Your weekly logical fallacy: tu quoque

Et tu, Brute? No, YOU! Speaking of you, where were you Jason? Sorry I didn't have a logical fallacy. I didn't quite run out though this one is similar to others I have already covered. I had the week off from volunteering. Then I got distracted. Then I forgot to post something. So yeah you could say that you should ignore me because I missed a week. Then again you might also be committing a tu quoque fallacy. Let's get into it!

You avoided having to engage with criticism by turning it back on the accuser - you answered criticism with criticism.

Pronounced too-kwo-kweh. Literally translating as 'you too' this fallacy is also known as the appeal to hypocrisy. It is commonly employed as an effective red herring because it takes the heat off someone having to defend their argument, and instead shifts the focus back on to the person making the criticism.

Example: Samantha identified that Johnathan had committed a logical fallacy when he said only true nudists would be naked in their homes even when contracting a service person to come work in your home. Johnathan then pointed out that Samantha also committed a fallacy when she said that only lonely older men are nudists. Neither gave points in defense of their original arguments.

• Flag
• Edit
• Delete
• Quote
• Reply