Shill gambit

	Cogito ergo sum; Logic and rhetoric
	Key articles
	Logical fallacy; Syllogism; Argument;
	General logic
	Russell's paradox; Escape to the future; Shoehorning; List of cognitive biases; Truth table; Argument from ignorance;
	Bad logic
	Galileo gambit; Argumentum ad baculum; Argumentum ad dictionarium; SeekFind; Affirming a disjunct; پاسخ کورتیر; v - t - e

Get-out-of-argument-free card.

The shill gambit, a type of ad-hominem and poisoning-the-well rhetorical move, occurs when one party dismisses another party's arguments by proclaiming them to be on the payroll of some agency. It usually goes something like this:

“”Not Alex Jones: There is absolutely no evidence that explosives were planted in the Twin Towers.
Alex Jones: I knew it! Another Bush-administration shill spreading disinformation! Go spew your NWO lies somewhere else, shill!

The shill gambit works as an attack because a conflict of interest^[1] can cause serious problems when addressing scientific/technical issues, where both lives and massive amounts of money can be at stake. In many cases, conflict of interest has caused problems in the past, notably when medical trials go awry because data was covered up to save face and/or money.

Why it's flawed

Where this gambit becomes fallacious is where such conflict has not been demonstrated. Indeed, when a shill gambit is used fallaciously, the only "evidence" given of such a connection to a big company or government is that someone endorses a particular position — and therefore, they must hold that position only because they're being paid or receiving some other deal-sweetener. Such a move is less fallacious and can even be beneficial when such conflict of interest is demonstrated and shown to interfere with a person's judgment of the evidence.

There is further justification for some paranoia over internet-based shills as there are many online astroturf campaigns. However, such shills tend to spend their time flooding sites like Amazon.com with glowing reviews of their company's product using armies of sock puppets. When shills actually go on message boards, they will seldom engage in debate — instead, they make one or two quick posts or perform a brief back-and-forth with a sock puppet and then leave permanently.

Examples

Big Pharma

The shill gambit is a more general form of the "pharma shill gambit" coined by Orac of Respectful Insolence.^[2] Alties are especially prone to accusing anyone who calls their woo what it is of shilling for Big Pharma — leading many bloggers to say that they wish they were making that much money.

Orac also defined the "reverse pharma shill gambit," which calls the altie on his connection to a company that peddles quackery. (c.f. Big Placebo.) He pulled this gambit himself when he called Age of Autism out for taking money from alt-med woomeister Lee Silsby.^[3] A similar situation occurred when people noticed that Andrew Wakefield suffered a major conflict of interest as he was financed by companies that had a lot to gain if the "triple-jab" MMR vaccine was revoked in favor of three separate ones.

Politics

About sums it up. (Thanks, Alex!)

In American politics, right-wingers will often try to discredit liberal groups by showing that they, or someone they work for, are in the pay of George Soros, while left-wingers do the same to right-wing groups by showing that they have at some point received money from some corporation or other; at present (2010s) the Koch brothers are popular "evil capitalist pig" figures for this purpose (Richard Mellon Scaife is so 1990s, and Rupert Murdoch was 2000s news.).

Climate change

“”[They are e]ither a bot or a paid shill. I generally find this true of anyone who disagrees with my POV. Just the other night, my wife criticized me for driving too slowly. After 40 years of marriage, I find that I'm married to a petroleum industry shill!

—/u/JohnAlanTucker^[4]

Amazingly, people will allege a conflict of interest for grant money for showing evidence of climate change, never quite specifying what that conflict of interest is, while also willfully ignoring the much more explicit conflicts of interest in studies funded by fossil fuel lobbying groups.

