Whataboutism

What is
Whataboutism?

Whataboutism shifts attention away from a criticism by pointing to a different issue, often involving someone else.

How to be sure it's Whataboutism?

To spot it, ask whether the response addresses the original point or simply changes the subject. Examples include statements like “What about when the other side did the same thing?” or responding to one problem by immediately raising a different one.
Read The Study

Study under review - coming soon

Project Description

Truth Labs for Education is a collaboration between Cambridge University, the University of Bristol, and Google Jigsaw. We created a series of short videos designed to help people resist unwanted persuasion online. The videos are rooted in a framework from social psychology called inoculation theory, which posits that by exposing people to a weakened dose of a persuasive argument or technique and pre-emptively refuting it, they develop psychological resistance against future manipulative persuasion attempts.

We created 5 videos, each of which “inoculates” people against a particular manipulation technique or misleading rhetorical device commonly encountered online: ad hominem attacks, using emotional language to evoke fear or outrage, false dichotomies, incoherence, and scapegoating.