between his feet and the ball. He'll have a sense of movement because he'll feel the air rushing around him as he spins, and he'll see faces in the audience turn into blurry lines, and so forth. To take another example, when you go to a show at a planetarium, they'll usually warn you before hand that you might feel a sense of motion sickness because of what's on the screen, but if you just shut your eyes, it will go away. The sensory perception of motion is what creates the sense of motion.

Technically, from the frame of reference of the circus performer falling off the ball, it was the entire universe spinning around him that made him lose his balance. You can use the frame of reference of Alpha Centauri if you want, or of the audience in the circus, and yes, from that frame of reference, he's the one spinning. But from that frame of reference, there is no centrifugal force at all. From that frame of reference, there's a centripetal force, provided by the friction between the performers feet and the ball. When he falls, it's because the centripetal force is not great enough to overcome the inertia of his lateral momentum.

Also, there can be no absolute rotation because all rotation is, at a certain level, revolution. When a sphere rotates around its axis, that means the molecules that compose the sphere are revolving around the axis. Furthermore, all revolution is really lateral motion. At any given instant, the molecules in the sphere are moving in a straight line tangential to their revolution. All motion is relative.

"No, I would not agree. We don't feel any sense of centrifugal force because, in our frame of reference, the earth isn't moving. It's the same reason why, when you are flying in an airplane, and the plane is at cruising speed, it feels like the plane is standing still. In your frame of reference, it is."

In our frame of reference Earth isn't moving indeed - but in the Sun's frame of reference, it is. So, an observer on the Sun might ask: 'Look at that planet: it's moving in circles, therefore centrifugal force must be acting on it. Why doesn't it fly away then?' And the answer would be that it doesn't fly away because that centrifugal force is canceled out by the force of Sun's gravity, that's what's preventing Earth from flying away. Do you agree with that, that was what I was trying to ask. Airplane is different - it is a perfectly good inertial frame of reference, no disagreement there, but we are talking about more complicated frames right now.

Your example with a circus performer isn't exactly what I had in mind; I'll try to give a better one. Imagine a wheel-shaped space station◊ far from Earth. (ever saw '2001'?) It is rotating very quickly, in order to create artificial gravity. People inside the station do not feel motion sickness, or air in their hair, because the air is rotating with them, they don't feel any motion at all, because they are rotating together with the station, except for one thing: they feel a mysterious force, undistinguishable from gravity, that pushes them towards the walls of the station, away from the axis of rotation. So they wonder: 'We are far away from any source of gravity, why is that we are not in the state of weightlessness? What is this strange force which is still causing the apples to fall away from the central axis of the station, when dropped?' And the answer is - centrifugal force, created by rotation. In other words: if you are in space and see stars circling around you, check whether you are in the state of weightlessness or not: if you are not, you are rotating, if you are - it means that evil alien god Azathoth is messing with the Universe again, rotating it around you. (The second scenario is somewhat less likely.) This is what makes me say that rotation is absolute.

"Also, there can be no absolute rotation because all rotation is, at a certain level, revolution." Yes and no. It is unlike the revolution of a planet around the star caused by gravity, and although there is a similarity, it's not total.

"Furthermore, all revolution is really lateral motion. At any given instant, the molecules in the sphere are moving in a straight line tangential to their revolution. All motion is relative. " No, they are not. Saying that at any given instant they are moving in a straight line is just as wrong as saying that at every given moment they are standing still, a la Zeno. In reality they are only moving in straight lines +o(something), with some mistake that decreases as the length of arc decreases, but it's NOT the same as moving in a straight line. This little correction is making the huge difference, all the difference. In fact, you could say that those molecules are changing their direction at any given moment, that would be closer to truth.

To conclude: I think I was genuinely mistaken about the revolution, thanks for correcting me. But now it seems to me that your other ideas about motion are wrong-wrong, sorry.

I promise you that they are not wrong, or wrong-wrong, and I assure you that if you ask any professor of physics at any accredited college or university in the United States, or any similar institution in any other country, they will tell you that I am right and that you are wrong.

Your example with the space station proves nothing, because, again, you're assuming the thing you have to prove. Yes, in one frame of reference, the space station is spinning, and this creates a centripetal acceleration that simulates gravity for the residents of the space station. In another frame of reference, that of the station itself, the station is not moving at all. The occupants of the station are undergoing centrifugal acceleration that is pushing them against the bulkheads.

