Ad hominem

"ad hominem" is a Latin phrase used very commonly in English (just like "ad nauseum", and also "i.e." and "e.g." are abbreviations of Latin phrases). It is, effectively, part of English.

What it means is, in the context of an argument, referring to who made the argument, as opposed to the argument's own referents, in deciding whether to accept or reject it. It is normally considered proof that one has no real argument to offer against or for what is said, if one must invoke "who wrote it" as an refutation or as a reason of non-acting upon it thus in silent approval of it.

Ad hominem is the weakest form of argument. It is an attack or defense on an argument based on who made the argument, rather than based on its merits.

Ad hominem revert is an obvious example, one common on large public wikis and giving rise to calls for a revert currency to make such actions "not free". Ad hominem delete is an example of this weak form raised to sysop vandalism, a particularly stupid phenomenon encouraged mostly by Wikimedia.

Trolls also disapprove of ad hominem approval wherein the edits of some known author do not fire up a desire to track their trail by following Special:Recentchanges. This tends to create a hierarchy of insiders and thus an insider culture similar to that of bureaucracy or academia, where a trusted name can spout nonsense for years without being detected or kicked out, and where untrusted names with proof of their claims get ignored.