# Hypocrisy ... not so much **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 23, 2012, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899 "2012-11-23T15:14:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2012, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/21 "2012-11-24T22:20:21Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > But in this case the gay-bashing preacher who secretely sleeps with other men wouldn’t be a hypocrite either, right? No, he would be a hypocrite if he wasn’t ashamed of sleeping with other men, or if (as is likely, in such a case) he presented himself publicly as being a good person according to his own precepts. My point is that secrecy, _per se_, does not have much to do with it. Your secret smoker would be a hypocrite if he publicly said not only “smoking is wrong” but also “and, of course, I therefore don’t smoke”, but I see know reason why that should be the case. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2012, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/22 "2012-11-24T22:27:17Z")
> [@K364](#): > > This is the [Strawman Fallacy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strawman_fallacy): Well, that might be what he was thinking of, but it equally well might not be. He might just be thinking of _false analogy_, or, indeed, any number of other things. He really hasn’t given us much to go on. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2012, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/23 "2012-11-24T22:46:37Z")
I think he’s driving at the tu quoque, so beloved of political dopers. ---
**Author:** ![What\_the](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f4b2a3/32.png) [@What\_the](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_the)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2012, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/24 "2012-11-25T13:11:59Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Hypocrisy isn’t about comparisons at all. It’s only hypocrisy if the person saying that something is wrong is also doing that \*same \*something. If it’s a comparison, it’s not hypocrisy. This pretty much get to my issue. There are very few actions/statements/beliefs that are **exactly** the same. There may be difs in intent of certain actions or dif in reaction to actions that themselves are very close to the same. Here’s an example: I called somebody “a little weenie” once. Somebody else calls somebody “a worthless cunt”. I suggest that that is not very nice. Someone points to my having engaged in genitalia-based name calling before and suggests that I’m a hypocrite. I’d say they are wrong. I think making comparisons does come into play. If not, then the h-word is bandied about way too much. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2012, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/25 "2012-11-25T15:39:11Z")
The question is, what is it you were suggesting is not very nice? Where you suggesting that genitalia-based name calling is not very nice? If so, then the accusation sticks. Is it something else that you were suggesting is not very nice? If so, then your interlocutor’s failure to understand your meaning is an invitation to clarify. ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/26 "2012-11-25T20:07:43Z")
> [@Nametag](#): > > More likely, of course, he has some rationalization, and again it’s sincerity that makes the difference: hypocrisy, by definition, is never sincere. I don’t know, in _my_ book, a hypocrite is someone who _sincerely_ preaches for or against _X_, while _sincerely_ believing, for whatever reason, that he’s exempt from that particular rule. For example, a TV preacher who does the ‘hookers and blow’ lifestyle off camera, because he doesn’t actually _believe_ in what he’s preaching is just a con-man, not a hypocrite, because he’s just putting on an act for the cameras to convince all the Christian old farts to send him money ‘to do the Lord’s work’. On the other hand, one who preaches that you should live a simple, humble lifestyle, and send lots of money to him so he can ‘do the Lord’s work’, but lives opulently, himself, and justifies it to himself as God wanting him to ‘be comfortable’ because he’s ‘doing the Lord’s work’, and is _sincere in believing_ both, is a hypocrite. ---
