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Politicians have long relied on standing straw men—the tactic of distorting their opponents’ policy proposals or positions to make them easier to "knock down." This rhetorical sleight of hand not only allows them to frame their opponent as extreme, illogical, or out of touch but makes their own positions seem more reasonable by comparison. Even the most vigilant opponent, prepared to call out a straw man, can find themselves in an uphill battle, as the technique is rarely disarmed by correcting the record.
This perplexing characteristic of straw men stems from our reliance on cognitive shortcuts, or heuristics
- any approach to problem solving or self-discovery that employs mental shortcuts to ease the cognitive load of decision making, often relying on intuition or gut feeling. Not guaranteed to be optimal or rational, this method is nevertheless sufficient for reaching an immediate decision.
—mental strategies that allow us to make quick judgments when we encounter new information without expending significant mental effort. Heuristics encourage us to accept simplified arguments that resonate with our existing belief system, bypassing the need to critically evaluate the details of one’s actual position. For instance, when a straw man portrays an opponent’s stance as extreme or unreasonable, listeners are likely to rely on confirmation bias - the cognitive bias that leads individuals to favor information that confirms their existing beliefs while disregarding or discounting evidence that contradicts them.
—a heuristic that favors information aligning with their preexisting views—to accept the distorted portrayal without question.
Compounding this is the continued influence effect - a cognitive phenomenon where misinformation persists in people’s minds and continues to influence their beliefs or behaviors, even after they recognize it has been debunked.
, a psychological phenomenon where false information can persist in people’s minds even after they have been presented with a correction or factual rebuttal.[1] Once an audience internalizes a distorted version of an argument, subsequent clarifications often fail to fully replace the initial misconception. To make matters worse, because the audience’s return on cognitive rewards is keyed toward new information, particularly when it is engaging or sensational, the opponent gains less credibility in clarifying their own position than the author of the straw man does in distorting it.[2]
The audience also often doesn't interpret the straw man as a form of deception on the part of the author. Instead, the author is more often perceived as having a particularly profound understanding of the opponent’s position.[2] Successful straw men are therefore constructed not from what the opponent has said, but what they have supposedly left unsaid. A successful straw man makes the opponent seem both malicious—as if they are hiding their "true" intent from the audience—and incompetent, as if they failed in their supposed attempt to fool the audience.[3]
By placing the burden of rectifying the distorted claim on the opponent, rather than the author of the straw man, audiences are cognitively predisposed to favor the author of the straw man over the individual attempting to correct the misrepresentation.[2] Correcting the record can be a slow, painstaking process that requires careful explanation, while the distorted version of the argument lingers in the audience’s memory. Worse still, efforts to clarify or refute the straw man can unintentionally reinforce it. By repeating the distorted argument in order to debunk it, opponents may further cement its association with their position in the minds of listeners.
An effective straw man also capitalizes on the human tendency to prioritize conquest over reason, framing debates as battles to be won rather than opportunities for understanding.[4] By presenting a distorted version of their opponent’s argument, the speaker creates an easily defeatable foe, allowing them to performatively "win" the exchange. This taps into the audience’s instinctive association of dominance with credibility—where the ability to overpower an opponent, rhetorically or otherwise, is seen as a marker of strength and authority.
Recognizing straw man arguments requires not only identifying their hallmarks but also understanding why they work. When a politician claims their opponent supports an extreme or illogical position, it is crucial to question whether this reflects the opponent’s actual views or is a convenient distortion. By understanding how straw men exploit our reliance on heuristics, bias towards new information, and tendency to favor conquest over reason, audiences can better resist their pull and see through their misdirection.
