 Understanding the importance of logical fallacies when people of influence are making statements is absolutely critical. While the common conception of an argument is two people fighting with each other, an argument is just a person trying to persuade your opinion. Without understanding flawed arguments, we can be persuaded based on fallacies rather than legitimate reason. While this may not be a big deal when your friend is arguing for you two to order pizza instead of Chinese food, it becomes an issue when someone with a massive influence uses logical fallacies to influence the opinion of hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people, on a very serious accusation. Like over one million other people, I watched Blair White's video about Shane Dawson. Blair White is a YouTuber who has called out problematic behavior many times, so her audience wanted to know if she'd quote unquote keep that same energy for Shane Dawson's recent accusations. As I watched her video, one of the worst logical fallacies arose and it was a critical part of the video to support her argument. While she didn't directly accuse Shane of misconduct with minors, she used flawed logic while also getting emotional. You know, one of the things that definitely made me realize this was an important video to do is when all these things started coming out about Shane, I had a very real conversation with my fiance and he asked me, Blair, give me an honest answer. Do you think Shane Dawson is a p- My reaction was, I don't think so? And the fact that I wasn't able to confidently state, hell no, of course not. Like why are you even asking me that is a problem. In this video, my goal is not to attack the character of Blair White. Personally, I believe she's a good person who has some different opinions than myself, but I respect her opinions. She's someone who has faced her own backlash due to her controversial opinions, but she still stands by what she believes. Although I'm not going to discuss the character of Blair, it's extremely important to break down the logical fallacies of her argument because this is a serious subject. I don't personally know Shane, but he's being accused of things that some people never come back from. These types of accusations can ruin a person's life. So when the stakes are this high, we need to use critical thinking and address logical fallacies when they arise. The last thing any critical thinker wants to do is attack someone based on a flawed argument riddled with logical fallacies. More importantly, this has everyday applications as well within our own friend and family circles, rumors and gossip spread. Part of the human experience is people sharing information about one another. Without realizing it, we're being persuaded by flawed arguments. But when we practice spotting logical fallacies while consuming content, it better helps us be critical thinkers in our everyday life. So in this video, we're going to discuss Blair White's use of the argument from ignorance fallacy, but after that we're going to talk about the fallacies from the crowd. But before we get started, if you're new to the Rewired Soul, make sure you subscribe and turn the notification bell on. Here at the Rewired Soul, we believe critical thinking is a key towards mental and emotional well-being. By learning from real-world scenarios, we can build upon a foundation of emotional intelligence. My reaction was, I don't think so. And the fact that I wasn't able to confidently state, hell no, of course not. Like, why are you even asking me that is a problem. Emotions are an interesting thing, and it's actually fascinating how they're created. I'm currently reading how emotions are made by the neuroscientist Dr. Lisa Feldman. As Blair gets emotional while stating she can't say for certain that Shane hasn't done these things, it's something to take note of. This is a prime example of how lacking critical thinking can affect our emotions and even ruin friendships. So what is the argument from ignorance fallacy? Also known as the appeal to ignorance, this fallacy is when a person claims or assumes that something is true because it hasn't been proven false. Appeals to ignorance are often used by creationists. They'll argue that you cannot prove that God doesn't exist, therefore he must exist. They'll also commit another fallacy by moving the goalpost. When presented with strong evidence that supports the Big Bang theory, they'll argue, well, how do you know that God didn't create the Big Bang? While the debate about creationism versus evolution may never fully go away, we need to realize that the argument from ignorance fallacy is dangerous when we're using it to gauge relationships. The argument from ignorance also makes something unfalsifiable. As you may remember from the last video on Ghost, good scientists and skeptics do what they can to disprove a theory in order to confirm it. For a moment, I want you to ask yourself if Blair's argument from ignorance is falsifiable. When Blair says that she can't say for certain that Shane hasn't participated in misconduct with a child, ask yourself, what evidence would Blair need to be certain? Short of being able to produce footage of Shane's every waking moment since birth, there is no way to say this for certain. Now, I want you to think about how dangerous this argument from ignorance can be when it comes to your own relationships. And let's make no mistake, Blair and Shane were friends, so this is very relevant to the topic at hand. For example, every night I go to bed at about 10 