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Headlines “Politics” [read the OP before posting]
- Thread starter vonFiedler
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90% of the arguments in this thread are whataboutisms
so basically nobody can point out how hypocritical and self-serving the US is because that would automatically be 'whataboutism'? is that where we're at right now?
I'm such a fool! Why would anyone ever give attention to what's going on in the most democratic country in front of our eyes as we hold and shake their clean hands? (MBS was behind the murder of a US-based journalist for simply speaking out against the Saudi regime, but you know, that's just a "what about" argument, it doesn't matter). Now, let's accuse others when it suits us, because we're in a position to do so, our successful foreign policy proves it and no one can say otherwise, even allowing us the right to decide which country is good or bad for everyone to the point of accusing them for almost anything without taking the time to look at ourselves in a mirror first. Do not criticize our foreign policies and be thankful to have such an exceptionally phenomenal, stupendous, peaceful and diplomatically non-threatening foreign policy that assures us a promising future!
Hypocrisy at its finest.
Whataboutism arguments are basically always used to distract from problems with your own argument. It can and has been used by Nazis who point out atrocities committed by the Allies, tankies who point out problems with western imperialism, imperialists who point out atrocities done by native people, Islamic extremists who will point to discrimination of Muslims in the west, etc. The point of these arguments is so the arguer never has to defend their arguments in favor of their beliefs and refocus the argument on the opponent, so whataboutism is basically a distraction. Also, it makes use of the tu quoque fallacy, as America being a hypocrite on some issues does not make their criticisms of Russia etc. wrong.
Basically, whataboutisms are lazy, can be used to defend any position, just distract from the main point of the argument, and are just built on a fallacy. You should never use whataboutism arguments to seriously argue a point.
Basically, whataboutisms are lazy, can be used to defend any position, just distract from the main point of the argument, and are just built on a fallacy. You should never use whataboutism arguments to seriously argue a point.
a distraction from what? i mean, in this specific case, what is the 'main argument' that we are 'distracting you' from. because i'm pretty sure the whole point being made by zerses was that biden is a piece of shit hypocrite. if you take issue with that, just say so
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this 'whataboutism' move needs to be exposed so bad lol. it is 100% fraudulent and i have consistently seen it used to defend us imperial interests, including in this thread. i'm repeating myself from earlier in the thread, but basically the sequence is:
1) US or US supporter criticizes 'official' US enemy as if they have any moral authority to do so whatsoever (which of course they do not)
2) someone like zerses steps in to correctly point out how laughable and hypocritical that is, with examples
3) internet nerd steps in to say that the person in 2 is somehow committing 'whataboutism'
it's just got to stop, i'm sorry lol. it's getting to the point where biden's gonna be like, 'i heard putin is bald, old, his last name has five letters, and he lives in a house that is white. fucking cringe bro' and get away with it because anyone who points out the obvious will be committing 'whataboutism.' please delete this word from your vocabulary bc it's obvious 99% of you can't handle it in any sort of meaningful way
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It was hard for me to answer you not only because it's almost 5 AM for me and I'm sleeping, but because it's not something I should be doing when you literally answered with a bunch of nonsense, but I'm going to ask the same question lilyhollow has asked you before (which is a well made post on what I was trying to say), how is it a fallacy and distraction what I just asked on MBS? I don't get it.
Are we going to underestimate the fact that we are (from Biden's decisions) literally treating both situations differently and so the Saudi regime can't be treated in the same way we're treating Russia in terms of sanctions and threat statements? If that's not hypocrisy, then I don't know what is, because that's exactly what I was trying to point out. Heck, you didn't even try to deny that Biden is being hypocrite, simply because it's obvious enough he is. I'd ask you to back up your answer with something else, because you're not going to tell me that it's perfectly fine for the US to leave international diplomacy and decide to point fingers on others to be threatening them for things that even the US itself does not follow.
Biden's administration should get its shit together instead of acting like the international police it pretends to be.
Not only is this an extremely dumb form of "whataboutism," Biden's been focused on punishing MBS without damaging relations with the most important ally in the Middle East. There are already sanctions on Saudi officials, and the White House has already taken punitive measures crippling the Saudi war effort. WADDABOWT EM BEE EZZ is such an embarrassing argument to make lmao. But tankies who defend fascist Russia were already the definition of embarrassingYeah, let's go back to the cold war and call Russia's president a killer, let's point a finger on him and sanction him, because we think we've got enough moral to do so. This, of course, does not apply when we forget and forgive crimes made by Mohammed bin Salman (just so I can give you an example), because then who would buy our weapons to be used in foreign countries, and how would we dare to sanction an heir to the crown of one of the most democratic countries in the world! I'm pretty sure that's not being a killer either, not even enough to point a finger and impose sanctions on Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman himself as we do on Russia. This makes our international policies much more diplomatic and serious.
What will we do next? take Putin's words in wishing Biden good health as a threat just because he fell three times on his way up to Air Force One? jeez. I mean I thought it wouldn't be any bad than Trump's policies, but turns out it's exactly the same.
My life is complete. I’ve finally seen someone argue that someone isn’t a hypocrite because it’s the tu quoque fallacy to accuse someone of hypocrisy. We made it.
