There's a name for this kind of spurious argument. I don't know it, but I know there is.
It's where you set up one unpleasant extreme to compare to another, pretending that there is nothing in between. Of course there is!
From wikipedia:
The logical fallacy of false dilemmaalso known as falsified dilemma, fallacy of the excluded middle, black and white thinking, false dichotomy, false correlative, either/or dilemma or bifurcationinvolves a situation in which two alternative points of view are held to be the only options, when in reality there exist one or more other options which have not been considered.