"No, they are not. Saying that at any given instant they are moving in a straight line is just as wrong as saying that at every given moment they are standing still, a la Zeno. In reality they are only moving in straight lines +o(something), with some mistake that decreases as the length of arc decreases, but it's NOT the same as moving in a straight line. This little correction is making the huge difference, all the difference. In fact, you could say that those molecules are changing their direction at any given moment, that would be closer to truth. "

Actually, it is entirely correct to say that, at any given infinitesimally small moment in time, each molecule is moving in a straight line. You are correct to say that they are undergoing a constant centripetal acceleration, which constantly changes their velocities from moment to moment, keeping them moving in a circle. That is what centripetal acceleration is.

"In our frame of reference Earth isn't moving indeed - but in the Sun's frame of reference, it is. So, an observer on the Sun might ask: 'Look at that planet: it's moving in circles, therefore centrifugal force must be acting on it. Why doesn't it fly away then?' And the answer would be that it doesn't fly away because that centrifugal force is canceled out by the force of Sun's gravity, that's what's preventing Earth from flying away. Do you agree with that, that was what I was trying to ask. Airplane is different - it is a perfectly good inertial frame of reference, no disagreement there, but we are talking about more complicated frames right now."

Yes, in the sun's frame of reference, the earth is moving. That is completely true. However, a more accurate observation from the sun's frame of reference would be: 'Look at that planet: it is moving in a circle. That means that the direction of its movement must be constantly changing; in fact, when it is on the opposite side of the sun from where it is now, it will be moving in precisely the opposite direction. I know that, since velocity is a vector, any object that is changing its direction of motion must be changing its velocity, meaning it must be accelerating. Ergo, the fact that it doesn't keep moving in a straight line but instead keeps turning toward the sun must mean that it is undergoing centripetal acceleration. That is, the sun's gravity keeps pulling it toward the sun.' It would be incorrect from the sun's frame of reference to say that the earth is undergoing centrifugal acceleration. Here is a link to a short piece on the difference between centifugal and centripetal forces.

I think making an effort to understand the difference would help you understand this whole situation, because then I think you'd understand that saying there's a centrifugal force depends on being in an accelerating frame of reference in the first place, and that you cannot therefore use centrifugal force to declare one frame more valid than the other.

"In other words: if you are in space and see stars circling around you, check whether you are in the state of weightlessness or not: if you are not, you are rotating, if you are - it means that evil alien god Azathoth is messing with the Universe again, rotating it around you. (The second scenario is somewhat less likely.) This is what makes me say that rotation is absolute."

Again, no. The fact that you see the universe spinning around the space station and you do not feel a sense of weightlessness emphatically does not mean that the frame of reference in which the station is spinning and the universe is at rest is more valid than the one in which the station is at rest and the universe is revolving around it. Remember, the reason you feel a sense of artificial gravity due to the station's rotation is because the station is accelerating relative to you. Just as you get thrown into your seatbelt when the car you're riding in turns, you are pushed against the side of the station because it is turning. In one frame of reference, you are at rest, and the entire universe, including the station, are revolving around you. As a result, you are at rest and the side of the station gets pushed into you, creating a sense of artificial gravity. In another frame of reference, the universe, including the station, are at rest, and you are accelerating into the side of the station, creating a sense of artificial gravity. In yet another frame of reference, that of a comet or asteroid somewhere, it is at rest, and you, the station, and the rest of the universe are all moving at different velocities. All these frames of reference are equally valid.

Again, if I'm not explaining this well enough, and so far I have failed even to explain the Newtonian concept of centripetal acceleration and how it differs from centrifugal acceleration, I suggest that you consult a professional physicist.

It shouldn't be added to this page in any event- no one here is actually a strawman, they're practicing Informed Wrongness.

Wouldn't that therefor not be an example, because by definition, Strawman Has a Point is the result of bad writing.

Also, isn't the point that Gekko is kind of hypocritical to his speech, since he "cheats"- all of his actions might not have been illegal at the time, but they soon were and were still pretty shady.

So...? Why did you post that here?

So...? Why did you post that here?