Not sure if y’all have the self-awareness, but the point that was being made was that Biden is a damn hypocrite (which is a brute fact at this point) and then you all immediately went “the structure of this argument seems like a whataboutism and you’re distracting from the issue at hand”, when the issue at hand was discussing Biden’s hypocrisy which stopped being the topic of conversation because y’all launched into a tirade about whataboutisms.
You used “whataboutisms” to whatabout Zerses’ argumentation instead of facing his point about Biden lmfaooooo.
Not sure if y’all have the self-awareness, but the point that was being made was that Biden is a damn hypocrite (which is a brute fact at this point) and then you all immediately went “the structure of this argument seems like a whataboutism and you’re distracting from the issue at hand”, when the issue at hand was discussing Biden’s hypocrisy which stopped being the topic of conversation because y’all launched into a tirade about whataboutisms.
You used “whataboutisms” to whatabout Zerses’ argumentation instead of facing his point about Biden lmfaooooo.
I'm pointing out how stupid whataboutism is since I can use it to shut down any argument you make since you are on a device that uses a transistor. You can't weasel out of it by saying that your use is okay and it's only bad in the most extreme of circumstances.
So I was gonna make a post like above (note: no longer the one above) but was sniped, so I’ll just diversify the fallacies and say this is appeal to absurdity lmao. I can oppose deforestation while using paper to write notes in my university lectures. Thrusting individual responsibility on those who are involuntarily participatory in systems is one of the worst addles of modern political discourse, and is weaponisation of a flawed understanding of tu quoque. On the other hand, criticising the people who create these systems and are ideology leaders (like Biden) is valid and they can be called out for hypocrisy.
It’s the same reason why nothing is happening with climate change action. The discourse is “well Steve down the pub still goes to Malaga every year and doesn’t ensure his food has a low carbon footprint”. Sure, or the corporations who provide the food and fly businessmen around the world constantly, and the states that control international trade and where sources of energy come from could have a much vaster impact on climate change tomorrow by changing their own actions.
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the only thing you've demonstrated is that 'whataboutism' can, in certain cases, be used as a valid criticism of an argument. well no shit, i guess that makes you happy and satisfies you or whatever and that's great, but i'm only here to talk about how it absolutely does not apply to this specific biden case. people really learn the name of a fallacy and just throw it around anywhere thinking they're doing something ;_;
Bro.
Tu Quoque: denying the validity of a criticism because it can also be applied to the person making the criticism
Whataboutism: ignoring a criticism because it can be applied to another situation which isn’t also being criticised, distracting from the initial criticism.
Biden: “wow Russia bad but also stan states that help us make money while being as bad or worse than Russia <3”
Xerses: pointed out Biden’s stance
Just feel like we need to get those written out because you’re conflating terms far too much.
The whole point of this is is that Biden is a hypocrite for applying his “principles” unevenly. It’s not whataboutism to argue that, it’s an isolated stance that uses 2 case studies (Russia and MBS) to prove the stance. Tu quoque doesn’t even come into it, hence me laughing at you throwing the term out to argue that “appeal to hypocrisy” means you can never accuse anyone of being a hypocrite. No one said Biden can’t criticise people because he also commits such atrocities however true it may be; they said if Biden is against a state performing a given action then he needs to be against all states who do so, which is neither tu quoque nor whataboutism. Tu quoque’s existence as a concept doesn’t invalidate hypocrisy’s existence as an action. That’s all.
Regardless of the intention, though, this post does downplay the issues expressed with Russia. This post is bad for other reasons, though, cherrypicking quotes and taking them out of context to make Biden look like more a warmongerer. For example, this post does not mention the part in the article where Biden said he wanted to cooperate with Russia on certain issues like arms control, and took some parts out of context - for example, the "no soul" part was something that Biden said to Putin's face (Putin supposedly responded "we understand one another") and he responded to whether or not he thought Putin was a killer with “Mmm hmm, yes I do.” Seriously, took me only around a minute to read the article and see that this person was oversensationalizing everything.
you keep trying to subtly change your argument as if no one will notice. no one said that other countries get to avoid solving their own human rights problems. whatever human rights issues are happening in any other country, i hope they solve those problems. that does not give the united states the moral authority to criticize them.
if you want a discussion that centers around other countries' human rights abuses, maybe create another thread. the matter at hand is the us/biden's hypocrisy though.
It's still the same argument, "that does not give the united states the moral authority to criticize them" is basically a perfect example of tu quoque.
seems like literally what you're saying, at the end of the day, is: "the US does have moral authority to criticize other countries' human rights abuses. if you disagree, that's automatically whataboutism." yahhhhh idk i think we're done here :|
Alright then Duterte, who Biden is still buddying up to but is head of one of the worst regimes in the world right now and has been for years.
It was a throwaway example, there are many.
Duterte is backed by the PRC lmao. Claiming the US supports him is completely out of touch with reality.
No, it's more that "moral authority" isn't really a thing. Facts remain true regardless of who says them.
.................it's literally on their website. https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-the-philippines/#:~:text=The United States and the Philippines have a strong trade,and services traded (2086).&text=The two countries have a,1989, and a tax treaty.
Let America know that "moral authority" isn't really a thing so they stop trying to homogenise the world's politics and they finally end interventionist wars then thanks ^^
Yeah, two countries trading with each other isn't really evidence of countries supporting each other's government. That's like saying the U.S. supports the PRC and vice versa
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