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W. James Antle III (17 July 2017).
"The resistance that cried wolf".
The Week. Archived from
the original on 18 July 2017. Retrieved 22 July 2017. This bit of rhetorical judo has become so common in our politics that it even has a name: 'whataboutism.' Naturally, its origins have been traced back to the Russians, if not even further back.
Russian anonynomus reporting in. In Russia, there is a saying, "Всё познаётся в сравнении", literally "everything has to be learnt via comparation (or comparison)". This phrase is rather popular, on par with the phrase for "
the thing in itself" ("вещь в себе" in Russian).
81.89.66.133 (
talk)
07:47, 17 March 2022 (UTC)reply
Thanks for reading this. Because in Russian culture, people would "drop a whatty" one at another all the time without really implying hypocrisy or stuff like that.
81.89.66.133 (
talk)
14:07, 23 June 2022 (UTC)reply
Logic is purely Russian science. These morons cloned an article on "analogy" and call it propaganda. And yes, analogies do not always work, but its purely moronic to call it propaganda.
78.34.202.171 (
talk)
03:16, 4 August 2023 (UTC)reply
Don't make me tap the sign "
not a forum". Also, Wikipedia records what most reliable sources say about a topic, nothing more and nothing less. Does not matter if you or anyone else thinks the stuff they say is somehow wrong, false, problematic, unfair, or harmful.
StellarHalo (
talk)
05:34, 4 August 2023 (UTC)reply
Just a comment, but why in the heck is there a "defense" for this in the lede? It's ridiculous. It's a propaganda technique and much of this article is devoted in defending it. Wikipedia has failed.
47.34.52.39 (
talk)
19:36, 17 August 2023 (UTC)reply
The China section really needs more information, especially with their annual reports about US human rights and other notable incidents beyond the 2019 tweets.
TagaSanPedroAko (
talk)
01:55, 19 May 2023 (UTC)reply
Hunter Biden Probe
Since there's a whole section on Trump, What About Hunter Biden? (get it?)
Hunter Biden isn't as notable of a political figure as Donald Trump and the article should not be including every possible instance of whataboutism.
D1551D3N7 (
talk)
17:18, 17 March 2024 (UTC)reply
Hunter is notable figure as they seem to have a prominent Wikipedia entry however it appears that there is a bias towards one ideology over another as should it be included.
In my personal opinion the Trump section should be removed unless there are references to both sides of politics in order to remain politically neutral.
Throttler (
talk)
23:55, 11 May 2024 (UTC)reply
I didn't say Hunter Biden lacked notability for a Wikipedia page, I said he was not as notable a political figure as Donald Trump. He didn't hold the highest office in the US political system did he?
There is no reason we would need "references to both sides of politics" for neutrality in this article. What you are asking for is some form of
false balance.
If the Democratic Party deployed some logical fallacy heavily and was famous for doing so I wouldn't require that Wikipedia article to have some similar example of the Republican Party deploying the same fallacy if the example lacked notability or relevance just for some false sense of neutrality.
D1551D3N7 (
talk)
10:53, 12 May 2024 (UTC)reply
+1. Again: this is not an article about US politics. “Balancing” (falsely so) two “sides” of a local political opposition is just irrelevant (funnily enough, it is itself comparable to a form of whataboutism). The point should be to illustrate the logical/rhetorical concept of whataboutism with a few notable (noted) occurrences, not to keep a repertoire of every occurrence in every country in the world so that every hater is satisfied.
Maëlan11:54, 14 May 2024 (UTC)reply
Democrats whataboutism on the border
I think Democrats documented whataboutism on the border should be added to this article. Some sources that mention this include:
In those 3 articles I only see Trump using whataboutism defenses? It's not really clear where the Democrats are making a "what about" defense from those articles. Anyway just because there's a section on Trump as an example of Whataboutism doesn't mean there needs to be an equivalent section for Democrats especially if the usage is less clear and or notable.
D1551D3N7 (
talk)
17:28, 17 March 2024 (UTC)reply
Agreed. This article is about a generic notion, not US politics. Please don’t make this article even more US-centric.
Maëlan18:08, 17 March 2024 (UTC)reply
The section in question is titled "Use in political contexts," with subsections for Russia, China, and...Donald Trump. It would be much fairer and more in line with the rest of the article to remove the "Donald Trump" headline and replace it with "United States" and then detail examples in U.S. politics including Donald Trump and the Democrat Party. We could even add in the GOP in general for good measure.
Loltardo (
talk)
03:10, 16 April 2024 (UTC)reply
A Democrat is a member of the Democratic Party, not the "Democrat" party, a common error deliberately used to treat the party disrespectfully. Treating one's opponent carelessly and disrespectfully is a common type of tactic used by everyone in politics. --
Valjean (
talk) (PING me)
03:33, 16 April 2024 (UTC)reply
If you would take some time to read the content of those sections perhaps you would realize why the titles are appropriate. In the China and Russia ones the state itself is deploying the fallacy, the Donald Trump section is just about Trump using the fallacy, not the US as a state.
D1551D3N7 (
talk)
12:46, 16 April 2024 (UTC)reply