Justice Scalia , Gays and Penn State , and the Reductio ad Absurdum

Justice Scalia recently walked into I what it hink is a very faux controversy at Princeton recently. Instapundit recently seemed to have the the same problem when he posted "What is the gun community going to do about this tragedy?"/"I dunno. What is the gay community going to do about Penn State?" .

Law Prof Ann Alhouse went into all this at  Why are people having so much trouble understanding rhetorical devices?

I thought at Instapundit one remark that was posted  as prety apt :


Wait, is garage mahal actually so stupid that he can fail to see a reductio ad absurdum right in front of his nose?


I’ll try once more to explain it.

InstaPundit thinks that it would be absurd and ridiculous to blame all gays for the minuscule percentage of gays who are serial rapists. His whole point depends on us seeing just how ridiculous that would be. He is trying to get morons like AF and garage mahal to understand that is equally ridiculous to blame all gun-owners for the minuscule percentage of gun-owners who commit mass murders. But some lefties are so in love with the idea of calling all gun-owners and NRA members and Republicans mass-murderers that they are unable to understand a simple analogical reductio ad absurdum.


I think Althouse does a pretty good job pointing out how Scalia was using a reductio ad abusrdum for legal purposes.

Its a siogn of the times that education has gone downhill so much people can't grasp a reductio ad absurdum when it happens. It more shocking that people that do then act like they don't get to the argument in order to frame the speakers points in a deceptive way