“We Shouldn’t Listen to ‘TERFs’ Because They are a Minority ”

Argument Submitted by: D.B., PhD

This is an example of Argumentum Ad Populum (Appeal to the People). This one has a lot of different name variants, including “argument from consensus,” “common belief fallacy,” and “bandwagon fallacy.” The appeal to the people fallacy wrongly asserts that something must be true because a lot of people or the majority of people believe it. So if one assumes that people who deny gender identity theory are wrong because most people believe in gender identity theory, then (s)he is committing the Appeal to the People fallacy. As history has proven time and again, yesterday’s conventional wisdom can be today’s bigotry. It’s possible, of course, for a person with a minority belief to be right while the majority is wrong. It's also possible for everyone to be wrong or for everyone to be right. Even if everyone believed the world was flat, the world would still be round. If one person believed the world was round while everyone else believed it was flat, the person who believed the world was round would be eccentric but (s)he would still be correct.

The best response to Appeal to the People is to note how often popular opinion or conventional wisdom has been factually correct or unjust. Give examples of sexist or racist beliefs throughout history that were once conventional thinking, for example. Insist that what matters is truth itself, not what most people think it is. Most people could be right, but they could also be wrong. Note how many historical figures were marginalized for beliefs that were later accepted as true.

But, also, you may want to check out WoLF’s polling to see just how “minority” this opinion truly is!