Selective Attention
When you focus your attention on specific parts of an argument that appeal to you or support your position, and ignore the parts that do not.
Example
- I will have to vote no on this bill because my constituents won't like how it decreases environmental protections and social services and gives too much search and seizure power to police.
- What if we add in a paragraph with a small medical care increase and call it the family health bill?
Famous Examples
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It’s freezing and snowing in New York – we need global warming!
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The only card [Hillary Clinton] has is the woman’s card. She’s got nothing else to offer and frankly, if Hillary Clinton were a man, I don’t think she’d get 5 percent of the vote. The only thing she’s got going is the woman’s card, and the beautiful thing is, women don’t like her.
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In all, about 250,000 deaths annually are attributable to medication errors made by traditional practitioners of medicine. The ones the Obama FTC isn't interested in regulating.
Homeopathic medicine has no similar record of death.
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Morty: You have a whole planet sitting around generating your power for you? That's slavery.
Rick: It's society. They work for each other Morty. They pay each other, they buy houses, they get married and they make children that replace them when they get too old to make power.
Morty: That just sounds like slavery with extra steps.
Rick: Ooh lala. Somebody's gonna get laid in college.
Context: Rick and Morty season 2, episode 6 - The Ricks Must Be Crazy -
Jerry: You're asking me to lure Rick to his death?
Risotto: I'm only asking you to go on a ride with Rick, get off the ride without him and go home to your family.
Context: Rick and Morty season 3, episode 5 - The Whirly Dirly Conspiracy
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