# Two wrongs make a right

*Also called: Retaliation as justification*

- **Cluster:** Values and premises — Hidden value claims doing the arguing
- **Page:** https://fallacy.wiki/fallacy/two-wrongs/
- **In Arabic:** https://fallacy.wiki/ar/fallacy/two-wrongs.md
- **Licence:** CC BY 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

## 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.

## 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.

## Nearby

- [Whataboutism](https://fallacy.wiki/fallacy/whataboutism.md)
- [Tu quoque](https://fallacy.wiki/fallacy/tu-quoque.md)
- [Appeal to common practice](https://fallacy.wiki/fallacy/common-practice.md)

## Read more

- [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_wrongs_don%27t_make_a_right)
- [Fallacy Files](https://fallacyfiles.org/twowrong.html)

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From fallacy.wiki — a bilingual field guide to 91 logical fallacies, published by phi holdings. Licensed CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/): reuse freely with attribution to fallacy.wiki.