Day: July 2, 2025

When Democrats in congress propose benefits for Americans, such as a universal pre-K program, childcare benefits for working families, expansions of the child tax credit and the earned income credit, free college and so on many on the right (such as Fox News) engage in D&D. Not the roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons, but the Deficit argument and the Dependency argument.

The deficit argument, which can also be categorized as the “it costs too much” argument, is that such programs will cost too much money, thus increasing the deficit. Since increasing the deficit is claimed to be harmful, then these programs should not be implemented. Cost-benefit arguments are certainly sensible if they are made in good faith. While some on the right do make this argument in good faith, many do not.

While the philosophical problem of other minds shows that I cannot know the content of another’s mind (or even if they have one), a good general test for bad faith is the consistency test. If a person is making a good faith argument based on their professed concern about something, then they will have similar concerns in other similar situations. Naturally, there can be relevant differences that warrant not applying the same principle in other circumstances. In the case of the deficit argument, the test for bad faith is to see if those making the argument are consistently concerned about cost and the deficit. If so, then this can be reasonably taken as a good faith argument: they believe what they are arguing. If their concern is not consistent, then it is reasonable to suspect bad faith although people can be inconsistent for other reasons, such as being unaware of the inconsistency. Looking back on the previous Trump presidency (and other Republican administrations) and looking at the Big Beautiful Bill we can see that the right generally does not care about costs or deficits when it comes to spending money on or increasing the deficit for things they like, such as military expenditures, corporate subsidies, and tax cuts. As such, it is reasonable to conclude that they do not believe in their deficit argument and do not care about costs or deficits as such. This is not to say that their argument must thus be flawed or their claims untrue.

Bad faith argumentation is like (and can include) lying: it is a matter of intent and belief. To infer that someone’s argument must be fallacious or their claim’s false because they are arguing in bad faith would be to fall victim to the ad hominem fallacy. Just as person could be telling a “true lie” by making a true claim they believe is false to deceive, a person could make a good bad faith argument: the argument could have good logic and plausible premises, but the person making it does not believe in their own argument. So why not just assess the logic of the argument and truth of the claims?

While logical assessment should be done, determining whether an argument is made in bad faith is still important as a normative rather than logical matter. When someone makes a bad faith argument (or claim), they do not believe in their own argument (or claim). As such, other people are not under any moral obligation to take their bad faith argument or claim seriously. To use the example of lying, if I know someone is lying to me, my moral concern is not with whether their claim is true or not (that is a matter for critical thinking) but with their intention to deceive or manipulate me. As such, while I should not reject their claim out of hand (it could be a true lie) I should certainly not be influenced by their lie as they have forfeited the expectation that I will give them serious consideration.

As noted above, the right generally does not care about deficits and debt as such. To be fair, there are some who are consistent on this point and they have thus earned the normative right to be given due consideration. But those who have proven that they do not care about the deficit as such are just advancing a bad faith argument, they are engaging in deceit rather than good argumentation.

In closing, I want to stress that it does not follow that a bad faith argument must be a fallacy or that a bad faith claim must be false. Just as people can tell true lies, they can also advance good arguments in bad faith. As such, the argument that any proposal to help Americans who are not rich will cost too much should be given due consideration on its own merits and, of course, this should also apply when the right is running up the deficit with tax cuts, corporate subsidies, and military spending.

In addition to the deficit argument, many on the right also advance the Dependency argument. This will be considered in the next essay.

In my last essay I noted that those who have power in the United States tend to be white, male, straight, and (profess to be) Christian. Given this fact, it might seem odd that some argue that these groups are the real victims in the United States.

Contrary to the evidence, it is now often claimed that white people are the real victims of racism. It is true that white Americans have lost certain advantages arising from being perceived as white. In 1865 slavery was abolished and in 1870 voting rights were no longer restricted by race. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 also resulted in a relative loss of white advantage. As would be imagined, only racists point to these as examples of whites being the real victims of racism. But some whites believe they are now the real victims of racism.

