Back in 2015 Kim Davis, a county clerk in Kentucky, was the focus of national media because of her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. In 2025 she appeared in the national news again because of her petition to revisit the same-sex ruling. The Supreme Court denied her petition. I wrote about Davis in 2015 and it seems reasonable to revisit the timeless issue of ad hominem attacks.
As should be expected, opponents of same-sex marriage focused on the claim that Davis’ religious liberty was being violated. As should also be expected, her critics sought and found evidence of what seemed to be her hypocrisy: Davis has been divorced three times and is on her fourth marriage. Some bloggers, eager to attack her, claimed that she was guilty of adultery. Such attacks can be relevant to certain issues, but they are also irrelevant for other issues. It is worth sorting between the relevant and the irrelevant.
If the issue at hand is whether Davis was consistent in her professed religious values, then her actions would be relevant. After all, if a person claims to have a set of values and acts in ways that violate those values, then this provides grounds for accusations of hypocrisy or even a lack of belief in the professed values. That said, there can be many reasons why a person acts in violation of her professed values. One obvious reason is moral weakness—most people, me included, fail to live up to their principles due to our flaws and frailties. As none of us is without sin, we should not be hasty in judging the failings of others. However, it is reasonable to consider a person’s actions when assessing whether she is acting in a manner consistent with her professed values.
If Davis was, in fact, operating on the principle that marriage licenses should not be issued to people who have violated the rules of God (presumably as presented in the bible), then she would seem to have been required to accept that she should not have been issued a marriage license (after all, there is a wealth of scriptural condemnation of adultery and divorce). If she accepted that she should have been issued her license despite her violations of religious rules, then consistency would seem to require that the same treatment be afforded to everyone—including same-sex couples. After all, adultery makes God’s top ten list while homosexuality seems to be only mentioned in a single line (and one that also marks shellfish as an abomination). So, if adulterers can get licenses, it would be difficult to justify denying same-sex couples marriage licenses on the grounds of a Christian faith.
If the issue at hand is whether Davis was right in her professed view and her past refusal to grant licenses to same-sex couples, then references to her divorce and alleged adultery are logically irrelevant. If a person claimed that Davis was wrong in her view or acted wrongly in denying licenses because she has been divorced or has (allegedly) committed adultery, then this would be a personal attack ad hominem. A personal attack is committed when a person substitutes abusive remarks for evidence when attacking another person’s claim or claims. This line of “reasoning” is fallacious because the attack is directed at the person making the claim and not the claim itself. The truth value of a claim is independent of the person making the claim. After all, no matter how repugnant an individual might be, they can still make true claims.
If a critic of Davis asserts that her claim about same-sex marriage was in error because of her own alleged hypocrisy, then the critic would commit an ad hominem tu quoque. This fallacy is committed when it is concluded that a person’s claim is false because 1) it is inconsistent with something else a person has said or 2) what a person says is inconsistent with her actions. The fact that a person makes inconsistent claims does not make any particular claim she makes false (although of any pair of inconsistent claims only one can be true—but both can be false). Also, the fact that a person’s claims are not consistent with her actions might indicate that the person is a hypocrite, but this does not prove her claims are false. As such, Davis’ behavior had no bearing on the truth of her claims or the rightness of her decision to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
Dan Savage and others made the claim that Davis was motivated by her desire to profit from the fame she garnered from her actions. Savage asserts that “But no one is stating the obvious: this isn’t about Kim Davis standing up for her supposed principles—proof of that in a moment—it’s about Kim Davis cashing in.” Given, as Savage notes, the monetary windfall received by the pizza parlor owners who refused to cater a same-sex wedding, this has some plausibility.
If the issue at hand is Davis’ sincerity and the morality of her motivations, then whether or not she is motivated by hopes of profit or sincere belief does matter. If she is opposing same-sex marriage based on her informed conscience or, at the least, on a sincerely held principle, then that is a different matter than being motivated by a desire for fame and profit. A person motivated by principle to take a moral stand is at least attempting to act rightly—whether her principle is actually good or not. Claiming to be acting from principle while being motivated by fame and fortune would be to engage in deceit.
However, if the issue were whether Davis was right about her claim regarding same-sex marriage, then her motivations would not be relevant. To think otherwise would be to fall victim to yet another ad hominem, the circumstantial ad hominem. This is a fallacy in which one attempts to attack a claim by asserting that the person making the claim is making it simply out of self-interest. In some cases, this fallacy involves substituting an attack on a person’s circumstances (such as the person’s religion, political affiliation, ethnic background, etc.). This ad hominem is a fallacy because a person’s interests and circumstances have no bearing on the truth or falsity of the claim being made. While a person’s interests will provide them with motives to support certain claims, the claims stand or fall on their own. It is also the case that a person’s circumstances (religion, political affiliation, etc.) do not affect the truth or falsity of the claim. This is made clear by the following example: “Bill claims that 1+1 =2. But he is a Christian, so his claim is false.” Or, if someone claimed that Dan Savage was wrong simply because of his beliefs.
Thus, Davis’ behavior, beliefs, and motivations were relevant to certain issues. However, they are not relevant to the truth (or falsity) of her claims regarding same-sex marriage.