**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/27 "2012-11-26T10:19:03Z")
That’s exactly wrong. Hypocrisy is all about putting on an act. Hell, I’ll just quote from Wikipedia: > [@](#): > > The word hypocrisy comes from the Greek ὑπόκρισις (hypokrisis), which means “jealous”, “play-acting”, “acting out”, “coward” or “dissembling”.[3] The word hypocrite is from the Greek word ὑποκρίτης (hypokritēs), the agentive noun associated with υποκρίνομαι (hypokrinomai κρίση, “judgment” »κριτική (kritiki), “critics”) presumably because the performance of a dramatic text by an actor was to involve a degree of interpretation, or assessment. > > Alternatively, the word is an amalgam of the Greek prefix hypo-, meaning “under”, and the verb krinein, meaning “to sift or decide”. Thus the original meaning implied a deficiency in the ability to sift or decide. This deficiency, as it pertains to one’s own beliefs and feelings, informs the word’s contemporary meaning.[4] > > Whereas hypokrisis applied to any sort of public performance (including the art of rhetoric), hypokrites was a technical term for a stage actor and was not considered an appropriate role for a public figure. In Athens in the 4th century BC, for example, the great orator Demosthenes ridiculed his rival Aeschines, who had been a successful actor before taking up politics, as a hypocrites whose skill at impersonating characters on stage made him an untrustworthy politician. This negative view of the hypokrites, perhaps combined with the Roman disdain for actors, later shaded into the originally neutral hypokrisis. It is this later sense of hypokrisis as “play-acting”, i.e., the assumption of a counterfeit persona, that gives the modern word hypocrisy its negative connotation. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/28 "2012-11-26T10:33:30Z")
Here’s Neal Stephenson’s take on hypocrisy, from **the Diamond Age**. Oddly enough, he seems to be in favor of it: > [@](#): > > “You know, when I was a young man, hypocrisy was deemed the worst of vices,” Finkle-McGraw said. “It was all because of moral relativism. You see, in that sort of a climate, you are not allowed to criticise others–after all, if there is no absolute right and wrong, then what grounds is there for criticism?” > … > > "Now, this led to a good deal of general frustration, for people are naturally censorious and love nothing better than to criticise others’ shortcomings. And so it was that they seized on hypocrisy and elevated it from a ubiquitous peccadillo into the monarch of all vices. For, you see, even if there is no right and wrong, you can find grounds to criticise another person by contrasting what he has espoused with what he has actually done. In this case, you are not making any judgment whatsoever as to the correctness of his views or the morality of his behaviour–you are merely pointing out that he has said one thing and done another. Virtually all political discourse in the days of my youth was devoted to the ferreting out of hypocrisy. > > … > > “We take a somewhat different view of hypocrisy,” Finkle-McGraw continued. “In the late-twentieth-century Weltanschauung, a hypocrite was someone who espoused high moral views as part of a planned campaign of deception–he never held these beliefs sincerely and routinely violated them in privacy. Of course, most hypocrites are not like that. Most of the time it’s a spirit-is-willing, flesh-is-weak sort of thing.” > > “That we occasionally violate our own stated moral code,” Major Napier said, working it through, “does not imply that we are insincere in espousing that code.” > > “Of course not,” Finkle-McGraw said. “It’s perfectly obvious, really. No one ever said that it was easy to hew to a strict code of conduct. Really, the difficulties involved–the missteps we make along the way–are what make it interesting. The internal, and eternal , struggle, between our base impulses and the rigorous demands of our own moral system is quintessentially human. It is how we conduct ourselves in that struggle that determines how we may in time be judged by a higher power.” All three men were quiet for a few moments, chewing mouthfuls of beer or smoke, pondering the matter. ---
**Author:** ![What\_the](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f4b2a3/32.png) [@What\_the](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_the)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/29 "2012-11-26T13:34:02Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I think he’s driving at the tu quoque, so beloved of political dopers. Nope. The wiki has a good def if you are interested. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/30 "2012-11-26T13:58:57Z")
But as I intimated in my previous post, it’s not so much about “comparisons” as it is about determining whether the _same thing_ is being done. You objected that it’s never exactly the same thing, but that is a general point, not a point specific to questions about hypocracy. No two actions are “exactly the same,” ever–any distinct things in the world have distinctions between them. That’s beside the point. If you believe people should do X, and you do X, then you’re a hypocrite. In your example, the question isn’t “is calling someone a twat similar enough to calling them a weenie?” The question, rather, is what exactly the “X” you were criticising them for in the first place was. You should be asking “Was I criticizing them for using genital terms in name calling?” If that’s what you were criticizing them for, you’re a hypocrite. If that’s not what you were criticizing them for, then you should now clarify for them what the criticism was about. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/31 "2012-11-26T14:18:00Z")