When pressed for contemporary evidence of how whites are the real victims of racism, people typically point to things like affirmative action, Black Lives Matter, criticism of systematic racism, and the fact that Kamala Harris was the Democrat’s presidential candidate. I do not think that most of my fellow white folk are lying when they claim they believe they are the real victims of racism. But I think they are in error. The obvious reason is the overwhelming evidence of systematic racism in the United States is for racism whose targets are not white. I do get why white people can honestly believe they are the real victims. There are ongoing efforts to convince white people that criticism of systematic racism and efforts to offset the negative impact of centuries of racism are racist. There is also the “clever” tactic of accusing people of being racist when they acknowledge the role of the racist’s conception of race as a factor in addressing racism. To pre-empt a likely fallacious appeal to anecdotal evidence, I know individual white people can be victims of racial discrimination. In addition to condemning that as morally wrong I will also note that my concern here is at the group level rather than focusing on anecdotes. It is consistent with white folks like me generally having an advantage because we are perceived as white that some specific white people face real racial discrimination.  And discrimination of this sort is wrong.

Contrary to the evidence, it is also now claimed that men are the real victims of sexism. It is true that men have lost many advantages relative to women. In 1920 women got the right to vote in the United States. There have also been laws passed to protect women at work and at home. Divorce has changed over the years and men (have mostly) lost the “right” to rape their wives. As would be expected, few would point to these as examples of how men are the real victims of sexism. When pressed, common examples involve references to the Me Too movement, certain feminists bashing men, strong female characters in media, changing gender roles, the rights of fathers relative to those of mothers, the charge of toxic masculinity, and Kamala Harris.

It must be acknowledged that there are some real issues with sexism against men; a good example being concerns about fathers’ rights. Men can be victims because of their sex: men suffer the heaviest casualties in combat and far more men than women are killed or injured in workplace accidents. At this point, you might be thinking that I have refuted my own view because I just argued men can be more likely to be harmed because they are men.

I must acknowledge that men are victims of sexism, but they are not generally the victims of the sexism of women. that is, it is not women who are the main cause of the suffering and death of men because they are men. It is the sexism of other men. Men are more likely to die and be injured in certain jobs because there are more men working those traditional male jobs. As an example, more men die in commercial fishing accidents than women because more men work in that field. More men die in battle because other men tend to send them to die in battle.

Rather than engage in a debate over who is being harmed the most by sexism, I agree that men and women are brutalized by sexism and that these problems need to be addressed. As such, men and women are both the real victims here. But what about straight people? Are we the victims of oppression?

Contrary to evidence, it is often claimed that we straight people are the real victims of discrimination. It is true that same-sex couples gained the legal right to marry in 2015 and there are some protections in place against discrimination based on sexual orientation. There is still open opposition to these legal rights and protections and opposition is often cast in terms of how gay rights somehow hurt straight people. For example, one stock argument against same sex marriage was that allowing it would be harmful to different sex marriages; something that absolutely did not happen.

But there are cases in which people are discriminated against because they are straight, which raises real moral concerns about hiring ethics. I do acknowledge the obvious: individual straight people can suffer from discrimination. But this is consistent with the social and legal advantages that arise from being straight in the states. As such, while a straight person can be a victim of discrimination, we straight people as a class enjoy significant advantages. But what about we Christians? Are we being oppressed in America?

While Americans generally recognize that discrimination exists against religious minorities, about 50% of Americans believe that evangelical Christians face discrimination. While the United States freedom of religion and often practices the separation of church and state, Christianity is the dominant religion. As such, some effort is required to claim religious discrimination against Christians in general.

As evidence of discrimination against Christians, people often cite Fox News unrelenting absurd war on Christmas propaganda.  It is absurd that people even need to try to refute what is obviously untrue. After all, Christmas  effectively rules the United States from late October until early January. Most of the other “evidence” of discrimination involves cases in which the separation of church and state is enforced, cases in which religious employers are not allowed to discriminate against employees or customers, and similar cases in which Christians are not allowed an exception to the law. While these do show that the dominance of Christianity in government, society and business has declined, this is not evidence of discrimination.