p.m. because I'm an old man and I like to wake up early. Meanwhile, my beautiful girlfriend Tristan doesn't come to bed until about 1 a.m. Imagine if a rumor circulated that Tristan was cheating on me. And then, like Blair's fiance, someone asked me if I could say for certain that Tristan isn't cheating. Well, each night there's at least three unaccountable hours where hypothetically she could be cheating. Or what if Tristan were questioned about me? I wake up two to three hours before her each morning. I could be doing anything in that time frame. Are you starting to see how the argument from ignorance can ruin our relationships? When making arguments for a serious claim such as Shane potentially being a predator, the burden of proof is on the accusers. Why? Because disproving an argument from ignorance can sometimes be impossible. If you don't believe me, pause this video and run through a few of your own real-life scenarios and think about how difficult it would be to disprove an argument from ignorance. Again, Blair didn't say that Shane is guilty. But when looking at her burden of proof, all she has is what she deems tasteless jokes. If your strongest evidence of such a serious accusation is jokes made publicly, following that logic, we'd have to lock up three quarters of the entire population of stand-up comedians. It's important to realize that the premise of the argument isn't about Shane's character. We're discussing how a creator is using the argument from ignorance logical fallacy in a video that has over one million views. Again, as discussed in the intro, we need to understand logical fallacies because flawed logic may persuade us. And this is why, in the next section, we're going to discuss two logical fallacies the community uses which appeal to popularity and authority. So, Blair White is just one person. And one person using logical fallacies isn't a huge deal for the rest of us. Unfortunately, Blair using this flawed logic may have destroyed her relationship with someone she once called a friend, but we're now going to talk about the much bigger issue. Since making her first video on Jeffree Star and then following it up with her video on Shane Dawson, she's gained over 40,000 subscribers. As of recording this video, she's only 21,000 subscribers away from the coveted one million subscriber mark. Aside from reaching over one million views on her video about Shane using the argument from ignorance fallacy, with every new milestone of subscribers, it's now more crucial that she applies critical thinking to her arguments. While it'd be great to live in a world where we're all individual thinkers who objectively look at facts and develop our own opinions, this is far from the case. As you've learned from this video and previous videos, we must stay vigilant in order to avoid our own cognitive biases. And it's even more important that we aren't persuaded by flawed arguments that use logical fallacies. The two logical fallacies that affect the community are the appeal to celebrity and appeal to popularity. With the amount of influence that Blair White and other influencers have, it's of the utmost importance that they present a sound argument when making such widely viewed videos. So, what are these two logical fallacies? First, there's the appeal to celebrity. The appeal to celebrity is a logical fallacy that states that since a celebrity has the opinion, it must be true. This often occurs due to a cognitive bias known as the halo effect. The halo effect is when we take one positive attribute of a person and then believe it makes the person infallible. For some reason, we believe that since a person has reached celebrity status, which is so admired, they must know what they're talking about. A prime example of this was when the actress and model, Jenny McCarthy, went on a world tour claiming that vaccines cause autism. People cited her opinions in an appeal to celebrity as a way to say that her opinions have as much weight as credentialed scientists. Just because Jenny McCarthy is rich, famous, and attractive does not mean that she has any credibility when it comes to debunking medical scientists. Recently, in Dave Chappelle's special, titled 846, where he discusses George Floyd in the BLM protest, he discusses how flawed the appeal to celebrity is. Chappelle discusses how just because he's a celebrity, it doesn't mean his opinions matter more than anyone else's. He's actually had this stance for quite some time. In his 2004 stand-up special, For What It's Worth, he joked about the fact that MTV asked Ja Rule what his thoughts were on 9-11. Right now, you may be acknowledging how the appeal to celebrity fallacy isn't valid evidence for an argument, but it's something we see daily. How many times does a friend send you a video that validates their opinion because the person saying it is a celebrity? More importantly, how often do you share a video because a celebrity has the same opinion as you? If you don't have any first-hand experience with the appeal to celebrity fallacy, look no further than a Twitter debate where comments are filled with links to arguments celebrities have made. So, when Blair White is using her argument from ignorance, it's no longer just her opinion. This isn't mere speculation either. With a quick Twitter search, you can see how many people have tweeted out her video using the appeal to celebrity fallacy. Lastly, let's discuss the appeal to popularity fallacy. This logical fallacy is when someone states, everyone is saying X, therefore X must be correct. We must remember that just because something is a popular belief, it doesn't mean that it's true. We're social creatures and we often look to others to form our opinions, but this doesn't make the argument any more valid. For years, the popular opinions of the time were that the earth was flat and that the sun revolved around the earth. When a creator like Blair White makes a video, the appeal to popularity is used quite frequently. As people try to defend their argument, they often use this fallacy by pointing to the amount of views or the like to dislike ratio. As we discuss critical thinking skills and persuasive arguments, it's a bit scary to think about. Blair White is just one person who used the argument from ignorance fallacy and has persuaded at least 68,000 people. 