Conspiracy

Conspiracy theorists also love the shill gambit, though "shill" is often replaced with "operative" or "disinformation agent." This is the driving force behind the parody Bielefeld conspiracy and its many variants. Even when presented with incontrovertible evidence for Bielefeld's existence, the "theorist" can always use the shill gambit to turn the argument in his/her favor. It's not uncommon to find a conspiracy theorist claim to "expose" a popular skeptic/website as a way to come across as a whistleblower.^[5]^[6] This is similar in the vein to other famous whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, but infinitely more credible, as the mainstream media (Read: Shills) doesn't bring any attention to them.

Many leftists who defend authoritarian anti-Western and anti-American regimes portray their critics as warmongers and neocons. Max Blumenthal, who was once a pretty intelligent progressive, has fallen from grace in the pro-interventionism circles and questioned the scale of Uyghur detention in camps in China's northwestern Xinjiang province and challenged reports of atrocities allegedly committed by the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He has appeared on Tucker Carlson's show and multiple foreign state media outlets, including RT, Press TV, Turkey's TRT World, Al Jazeera, Venezuela's Telesur, and China's CGTN. He attempts to cast doubt on those who criticize the authoritarian tendencies of China, Putin's Russia, and others as warmongering neocon shills. This behavior shows that Blumenthal has not only gone full tankie and also employs the shill gambit.^[7] Max also blames billionaire George Soros for regime change in Venezuela, Latin America, Nicaragua, and Hong Kong while being interviewed on the Jimmy Dore show.^[8]

Trivia

It's a well-known fact^{[citation NOT needed]} that shills live in Shillington, Pennsylvania.

RationalWiki!

We found those checks we were waiting on.

“”RationalWiki is run by literal shills. Absolutely nothing on that site should be taken seriously.

—we've been exposed^[9]

RationalWiki's status as a "shill" site has been revealed by neo-Nazis^[10] and other anti-Semites,^[11] Flat Earthers,^[12] MRAs,^[13] Gamergaters,^[14]^[15] GMO haters,^[16]^[17] alt-med pushers,^[18] and general conspiracy theorists.^[19] You're in good company, folks!

References

[1] See the Wikipedia article on conflict of interest.

[2] ttps://web.archive.org/web/20100306221631/http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2006/09/the_pharma_shill_gambit_1.php

[3] Reverse Pharma Shill Gambit

[4] ttps://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/4icd7h/over_40_rodent_feeding_studies_show_genetically/d2x1whf

[5] this Youtube video for example

[6] Video of poorly-disguised alt-med conspiracy-theorist Ty Bollinger pretending to be a BigPharma whistleblower.

[7] Enter the Grayzone: fringe leftists deny the scale of China’s Uyghur oppression. codastory.com, 30 July 2020.

[8] ttps://twitter.com/themattdimitri/status/1262265713655349248

[9] ttps://www.reddit.com/r/KotakuInAction/comments/62ivmv/humor_it_seems_like_kia_is_still_in_rationalwikis/dfn072n/

[10] ttp://en.metapedia.org/m/index.php?title=RationalWiki&oldid=389223

[11] ttps://sites.google.com/site/omerbashich/stats_etc

[12] ttp://www.theflatearthsociety.org/forum/index.php?topic=65625.1605;wap2

[13] ttps://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-47020.html

[14] ttps://www.reddit.com/r/KotakuInAction/comments/4ec1yl/censorshipaccording_to_rational_wiki_the_many/d1yzw8x

[15] ttps://www.reddit.com/r/KotakuInAction/comments/459pba/dramapedia_rationalwiki_editors_leaving_because/czw98ky