As in the other cases, individual Christians can face religious discrimination. However, this is consistent with Christianity being the dominant religion in the United States. The same survey in which 50% of those surveyed claimed that evangelicals faced discrimination only 15% claimed that being an evangelical hurt a person’s chances of getting ahead, while 63% agreed that being a Muslim hurt a person’s chances of getting ahead (31% said it hurt chances a lot). I do agree that religious discrimination is real and oppose it but it is wrong to claim that as a group Christians are the victims here.

In closing, while a person from any group can be a victim, the groups discussed generally enjoy advantages and are not the “real” victims. But it is not a contest to be the real victim: we should be morally concerned with human suffering regardless of which group a person belongs to. But we should not be disingenuous when discussing which groups have advantages. You might be wondering why this series is entitled “Mighty Victims.” This will be answered in the next essay.

The people who have power in the United States tend to be white, male, straight, and (profess to be) Christian. This can be confirmed by a cursory look at who holds top positions in government, business, and academics. Membership in these groups confers advantages that increase the odds of having power. Before getting on with the discussion, I need to pre-empty some likely straw person attacks on my view.

First, even belonging to all four groups is no guarantee a person will have power. After all, there are straight, white men who have faith in Jesus yet are struggling with poverty and are powerless. Second, people do have power despite not being members of these groups. For example, I am aware that Oprah and Beyonce exist.  My claim is moderate: membership in one or more of these groups confers relative advantages while being outside of one or more of these groups can confer relative disadvantages. This can be illustrated with an analogy from gaming.

Imagine a basic game rule: to succeed at something (such as getting a job or hitting a monster with a sword), you need to roll a set number or higher on a die. This represents the role of chance in real life. In most games, you can get pluses and minuses to your roll, based on various factors. For example, if your character is related to the king, you might get a plus when rolling to talk the city guard out of arresting you for the bar fight. If your character belongs to an unpopular band of rebels, you might suffer a minus when rolling to convince the city guard to not attack you when they catch you speaking out against the king.

Looking at real life like a game, membership in one or more of these groups would confer a plus on some rolls and not being in these groups might confer a negative on some rolls. To address some more likely strawman attacks, I am not claiming that being in one of these groups always gives an advantage in every possible situation. Nor am I claiming that being outside of these groups always confers a disadvantage in every possible situation. My claim is that a person gains more advantages from being a member of these groups relative to other groups and this is consistent with cases where membership in one of these groups might not yield an advantage or even be a disadvantage. For example, a white male would be at a disadvantage when trying to secure a literary prize for minority female authors. But that same white male would often enjoy many advantages relative to minority women, such as how seriously their views are taken at work.  Pointing out a few examples in which white, straight, Christian men do not have an advantage (or might be at a disadvantage) does not refute the general claim that membership in these groups confers general advantages in the United States.

It is important to note that I am taking these advantages and disadvantages to be, as I have said, like pluses and minuses on random rolls rather than factors that always decide the outcome of events. As a made-up example, imagine that getting a good job requires rolling a 15+ using a 20-sided die. Imagine that for various reasons, such as bias, race and sex are factors that impact your chance of being hired. Put in made-up game terms, imagine that because of bias, being a man would give you a +1 on the roll and being white would also give +1 on the roll to get hired. A white man would make the roll with a +2, a black man would make it with a +1, a white woman would roll with +1, and a brown woman would make the roll at +0. Any one of them could succeed (0r fail) on the roll. But imagine hundreds, thousands or millions of people trying to get good jobs: even small relative advantages will have a significant impact on the overall results. If the relative advantages are larger, the impact will be even more significant and will result in a noticeable difference when large numbers of people are involved. This is what the United States looks like. As such, it makes sense to believe that membership in certain groups confers meaningful advantages in life. Again, these advantages do not guarantee success, nor do they utterly exclude others from succeeding they just rig the rolls, to go with the gaming analogy.

Interestingly, there are those who claim that the members of the above groups (straight, white, male, Christian) are the real victims today not the groups who are underrepresented in having power. I will turn to this subject in the next essay in this series.