A strawman is a distorted version of someone's actual argument. Someone makes a strawman in order to purposely destroy it, and then they act like they beat the actual argument the strawman came from. It's like if an argument was a boxing match, but instead of fighting the other guy, you made a scarecrow based on him and then gloated when it fell apart. Except you didn't actually win, because you weren't actually fighting the guy. Here's an example. Alice: "We should get a dog, not a cat." Bob: "Why do you hate cats?" It's super simplistic, but you can see how Bob skewed what Alice was saying. Instead of engaging with whatever reasoning she might have, Bob is arguing as if Alice said "I hate cats." The fake argument ("I hate cats") is a strawman. Edit: It's also worth noting that we've all unintentionally made a strawman somewhere in our lives - it's just another logical fallacy the brain gets into. However, it's also entirely possible to intentionally and maliciously strawman an opponent's argument to manipulate people into siding with you. EDIT 2: Holy shit, this blew up. Thanks for the awards, y'all. Also, a couple things: My example's not very good. For better examples of people using strawmen in the wild, look for any debate surrounding the "War on Christmas." It goes something like this: Charlie: "We should put 'Happy Holidays' on our merchandise because it's more inclusive than 'Merry Christmas.'" David: "I can't believe Christmas is offensive to you now!!" Hopefully this example better illustrates what an actual strawman might look like. Note how David has distorted Charlie's argument from "because it's inclusive" to "because I'm offended." I've also been getting a few replies about strawmanning and gaslighting. They are not the same, but they are related. Gaslighting is a form of abuse where the abuser twists the victim's sense of reality, making the victim question their perception, their reasoning, and even their sanity. Strawman arguments can certainly be used as a gaslighter's tactic, but strawmen are a logical fallacy and gaslighting is a type of abuse. More on reddit.com

A strawman fallacy is when an opponent misrepresents or exaggerates your position. What are some of the most common examples of strawman fallacies… More on reddit.com

Trump. Speeches, posts, interviews, he puts them out in droves. More on reddit.com

Pretending somebody said something dumber than they really said, and then criticizing that instead of criticizing what they actually said. If you say it can be bad for one's health to eat too much sweets, and I reply "Really? You think I'll die from a candy bar? Ridiculous." then I'm using the strawman fallacy. More on reddit.com