What is the fallacy that privileges one person over another?

Question

I see this a lot, someone in a category of people attempts to shut down anyone with an opinion that is not from the same category. For example, people without children weighing in on parenting; the parent may say something like "well, since you don't have kids and I do, my position is of more validity than yours."

Another example: a drug user (of some kind) telling someone who has never done drugs and does not care to, "until you tried it, you have no right to judge me."

People frequently try to limit the consideration on opinions to those in their same group, while it is perfectly reasonable that the non-drug user, especially if they are a chemist or well read on the subject, may have an equally valid opinion, or even more valid. In fact some might even say that someone NOT in the category has a better chance of being objective and seeing the forest for the trees.

So what is the fallacy of trying to shut down opinions when the source of the opinion is not someone who has personally had the experience under discussion?

Answer 1

It is specifically just the genetic fallacy: assuming an argument is erroneous on the basis of its provenience.

But I prefer to see it as what CS Lewis named 'Bulverism' -- diagnosing an argument as a symptom of something (the speaker's known or presumed bias or ignorance, the social or political context, any psychological dynamics at play, concurrent rhetorical manipulations, etc.) instead of considering its content

The specific diagnosis given in both of your example cases is 'ignorance through lack of exposure'.

However you choose to identify it in particular, as @elmer007 notes above, you can tell this is a fallacy right away because it is ad hominem -- pointed at the speaker and not the content.

Even if ignoring or being especially dubious about an argument for some contextual reason is sensible, it is always still a fallacy. Logically, one can only reject an argument based upon its content -- which involves actually considering the content.

Answer 2

In the examples you've given, it appears to be a "psychological essentialism" function. Which, while phase appropriate for ages 4-7, seems also to be quite popular in current extreme postmodern ideologies. For example; only a woman can say anything valid about women. If you're not a black male, then you have no insight into the state of black male life. You must be queer to say anything about queerness. And on and on. Identity politics uses this tactic to an alarming degree. But, as already stated by someone else, politics is not philosophy. And identity politics is totally bereft of philosophical soundness. Your examples fall into a kind of identitarian rut. Now, a junior high math teacher and someone who works at CERN might be better protagonist/antagonist examples of experience vs training/knowledge.

Answer 3

Not everything that shuts down our arguments is a named fallacy. In this case, I would call this behavior "efficient."

It would be very reasonable to assume that an expert's opinion is more valid than that of someone who knows nothing of a field, would it not? Do we assume that the average traveler has a better opinion regarding how to fly an airplane than a pilot? Do we assume the average driver has a better opinion of how to maintain a vehicle than a seasoned mechanic? No, we don't.

If one had unlimited resources, it would be highly reasonable to listen to every opinion and weigh them accordingly. A failure to do so might be called a selection bias (which could be as close to a named fallacy as you may get). However, we rarely (if ever) are so lucky. Accordingly, what you want to call a fallacy, I would call an efficient way to spend finite resources. The more limited the resources are, the more reasonable this behavior is.

Answer 4

I read the answers and they are interesting. I agree that this thinking can be seen as an ad hominem but to me sound more like an apeal to authority or ad verecundiam fallacy.

To think that people with some experience are right just because they have more experience, despite evidence to the contrary. However one must also consider that the argument that experience gives people a knowledge advantage over the non experienced counterpart can be perfectly good. It is not a fallacy in all circumstances, to think it is so would be the argument from fallacy.

From Wikipedia:

Argument from fallacy is the formal fallacy of analyzing an argument and inferring that, since it contains a fallacy, its conclusion must be false. It is also called argument to logic (argumentum ad logicam), fallacy fallacy, fallacist's fallacy, and bad reasons fallacy.