whataboutism
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"Whataboutism" or "whataboutery" (as in, "but what about X?") refers to the propaganda strategy of responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of offering an explanation or defense against the original accusation. It is an informal fallacy that the accused party uses to avoid accountability—whether attempting to distract by shifting the conversation's focus away from their behaviour or attempting to justify themselves by pointing to the similar behaviour (which may be true or false, but irrelevant) of their opponent or another party who is not the current subject of discussio
~28 min read
Article
27 sectionsContents
- Etymology
- Origins
- Analysis
- Psychological motivations
- Intentionally discrediting oneself
- Concerns about effects
- Defense
- Contextualization
- Distorted self-perception
- Lack of sincerity
- Idealization
- Protective mechanism
- Deflection
- In proverbs and similes
- Use in political contexts
- Soviet Union and Russia
- Notable examples
- Russophobia allegation
- China
- Donald Trump
- Use by other states
- Europe
- Asia
- See also
- References
- Further reading
- External links
"Whataboutism" or "whataboutery" (as in, "but what about X?") refers to the propaganda strategy of responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of offering an explanation or defense against the original accusation. It is an informal fallacy that the accused party uses to avoid accountability—whether attempting to distract by shifting the conversation's focus away from their behaviour or attempting to justify themselves by pointing to the similar behaviour (which may be true or false, but irrelevant) of their opponent or another party who is not the current subject of discussion.
From a logical and argumentative point of view, whataboutism is considered a variant of the "tu quoque" pattern, which is a subtype of the ad hominem style of argument.