Logical Fallacy

One of the logical fallacies usually found in advertisements during tight competition is the strawman argument. This refers to the misrepresentation or skewing of an argument to make it easier to attack. Recently, Verizon released a commercial showing the superiority of their network over the rest  through a ratings test conducted nationwide by a company named RootMetrics.  In this ad, they used colored balls to represent each cell carrier and prove how much better their numbers were in comparison.

T-Mobile decided to respond with a campaign of their own explaining their network has expanded and how Verizon used "last year's" numbers, suggesting the data is invalid. Now ignoring the fact 2016 has just begun for starters, they didn't actually present any data that Verizon lied. Instead, they just flooded pink balls into the slide to give the impression they mean something when they don't actually represent anything. On top of this, they gave a guest spot to Steve Harvey after his infamous "Miss Universe" incident to add humor and a celebrity to the mix. This can be labeled under the appeal to authority fallacy too.

This fallacy enables one to create a new argument without actually defending the original one presented. When used correctly or with the right audience, the information used to replace the original argument can be confused for a true explanation to it. In the comments for the youtube video, you see many agreeing with T-Mobile's position but not acknowledging that they didn't prove Verizon wrong. They used data showing their network has improved but nothing that proves it is better than what Verizon has to offer or new statistics from RootMetrics proving the improvement surpassing any other carrier. The best way to not fall victim to these tactics is to pay attention to what is said and what is used to defend the argument on both sides. In actuality, both sides have used tactics to exaggerate how great they are and downplay their opponents so this is normal. Even with the lack of authenticity to their argument, the following T-Mobile commercial won me over off humor alone!