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Worst. Argument. Ever.

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Connoisseurs of trolling prodigious non-sequiturs really should check out the comments thread here. A commenter repeatedly claims that the grossly offensive analogy between the Duke lacrosse case and the Scottsboro boys case should be defended because someone else had once made the same analogy to defend the prosecution. OK, so far merely have a garden-variety bad argument, self-evidently illogical and devoid of merit but not special. But it gets better–when pressed the commenter can’t even produce evidence that the initial analogy was even made! Longtime readers will be reminded of the great Niels Jackson–when they open the Bad Arguments Hall of Fame, Luker will go in on the first ballot.

For the punchline, check out this post begging for reinforcements; you’ll be shocked to discover that legions of defenders have not come forward to defend the propositions that 1)unsubstantiated charges of rape that were dropped as the prosecutor recuses himself in disgrace are analogous to a case where poor blacks in the apartheid south where railroaded to Death Row via a formalized lynching, and 2)that Party A’s use of a bad analogy insulates Party B’s use of said analogy from criticism from Party C. I particularly like the high stakes adduced by Luker–“reputations at stake?” Personally, I think anyone’s reputation can survive a use of an offensive analogy; a reputation can probably even survive using every ounce of ressentiment you can muster to invent someone’s use of a bad analogy to prop up an argument that would be risibly feeble even if the fictitious analogy was real.

…in fairness, Luker is right to note in comments the “or not” added to the end of his sentence, which suggests that he as at least half-joking.

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