68,000 people is also a conservative estimate because not everyone who agreed with her liked the video. But now there are those using that number as a way to commit the appeal to popularity fallacy, which is rooted in a flawed argument. So now that we know that Blair White used logical fallacies to form her opinion about Shane and now that we have thousands of people appealing to celebrity and popularity, what's the solution? Now that we've come to the conclusion of the video, I feel like I've kept my promise of criticizing Blair White's flawed argument and not her as a person. As we've discussed, it's absolutely crucial that we're aware of logical fallacies and hone our own critical thinking skills to avoid being persuaded by flawed arguments. We're all human and no matter what we want to believe, we'll never be fully objective. We're emotional, social creatures and unconsciously our opinions are often formed quickly and based on the information provided by others. But in situations like this, it's absolutely crucial that we pause, take a step back and ask ourselves how sound an argument is. Shane Dawson is currently facing serious accusation and as people in the community, we must use critical thinking before rushing to judgment. This is a man who has been on YouTube for over a decade and I believe the least we can do is rationally look at the evidence without being persuaded by flawed arguments. Right now there is an enormous amount of videos being made trying to expose Shane, but we must remember that we shouldn't appeal to celebrity or popularity. Studies have shown that as a way to not be exiled from the group, we'll conform and completely lose independent thought. I think a perfect example as to why we need to be independent thinkers comes from the famous Solomon Ashe study on conformity from 1951. In this social psychology experiment, one participant was brought into a room with seven other people. As part of the study, the one participant didn't know that the other seven people were actors. For the experiment there was shown these two pictures and asked which one matched the target line length. In one variation of the experiment, the seven actors were first asked for their answers and they all gave the wrong one. What Solomon Ashe found over 12 clinical trials was roughly 75% of people conformed and gave the wrong answer knowing it was incorrect. Based on the wisdom of the crowd theory, we figure that they must all be right and we're missing something so we conform even though things aren't adding up properly. What's even more fascinating was that all it took in another variation of the study was for one of the seven actors to give the correct answer for people to feel that it was okay to not conform. So, before you appeal to authority or popularity, will you blindly agree with the crowd or will you be the one that gives others the permission to not conform? Alright everybody, thank you once again for making it all the way through an entire video and I hope you learned some things. So keep an eye out in your day to day lives and see if people are using logical fallacies to try to persuade your opinion. Whether you're watching YouTube content or you're watching the news, ask yourself, is this using an argument from ignorance? Is this appealing to popularity or is it appealing to celebrity? But also, even more importantly, keep an eye out in your own relationships because when our emotions go up, the logical part of our brain goes down and we stop thinking rationally and this can cause a lot of interpersonal conflicts. Alright, something that I've had to personally work on is sitting back when I start to get heated and think rationally about the situation and even challenge my own thoughts and the own fallacies that my mind is coming up with. So if you need help with your mental health or with setting boundaries with people in your lives and confronting people if maybe they're trying to persuade you and things like that, don't be afraid to ask for help. Personally, I use BetterHelp online therapy. It's affordable online therapy and if you would like down in the description and in the pinned comment, I have an affiliate link which means you get affordable online therapy and a little bit comes back to support the channel and all the work that I put into these videos. Alright, but anyways, that's all I got for this video. If you liked this video, make sure you give it a thumbs up and if you're new, what are you waiting for? Make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell and a huge, huge thank you to everybody out there who supports the channel, whether it be over on Patreon or buying my mental health books or the merch from the merch store. I appreciate you. Alright, thanks again for watching. I'll see you next time.