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This has to be one of my biggest peeves online. It's such a pervasive tactic to shut down discussion of a topic that's disadvantageous for the "other side". To use a topical example I see pretty much all the time: say there is a reddit thread that has the title "1 in 4 women experience X". There is a pretty heavy implication, and it's there no matter how much people want to deny it, that by extension men don't experience X either at all or to such a degree. Yet, if you point it out that "men experience X just as often though?", you won't be refuted or shown statistics that show they don't, you'll just be accused of "whataboutism" ("what about the men?" - well, the fact that it takes an article like this to start some people saying "woah woah woah... this hasn't been proven yet!!" should tell you something) when what you were pointing out is that aforementioned subtext that men DON'T experience it.

I absolutely despise the word now, to the point I'll cringe a bit even when it's used legitimately.



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