"According to lexicographer Ben Zimmer,[14] the term originated in Northern Ireland in the 1970s. Zimmer cites a 1974 letter by history teacher Sean O'Conaill which was published in The Irish Times where he complained about "the Whatabouts", people who defended the IRA by pointing out supposed wrongdoings of their enemy" (WP) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

Or we could just call it by its older name, the "Tu quoque" defense. "The Oxford English Dictionary cites John Cooke's 1614 stage play The Cittie Gallant as the earliest known use of the term in the English language.[1]"

C'mon, try harder.

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pasquinelli 10 hours ago | parent [-]

the point you're contesting is who coined the term, the unimportant part of the comment you're replying to. it sounds like you're saying, "of course the liberals are hypocrites, but they didn't coin the term!" is that what you mean to say?

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cmrdporcupine 10 hours ago | parent [-]

There is nothing "important" about the comment I'm replying to, it's well below HN commenting standards.

.. and yes, I see it's flagged/dead now.

	▲	milemi 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		If you go to the Google ngram viewer you won’t see a single occurrence of whataboutism before 2006. I’m not saying it was coined at the Liberals Coining Scare Words 2006 conference, but use of the word is a hallmark of a shitlib hypocrite. Whatabout and whataboutism are two different words.