Distraction In Red Herrings

Distraction! Is the main point of the Red Herring fallacy. The name originates from the 18th century when British fugitives would use the distinctive scent of a Red Herring on their trail to divert and contaminating their pathway. Red Herring fallacy is categorized as “Ignoratio elenchi” which translates to “ignorance of the proof” in Latin. Red Herrings are mostly used in law, politics and mystery novels. In law, lawyers would include many fallacies to divert and distract from the main point. Same goes for politics, it is much more noticeable in news during debates about current rules and regulations. In mystery genre books, Red Herring is used to redirecting readers into different conclusions and events in earlier chapters to keep the mysterious and prevent readers from wrecking the finale.
In my opinion, I believe that acquiring knowledge about fallacies may assist you in understanding what the author’s or speaker’s message is. It aids you in unfolding the truth about certain events and certain people. Without the knowledge of what fallacies are, and how they function it can lead to down a rabbit hole of fake news and incorrect information. After strengthening my …show more content…
Thankfully, with today’s technology and advancements, it has become painless to research almost anything on the internet without struggling to locate information. The only struggle that I encountered was finding the reason for using specifically a Red Herring fish to distract bloodhound dogs. Fish, in general, possess a foul strong smell, but my interest was what made Red Herring’s scent more potent compared to other fish? I was not able to locate any credible source for the main reason why Red Herrings were used. However, it took the group a couple of class meetings to decide on how to display our findings and interaction with the