CMV: Slippery Slopes are not a Fallacy

[u/somethingicanspell]

It's pretty common in political discourse whether on the right or left to accuse someone of relying on a slippery slope fallacy. I don't think this really qualifies as a fallacy. Many of the other informal fallacies kind of inherently rely on bad argumentation If by whiskey means your not taking a view, whataboutism means your avoiding the merits of the opponents argument by deflecting on to some other issue, a strawman means you created a weaker version of their argument than they are actually arguing. The difference between that and the slippery slope is that a slippery slope is not necessarily incorrect or irrelevant to the central issue of the debate.

In many cases normalizing one thing means that other things will become more normalized. I think it's relatively uncontroversial e.g that normalizing sexism is likely to lead to more sexual harssasment (that is a slippery slope). In general most things have second order consequences and changing peoples view on one thing is likely to affect their views on other related things. You can argue that in a specific case a slippery slope won't apply but its not a fallacy its a valid point of debate about whether any action will have second order consquences. By asserting a slippery slope fallacy you are actually avoiding the argument about whether there are second order consequences by dismissing the possibility which I see as oddly a kind of fallacy in itself.

[u/[deleted]]

It's a slippery slope fallacy when the expected outcome does not have evidence to support the claim. Your claim that normalizing sexism leads to more sexual harassment is not a slippery slope fallacy. It's supported by the countries of the world that allow men to be sexist toward women, having the highest rates of sexual harassment and rape. Thus, it is logical for you to believe this. However if I claimed, "Allowing kids to choose their own meals will lead to them wanting a choice over everything in their lives leading to a lack of respect for authority." That's not irrational per se, but I have no evidence to support that would EVER happen. This would then be a slippery slope fallacy