“Whataboutery is the practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counter-accusation or raising a different issue, rather than directly addressing the criticism. Also known as whataboutism, it functions as a diversion tactic to deflect blame and avoid accountability.” This is how the Cambridge dictionary defines the word. It’s what seems to be the power move in framing or reframing any online debate that rages.
The ability to move the herd to a new topic that ignites base emotions. Divert the outrage to something or someone else, and the original topic loses some momentum. The crowd’s gaze is now captivated by the trapeze artist or the clown, the circus ringmaster put in the spotlight.
A conversation at home, sharing updates on various topics that set the Internet ablaze, brought the now-infamous Biriyani370 case into focus. “What do you stand for?” Or “What do you stand against?” is what this discussion invited into my awareness. The ‘dead people clip’ about a lady doctor making inappropriate comments suddenly found traction, and the conversation was moving towards “What about her…”
In a world that seems to be in a perma-crisis mode, where we lurch from one problem to the next, it’s easy to get into a “not my monkey, not my circus” mindset and weave through life avoiding problems. But it’s equally important to reflect deeply as an organisation, as a brand, and as an individual, what do I stand for. What are my values? What is my mission statement? And what are my unique capabilities? Equipped with these answers, I can remain rooted and anchored enough to know when the monkey is mine and when I’m the ringmaster who needs to get this circus in order.
Going with the flow, navigating through and past difficult moments in life, also requires me to reflect on moments where I have dropped anchor. Where I have dug my heels in and said no, I will not let this pass. Many of the problems are rooted in real pain and deep hurt. Being able to sit with that pain and process it rather than just move on to the next topic is important.
Not everything in life is about engagement and entertainment. The performance must always go on, but the performers must be honoured and respected. Which brings me to the idea of performing vs high performance. Performing is dancing to the gallery, putting on a show, not because I care about the thing I am doing, but because it is what the gallery wants today. An athlete operating at peak performance, on the other hand, still has an audience that loves what they offer, but the motive to perform is pure. It’s rooted and anchored in what they deeply care about.
So, the next time I decide to offer my view on something that is setting the world on fire, I will first check in and see where I stand on the issue. Is it something I care about? And if yes, then I must ask myself, what am I going to do about it?
Comedy is no longer fun, when it starts hurting people in the real world. It’s not free speech, it’s not satire, it appears to be manufacturing outrage for engagement. That is not okay by me.
In the context of crisis communication, one of the tactics deployed is to “widen the debate”. This is different in my opinion to whataboutery. Expanding the narrative to include others is not deflection to a completely different topic. It’s possible to widen the debate and still do the right thing, which is to say “I’m sorry” and then take action to ensure the thing that went wrong does not happen again. The ecosystem can learn from this by widening the aperture of how the incident is viewed. The focus is on solving the problem, not making people look the other way.
What about you? Are you being drawn into the deceptive web of ‘Whataboutery’ or are you able to see clearly what you stand for and take a stand when it matters?
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