A spurious argument

The Punch is a good read. Usually. Yesterday, Leo Shanahan put up a s***ful article about the Young Libs. I hesitate to use the word "retarded", as it would be offensive to retarded people. They themselves would call the article "a piece of ******* ****".

Here it is.

Now I'm no fan of the Young Libs, but I feel compelled to defend them. It hate it when someone attacks someone else in such a terrible way that you have to defend them, even if you don't agree with them. It is known in most circles as the "Michael Moore Effect" (as opposed to the Gore Effect, which is to bring snow and rain to every city he speaks about global warming in).

Have a read, but if you like, I can summarise his points:
1) A guy who is a member of the Young Liberals in Queensland called President Obama a monkey on Twitter.
2) He was expelled from the Young Libs hours later.
3) Leo reckons this means there is a culture of racism within the Young Liberals.
4) In fact, he thinks the Liberal Party as a whole should have a good hard look at itself, because it has huge issues with overindulgence and stuff and shizz.

Ohhhh geez. I mean, I don't have to point out to you how stupid this argument is. So I won't.

Actually, I will, cos maybe you're Leo or Leo's mum and I wouldn't want you to go away without learning something.

Making sweeping assumptions about an entire group of people based on the Twitter of one of them is bad enough. Making those sweeping assumptions despite knowing that the member in question had been expelled from that group of people for that remark is downright unethical. Yep - it is willfully misleading and quite a bit s***ful.

So, by Leo's standards of logic, let's have a look at a few other news stories:
1) Brendan Fevola has gambling problems. Clearly the AFL is in the grip of debt-loaded cheating drunkards.
2) Christine Nixon was negligent in her duty on Black Saturday. JUST LIKE ALL VICTORIANS.
3) Kevin Rudd works his staff too hard. Every boss in Australia is doing the same and should be beaten behind the woodshed.

(Yay for straw men?)

The vast majority of comments are calling Leo out for his terrible article. The only commenters not doing that are rabid Labor supporters attacking the stupid kid.

So let this be a lesson to you! All of you!
1) Don't post racist comments on your Twitter.
2) Better yet, don't use Twitter. It's balls.
3) Especially don't make sweeping generalisations about large groups of people based on one remark from one member. That would just be stupid.

BONUS RANT

Are the Young Libs the easiest target to bash in the world? This is what I said on that article:

Finally - can anyone think of an easier target to pile on than the Young Libs? This article has almost every cliche about those born-into-privilege, boat shoe-wearing, private school-attending, sons of rugby union players I’ve seen. Perhaps Leo should have linked wearing a blazer to school to an endemic culture of violence against women. That might have completed the set.

Hope that was helpful! And Leo, if you're reading this, I usually don't mind your articles. But yesterday must have been a slow one in the office. I understand, I get those too.