False equivalence
Treats two unequal things as if they were the same.
Specimen
Both sides have made mistakes here — the company's safety lapses and the regulator's paperwork delays are equally concerning .
Fabricated passage — teaching example designed for clarity.
false equivalence — structural safety failures equated with administrative delay
Dissection
Both sides have made mistakes here — the company's safety lapses and the regulator's paperwork delays are equally concerning.
- 'both sides' presupposes symmetry
- magnitude unexamined
- 'equally' does all the work
Field notes
- Family
- Data & evidence issue
- Habitat
- political reporting, conflict coverage, business journalism
- Frequency
- found in 9% of analyzed articles
- Confused with
- Selective framing , False dichotomy
In the wild
"Critics of the policy and its defenders are equally guilty of overstatement."
Political analysis, broadsheet, February 2026
"Both the protesters and the police behaved badly on the day — there's no clean hands here."
News commentary, regional daily, April 2026
Why it works
'Both sides' framing feels like balance. The reader's fairness instinct rewards the author for apparent even-handedness — while the asymmetry goes unexamined.
Counter-move
Ask: are these actually comparable? Measure each on its own terms, not by proximity.
See it flagged in real articles while you read.
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