Iron Bru › Forums › Non Football › Another day another dirty Tory › Reply To: Another day another dirty Tory
It has nothing to do with the Beeb though or modern journalism. It’s an obvious flaw in an argument style, which can be shown to be flawed with basic logical reasoning. It doesn’t originate from there, and dates back to the 1970s. My point is that it’s a bad argument against any topic, left wing or right, because of the reasons I have laid out. The term doesn’t matter, responding to a point with “what about x?” is a logical fallacy, because it doesn’t counteract any of the points.
If you check my original point you picked up on wasn’t in response to you, because you hadn’t commented in the thread before me. I referred to Tory politicians, which I don’t think you are, so my point stands. I se “what about x or y?” being used all the time when anything gets criticised. And it does come across as deflection. So, no, I am not changing my original point. It’s a bad argument style. Saying what about x or y is a poor argument against a point is hardly daft, unless you can somehow show that valid arguments can be discounted by what others do. Which I would argue to be daft.
For those interested, the term whataboutery dates back to the early 1970s. It dates back to an Irish Times piece when they used the term to describe IRA arguments when confronted with questions about their terror tactics. The Irish journalist said that whenever he or others asked an IRA member about this they’d say “sure, but what about the Loyalist attacks on Catholics” or “sure, but what about bloody Sunday and British atrocities against the Irish?” He, correctly noted, that this did nothing to answer why IRA terror tactics are valid and just served as deflection and an excuse. It then caught on and people started using it to describe other situations, similar to this. It was commonly charged against communists who would always respond to Soviet Union wrongs with “well, you can’t criticise, because you excuse American problems.” None of this gives any argument as to why it’s ok for IRA terror or Soviet crimes, which is why it’s a logical fallacy. I have done and will continue to raise eyebrows and disregard such whatabouting nonsense, no matter the source, because it’s not a logical counteraction to an argument. Remember, the point you picked up on was not linked with you, and you have argued the toss about it, so I can only conclude you think anyone saying “what about x?” is some wondrous technique to argue against criticism, despite its lack of logical premise. Saying this, and thinking about it, does not make me superior to anyone else or whatever straw man you want to keep setting up.
In the academic scheme of things it is part of the ‘tu quoque’ fallacy. If it is somehow wrong to use academic terms, I apologise, but it doesn’t take away the issue of the problem, which everyone can understand. The fact is that “what about x?” is a tedious and flawed argument style. It doesn’t make me elitist or snobbish to point this out, but I do find refusals to engage with the reasons why and glib dismissals, as if they can never be wrong, to be a rather elitist point of view.
