The Law of Indistinct Induction

There's a kind of bad argument you see a lot from Fundamentalists trying to defend their extrabiblical holiness standards (KJV-onlyism, no CCM, no women wearing pants, etc.). It crops up so often, I figured it had to be part of some secret fundamentalist creed that I was not allowed access to. Some years ago, I formalized this article of faith like this:

If one Christian approves of a behaviour about which the Bible is silent or ambiguous, but which another, Fundamentalist Christian disapproves of, it is not a mere difference of opinion. Rather, the Fundamentalist shall infer that it is a tacit admission that the first Christian knows the behaviour is sinful, and furthermore, he secretly desires to commit even greater sins.

The shorter Shorter Catechism could put it thusly:

If a Christian has less strict standards than a Fundamentalist, that is the same as having no standards at all.

When I came up with this article circa 2012-13, I put it to the regulars at a now-defunct incarnation of the Fighting Fundamental Forums to give it a name. Ultimately, the suggestion that won out was The Law of Indistinct Induction.

Some practical examples (that I have actually seen):

• If you don't accept that the King James Bible alone is God's word for English-speaking people, you will accept anything as God's word: not only the NIV, but the New World Translation used by the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Book of Mormon, the Quran, Playboy, and comic books. (Yes, all of those have been suggested to me at some time as the only logical consequence of rejecting KJV-onlyism.)
• If you believe it is permissible for a Christian to have a glass of wine, then you must believe it is permissible for a Christian to get falling-down drunk, or even to use marijuana or harder drugs.
• If you would wear a swimsuit at the beach, what is stopping you from wearing it to work or to church?
• If you prefer not to wear a necktie to church, you would probably be happy coming naked if you had the chance. (The prospect of nude or nearly nude churchgoers seems to preoccupy them, for some reason.)

It's bad theology on multiple counts. As a transparent my-way-or-the-highway assertion, it's a textbook example of a false dichotomy. To my mind, it's a variation on the Fundamentalist mindset that all biblical doctrines are equally important: if a moral standard can be reasoned (or even reasonably inferred) from the Scriptures, it must be defended with all the fervour of St. Nicholas defending the Trinity at the Council of Nicaea by slugging Arius. There's no acknowledgement that the Bible may permit a certain amount of latitude for practices where it is not entirely clear—or even those where it is clear, such as permitting someone to decide for himself whether to drink wine.

This isn't really apropos of anything. To be honest, I can just never remember "The Law of Indistinct Induction," but it's such a common bad argument, I wanted to put it somewhere that was easily found.