Tu quoque is a retort that charges an adversary with being or doing what he or she criticizes in others, often translated as "you too."
Tu quoque es una réplica que acusa a un adversario de ser o hacer lo que critica en otros, a menudo traducido como "tú también".
| Front | tu quoque \TOO-KWOH-kwee\ |
|---|---|
| Back | noun A retort charging an adversary with being or doing what he or she criticizes in others. [A typical tu quoque involves charging your accuser with whatever it is you've just been accused of rather than refuting the truth of the accusation -- an evasive strategy that may or may not meet with success. The term has been active in the English language for about 400 years and has been put to use by a number of English writers, including C.S. Lewis, who penned, "your condemnation of my taste is insolent; only manners deter me from a tu quoque." The term is Latin in origin and translates as "you too," although the translation "you're another" is sometimes used as well (as in our second example sentence). "Tu quoque" functions in English as a noun, but it's often used attributively to modify other nouns, as in "a tu quoque argument."] "A good debater recognizes that resorting to a tu quoque only weakens one's position in the argument." |
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