Hey what’s up Thinkers! Kathy Gibbens here…
I thought I’d start off with this comment that a listener left on a thread on Facebook, this one is from Holly. She said, “I just wanted to say that my children and I are enjoying your podcast. My one daughter groans when we start the podcasts, but before she knows it, she’s getting involved and bringing up things she learned. I really love that the format is geared toward a kid level. I had been looking for something apologetics related for my kids to listen to, and this is a great start.” Ok, first of all, I had to chuckle about her daughter groaning b/c that’s EXACTLY what mine would do, lol! But it makes me so happy to hear that you’re listening as a family and learning how to recognize good & bad thinking!
If you’re interested in homeschooling but aren’t quite sure how, Classical Conversations offers a proven program built around local communities of families all walking the same path together. Learn why over 45,000 families trust CC with their homeschooling journey by visiting classicalconversations.com/gibbens. Our family has loved this program and I’m so happy to share it with you!
Alright, let’s dive into today’s new fallacy, the Gish Gallop. The Gish Gallop happens when someone is trying to make an argument by overwhelming the other person with a huge amount of arguments, some of which are not good arguments, and not giving the other person the chance to respond, then saying that because they didn’t or couldn’t respond to them all, they clearly don’t have a good argument. Now, the Gish Gallop is more of a debate tactic than a fallacy, but again, it leads to bad thinking, so I feel like it’s important to teach you about.
From what I learned, the term ‘Gish Gallop’ was coined in 1994 and was named after a man named Duane Gish. Duane Gish was an American creationist. In debates about creationism vs. evolution, Gish was accused of speaking extremely fast in an attempt to make it almost impossible for his opponent to be able to respond to the points he was making. The speaking fast is where the Gallop part of the name comes from. I feel like this technique could be named Appeal to Sheer Quantity or Proof by Verbal Vomit, lol! That would be a funnier name anyways!
It’s a little hard to give you examples of this tactic on a podcast like this because it’s typically used in a live debate or conversation and it would take me a long time to say all the things, but let me try to give you some examples of how it’s used.
Let’s say Bekah and Sarah are chatting in the back yard and Bekah says, “Well, unicorns are real, leprechauns are found at the end of every rainbow, pigs can fly, animals can talk and when I wish upon a start, my wishes always come true!” That’s the Gish Gallop. She’s saying too many things, too quickly for Sarah to be able to respond to.
You sometimes see it in written form, which will often look like someone posting a long list of bullet points, written in a very very terse, factual-sounding way, and summing up with a certain conclusion that they’re hoping everyone else accepts. To refute this type of a post would require a massive amount of writing or typing because of the sheer number of arguments being presented.
I’ve seen this tactic happen in videos & reels on social media. It’s very easy to fill up a screen with lists of ‘101 reasons why breathing fresh air is bad for you’ and the sheer number of reasons can make it seem like it’s a good argument, but really??? I don't care how many arguments you come up with for why breathing fresh air is bad for you, it still doesn’t make it a good argument!
The Gish Gallop usually has 2 components: 1) the speed of the arguments being made. It’s like they’re spewing them out like a firehouse, one after another in rapid succession with no breaks in between. And 2) the quality of the arguments. Typically, someone who is using this tactic doesn’t have strong arguments, so they’ll use a lot of half-truths, weak arguments and just plain filler language to make their points.
And the problem with this technique is that 1), they’re not making a good argument and 2) it’s just flat-out rude. It’s not a good conversation when you’re not giving the other person the opportunity to reply or defend their position.
The reason people commit the Gish Gallop is because they want to look good, they want to look & sound authoritative & credible. They may have weak evidence to back up their argument, so they think that if they can just overwhelm the other person and not give them the opportunity to reply well that it means they’ve won. And, the hard thing is that usually the person says so many wrong things that to correct them would require a 3-part block of instruction explaining what’s actually true! It usually take a lot of time to address the falsities and half-truths spewed out during a Gish Gallop, and a lot of times, it can look like the person committing it won, because often the audience falls for it! They’ll think, “Wow, this guy has so much evidence and the other guy can’t even respond to it, so clearly the argument must be correct.” No, it doesn’t mean that at all. The argument can be full of errors and lies, but the fact that the other person doesn’t have time to refute those arguments doesn’t mean they're true.
It makes me think of the verse Proverbs 10:19 that says, “When words are many, transgression is not lacking, but whoever restrains his lips is wise.”
You’ve probably seen the Gish Gallop happen in political debates, and I’ve seen it often in political hearings. What will happen is there will be a special political hearing into a particular topic and the person being questioned will be flooded with question after question, and hardly has a chance to answer before the questioner interrupts them with more facts or questions. The idea is to make it seem like the person doesn’t know what they’re talking about or doesn’t actually have a good argument, simply because of the sheer amount of facts or questions being hurled at them and the lack of time to be able to reply. I’ll be honest, this type of exchange is so annoying for me to listen to. It’s rude, and it makes the person committing the Gish Gallop look like an arrogant, impatient person. It’s not a good look and it’s definitely NOT a good argument strategy! If you’re on my email list, I’ll send out an email today with some links to videos where you can see the Gish Gallop in action. So there’s a little plug to get on my email list because I like to send out examples of some of these fallacies!
Question to ask yourself if you see someone committing the Gish Gallop is this: “Is it really true that the other person doesn’t know *how* to respond or are they just not being given the opportunity?” *repeat* and, if someone is using this tactic on you, here’s what you can say: “You’ve made a bunch of claims here, some of which are false, and I’ll need to go through one-by-one to be able to address them all appropriately”
Ok, guys, that’s it for today.
Remember: When you learn HOW to think, you will no longer fall prey to those who are trying to tell you what THEY want you to think and it all starts with asking one simple question: “Is that really true?”
