What, If Anything, Makes Hypocritical Blame Morally Wrong?

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter examines three different kinds of accounts of why hypocritical blame is wrong. First, it explores distribution-focused accounts, i.e., accounts that explain the wrongness of hypocritical blame in terms of how it distorts the distribution of some good, in casu, esteem. Second, it critically assesses two versions of blamer-focused accounts, i.e., commitment- and wrong-attention-based accounts. Finally, it considers five blamer-blamee-relation-focused accounts: the moral authority, the reciprocity, the moral community, the falsehood, and finally, the moral equality accounts. The last account says that hypocritical blame is wrongful because of how the blamer relates to the blamee as a superior. The chapter argues that the moral equality account—which, note, is an account of a different matter than the moral equality account of standing to blame that we encountered in Chapter 2—offers the best account. However, it does not submit that hypocritical blame cannot be wrong, in part, because of the wrong-making features appealed to by the other accounts.