CheckPoint: Identifying Fallacies

2. Letter to the editor: “Andrea Keene’s selective morality is once again showing through in her July 15 letter. This time she expresses her abhorrence of abortion. But how we see only what we choose to see! I wonder if any of the anti-abortionists have considered the widespread use of fertility drugs as the moral equivalent of abortion, and, if they have, why they haven’t come out against them, too. The use of these drugs frequently results in multiple births, which leads to the death of one of the infants, often after an agonizing struggle for survival. According to the rules of the pro-lifers, isn’t this murder?”
— North-State Record

This falls into the class of Straw Man. She is exaggerating her rebuttal. It is true that someone who uses fertility drugs can have that side effect and that it is common, it is uncommon to that the babies will have to fight to survive.

3. In one of her columns, Abigail Van Buren printed the letter of “I’d rather be a widow.” The letter writer, a divorcée, complained about widows who said they had a hard time coping. Far better, she wrote, to be a widow than to be a divorcée, who are all “rejects” who have been “publicly dumped” and are avoided “like they have leprosy.” Abby recognized the pseudo reasoning for what it was, though she did not call it by our name. What is our name for it?

This is an example of False Dilemma. She is stating that simply because the widows weren’t “dumped publicly” they don’t feel the pain of being alone, that they don’t have to deal with the public criticism of losing their husbands to death instead of another reason.
5. Letter to the editor: “Once again the Park Commission is considering closing North Park Drive for the sake of a few joggers and bicyclists.
These so-called fitness enthusiasts would evidently have us give up to them for