[16] ttp://www.truthwiki.org/skeptical-raptor/

[17] ttp://ecowatch.com/2014/02/28/monsantos-science-doesnt-add-up/

[18] ttp://www.whale.to/p/quacks.html

[19] ttps://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=40243.0

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v - t - e Articles about logical fallacies
Informal fallacies:			Appeal to tradition • Appeal to novelty • Appeal to nature • Argument from morality • Argumentum ad martyrdom • Big words • Certum est quia impossibile est • Morton's fork • Friend argument • Exception that proves the rule • Extended analogy • Hindsight bias • Race card • Moralistic fallacy • Release the data • Gish Gallop • Terrorism-baiting • Uncertainty tactic • Greece-baiting • Ham Hightail • Red-baiting • Gore's Law • Nazi analogies • Mistaking the map for the territory • Red herring • Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur • Presentism • Sunk cost • Two wrongs make a right • Flying carpet fallacy • My enemy's enemy • Appeal to ancient wisdom • Danth's Law • Argumentum ad lunam • Balance fallacy • Golden hammer • Loaded question • Escape to the future • Word magic • Spider-Man fallacy • Sanctioning the devil • Appeal to mystery • Informal fallacy • Common sense • Post-designation • Hyperbole • Relativist fallacy • Due diligence • Straw man • Good old days • Appeal to probability • Infinite regress • Circular reasoning • Media was wrong before • Is–ought problem • Ad iram • Just asking questions • Pink-baiting • Appeal to faith • Appeal to fear • Appeal to bias • Appeal to confidence • Appeal to consequences • Appeal to emotion • Appeal to flattery • Appeal to gravity • Appeal to hate • Argument from omniscience • Argument from silence • Argumentum ad baculum • Argumentum ad fastidium • Association fallacy • Broken window fallacy • Category mistake • Confounding factor • Counterfactual fallacy • Courtier's Reply • Damning with faint praise • Definitional fallacies • Equivocation • Fallacy of accent • Fallacy of accident • Fallacy of amphiboly • Gambler's fallacy • Imprecision fallacy • Moving the goalposts • Nirvana fallacy • Overprecision • Pathos gambit • Pragmatic fallacy • Quote mining • Argumentum ad sarcina inserta • Science doesn't know everything • Slothful induction • Spotlight fallacy • Style over substance • Toupee fallacy • Genuine but insignificant cause • Argument from incredulity • Appeal to age • Argumentum ad nauseam • Phantom distinction • Appeal to common sense • Argumentum ad hysteria • Omnipotence paradox • Argument from etymology • Appeal to trauma • Countless counterfeits fallacy •
	Ad hoc:		No True Scotsman • Moving the goalposts • Escape hatch • Handwave • Special pleading • Slothful induction • Nirvana fallacy • God of the gaps • PIDOOMA • Ad hoc • Tone argument •
	Arguments from ignorance:		Science doesn't know everything • Argument from incredulity • Argument from silence • Toupee fallacy • Appeal to censorship • Science was wrong before • Holmesian fallacy • Argument from omniscience • Willful ignorance • Argument from ignorance •
	Causation fallacies:		Post hoc, ergo propter hoc • Correlation does not imply causation • Wrong direction • Counterfactual fallacy • Regression fallacy • Gambler's fallacy • Denying the antecedent • Genuine but insignificant cause •
	Circular reasoning:		Infinite regress • Argument by assertion • Argumentum ad dictionarium • Appeal to faith • Circular reasoning • Self-refuting idea •
	Emotional appeals:		Appeal to fear • Appeal to emotion • Appeal to confidence • Deepity • Argumentum ad baculum • Appeal to shame • Appeal to flattery • Tone argument • Appeal to money • Argumentum ad fastidium • Appeal to gravity • Appeal to consequences • Loaded language • Style over substance • Appeal to pity • Appeal to hate • Pathos gambit • Shaming • Degenerate • Abomination •
	Fallacies of ambiguity:		Fallacy of accent • Equivocation • Fallacy of amphiboly • Quote mining • Fallacy of ambiguity • Moral equivalence • Scope fallacy • Suppressed correlative • Not as bad as • Etymology • Continuum fallacy • Wronger than wrong • Definitional fallacies • Code word • Phantom distinction •
