What it is
Justifying a wrong by pointing to a comparable wrong done by someone else.
In the wild
They cut corners, so we can too.
How to answer it
Ask what makes the act acceptable in itself, independent of what others did.
Values and premises
Two wrongs make a right
Also called Retaliation as justification
In depth
Origin and naming
The earliest recorded version of the phrase appears in a 1734 poem in The London Magazine — 'two wrongs infer one right'. As a fallacy of relevance it is now counted among the most common in Western philosophy: an injury answered by naming another injury, as if the second canceled the first.
More places it shows up
Caught selling user data, the app's spokesperson notes that every major platform does it — and the press release ends there, as if the census were a defense.
After the foul is called, the midfielder appeals to the referee: their striker took a dive in the first half, so this one evens the ledger.
In a custody dispute, both parents produce lists of the other's missed pickups, each treating the other's record as a license for their own.
During the contract negotiation, one side leaks the counterpart's memo and answers the outcry with the last leak, three years ago, in the other direction.
How to spot it
- The reply relocates the conversation — your accusation is answered with someone else's biography.
- The scale in the metaphor: the second wrong is offered to 'balance' the first, and nothing else about the act is defended.
- Ask whether the response would stand if the other party had never existed; the pause tells you the justification was borrowed.