When people are accused and/or determined to be guilty of bad behavior, their supporters always resort of all manner of attempts at rationalization for the bad behavior. Right now, supporters of Donald Trump are slowly cycling through the A to Z of Bad Rationalizations to try and minimize or exculpate him after a string of allegations that he engaged in sexually-based harrassment and assaults on women.
I find most of these attempts at rationalization to be amusing since they usually comprise a good introduction to the art and science of logical fallacies.
If the initial attempts at rationalization fail, the supporters eventually start to run out of plausible-sounding ideas, and then they turn to ever-more-implausible ones.
The latest one circulating is an interview with a beauty contestant from one of Donald Trump’s beauty pageants. The woman asserts that Donald Trump always behaved like a complete gentleman towards her.
Folks, please.
You’re killing me.
Reading this is like listening to a defense lawyer in a murder trial arguing for leniency for the defendant on the grounds that he once helped an old lady across the road.
Donald Trump, in my world, is supposed to behave like a total gentleman towards women. He doesn’t get any prize for behaving like a well-balanced member of society. That is a minimum expectation that every adult male should be able to meet.
Not only is the assertion that he behaved like a gentleman not at all praise-worthy, it doesn’t exculpate any of his other bad behavior. See the courtroom analogy.
If that is the best argument that Donald Trump’s supporters can find, they need to go engage their brains and work harder. This is laughable.