Formal fallacies:			Confusion of the inverse • Denying the antecedent • Non sequitur • Affirmative conclusion from a negative premise • Not even wrong • Chewbacca Defense • Affirming a disjunct • Illicit process • Four-term fallacy • Negative conclusion from affirmative premises • Fallacy fallacy • Substituting explanation for premise • Enthymeme • Syllogism • Formal fallacy • Existential assumption • Masked man fallacy • Self-refuting idea • Argument by gibberish • One single proof • Affirming the consequent • False dilemma • Conjunction fallacy •
Fallacious arguments:			Bumblebee argument • Fatwa envy • Gotcha argument • Hoyle's fallacy • Intuition pump • Logic and Creation • Not Circular Reasoning • Peanut butter argument • Great Beethoven fallacy • Fallacy of unique founding conditions • Evil is the absence of God • Argument from first cause • How do you know? Were you there? • Argument from design • Argument from beauty • Appeal to nature • Solferino fallacy • Religious scientists • Nothing to hide • Argument from fine tuning • Creep shaming • "I used to be an atheist" • Atheism as a religion • Argumentum ad populum • Argument from morality • Anti-environmentalism • Appeal to bias • Apophasis • Argumentum ad nauseam • Appeal to censorship • Argumentum ad sarcina inserta • Blaming the victim • Bait-and-switch • Danth's Law • Chewbacca Defense • Canard • DARVO • Demonization • Escape hatch • Friend argument • Everyone is racist • Gish Gallop • Greece-baiting • Gore's Law • Ham Hightail • Just asking questions • Leading question • Loaded language • Linking to authority • Loaded question • Lying by omission • Motte and bailey • Nazi analogies • Moving the goalposts • One single proof • Pink-baiting • One-way hash argument • Pathos gambit • Quote mining • Poisoning the well • Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur • Race card • Red-baiting • Red herring • Release the data • Science was wrong before • Straw man • Silent Majority • Uncertainty tactic • Style over substance • Terrorism-baiting • Weasel word • What's the harm (logical fallacy) • Whataboutism • Bullshit • Logical fallacy • Banana argument • Scapegoat • How come there are still monkeys? • Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white • Ontological argument • Omnipotence paradox • Presuppositionalism • Just a joke • Countless counterfeits fallacy •
Conditional fallacies:			Slippery slope • What's the harm (logical fallacy) • Special pleading • Conditional fallacy • On the spot fallacy • Appeal to the minority • Argumentum ad populum • Galileo gambit • Professor of nothing •
	Genetic fallacies:		Genetic fallacy •
		Appeals to authority:	Ipse dixit • Appeal to confidence • Argumentum ad populum • Argument from authority • Linking to authority • Silent Majority • Invincible authority • Appeal to celebrity • Ultracrepidarianism • Appeal to the minority • Galileo gambit • Appeal to identity • Weasel word • Professor of nothing • Euthyphro dilemma • Divine command theory •
		Ad hominem:	Ad iram • Argumentum ad cellarium • Bulverism • Poisoning the well • Blaming the victim • Tu quoque • Whataboutism • Nutpicking • Jonanism • Demonization • Appeal to bias • Fallacy of opposition • Association fallacy • Damning with faint praise • Pathos gambit • Appeal to identity • Argumentum ad hominem • Nazi analogies • Not an argument • Nothing to hide • Scapegoat • 地下室论证 •
	Imprecision fallacies:		Apex fallacy • Overprecision • Cherry picking • Overgeneralization • Texas sharpshooter fallacy • False analogy • Appeal to fiction • Spotlight fallacy • Pragmatic fallacy • Selection bias • Anecdotal evidence • Category mistake • Nutpicking • Imprecision fallacy • Confounding factor • Fallacy of accident • Neyman's bias •
Valid logical methods:			Rapoport's Rules • Negative evidence • Reductio ad absurdum •
Fallacy collections:			SeekFind • Nizkor Project • Fallacy Files • Your Logical Fallacy Is • Logically Fallacious •