Perelman, the use of the “pseudo-argument” and human rights

Abstract

In the Traité de l’argumentation, Perelman defines the “pseudoargument” as follows. “It is actually possible that one seeks to obtain approval while basing the argument on premises that one does not accept oneself as valid. This does not imply hypocrisy, since we can be convinced by arguments others than the ones used to convince the persons we are talking to.” I am not interested here in the possible absence of “hypocrisy”, as for instance when the speaker uses a path of reasoning that is different from the one he used to convince himself (because the latter would not be understood in a specific context by a particular audience). It happens often, especially today, that the speaker pretends to begin with the same premises as the ones accepted by his audience, because it helps him penetrate the “fortress”. In the examples I shall give, notably related to limitations to free speech, the censor pretends to begin with human rights premises. He then constructs an artificial and non-credible systemic conflict between religious liberty and freedom of expression. In certain instances, he is even able to completely invert the respective positions of the “hangman” and the “victim” by accusing the one who exercises his right to free speech of being a racist (who is guilty, for instance, of “islamophobia”, “christianophobia”, etc.). I shall try to show that the European judges on the European Court of Human Rights have never gone so far, but have accepted in certain circumstances the legitimacy of the “translation” of, notably, the problem of blasphemy into the language of the “right of others” not to be gratuitously hurt in their religious feelings. Now this is precisely, in my opinion, an example of the use of the “pseudo-argument” in the Perelmanian sense. I shall give many other examples of such a rhetorical strategy, which seems to be particularly confusing and pervasive today