So, is Rush Limbaugh a hypocrite? I don’t listen to him, but I’ve been given to understand that he has been pretty vocal about those bad druggies out there, all the while, being a user himself. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2012, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/32 "2012-11-26T14:42:06Z")
Not to defend Rush Limbaugh but has he spoken about drug addicts since the revelations about his paid medicine addiction? I don’t think he’s that stupid. ---
**Author:** ![What\_the](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f4b2a3/32.png) [@What\_the](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_the)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2012, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/33 "2012-11-28T14:02:26Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > But as I intimated in my previous post, it’s not so much about “comparisons” as it is about determining whether the _same thing_ is being done. You objected that it’s never exactly the same thing, but that is a general point, not a point specific to questions about hypocracy. No two actions are “exactly the same,” ever–any distinct things in the world have distinctions between them. That’s beside the point. > > If you believe people should do X, and you do X, then you’re a hypocrite. In your example, the question isn’t “is calling someone a twat similar enough to calling them a weenie?” The question, rather, is what exactly the “X” you were criticising them for in the first place was. You should be asking “Was I criticizing them for using genital terms in name calling?” If that’s what you were criticizing them for, you’re a hypocrite. If that’s not what you were criticizing them for, then you should now clarify for them what the criticism was about. I know you are trying but I can’t get past the fact that we agree no two things are the same …yet they must be the same for one to be a hypocrite. Regardless of the semantics, some amount of comparison or analysis needs to be done and without clarification a critic rarely has all of the facts he would need. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2012, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/34 "2012-11-28T15:39:05Z")
Rationalization is often part of hypocrisy, and the use of false comparisons can be part of that. But in the end hypocrisy comes down to a disparity between words and deeds. ---
**Author:** ![What\_the](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f4b2a3/32.png) [@What\_the](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_the)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2012, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/35 "2012-11-29T15:13:52Z")
Can we agree that “hypocrisy” in the classic sense is one thing but that it has become acceptably corrupted in common usage… emphasis on “acceptably”? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2012, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899/36 "2012-11-29T17:06:14Z")
> [@What\_the](#): > > I know you are trying but I can’t get past the fact that we agree no two things are the same …yet they must be the same for one to be a hypocrite. “No two actions are exactly the same, but a hypocrite does exactly the same thing he says one shouldn’t do.” I can see why that looks like it can’t be right. I should rephrase: “No two actions are exactly the same in every way, but a hypocrite does something which is exactly the same in the right ways as a thing he says one shouldn’t do.” And then the task is to figure out what “the right ways” means. And my position is that “the right ways” isn’t just a matter of degree of similarity. It’s a more open-and-shut matter, not a matter of degrees. Let’s look at a parallel example–species of animals. No two animals are exactly the same in every way, but many pairs of animals are exactly the same in the right ways to be members of the same speices. (Let’s assume a lay-observational criterion for species here, which will do in pinch for discussion’s sake.) So for example no two dogs are exactly the same, but they _are_ exactly the same in being vertebrate hairy quadruped carnivores living socially etc etc (keep adding info til you get specific to dogs and only dogs). Similarly, calling someone a “twat” is not exactly the same as calling them a “weenie” in every way–but they are exactly the same in the sense that each is an example of calling someone a genital-based derogatory name. So–if you said “no one should call people by genital-based derogatory names,” but then you called someone a weenie, then there’s a prima facie case that you’re a hypocrite. But if you said “no one should call people by female genital based derogatory names,” and then called someone a weenie, then there’s no reason to think you’re a hypocrite. > [@](#): > > Regardless of the semantics, some amount of comparison or analysis needs to be done and without clarification a critic rarely has all of the facts he would need. I’m not sure if it’s rare or not. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypocrisy-not-so-much/641899.md?page=1)