I think that’s a little unfair. It wasn’t just have an “unexamined assumption”, he just declared that solidarity was the best way and named some organizations he liked, with no attempt at estimating and quantifying. And he’s critiquing EA, an ideology whose claim to fame is impact evaluations. Can an EA saying “okay that’s great, I agree that could be true… but how about having a quantitative impact evaluation… of any kind, at all, just to help cement the case” really be characterized as “whataboutism” / methodology war?
(I don’t think I agree with your first paragraph, but I do think it’s fair to argue that “but not all readers are in high income countries” is whataboutism until I more fully expand on what I think the practical implications are on impact evaluation. I’m going to save the discussion about the practical problems that arise from being first world centric for a different post, or drop them, depending on how my opinion changes after I’ve put more thought into it.)
I think that’s a little unfair. It wasn’t just have an “unexamined assumption”, he just declared that solidarity was the best way and named some organizations he liked, with no attempt at estimating and quantifying. And he’s critiquing EA, an ideology whose claim to fame is impact evaluations. Can an EA saying “okay that’s great, I agree that could be true… but how about having a quantitative impact evaluation… of any kind, at all, just to help cement the case” really be characterized as “whataboutism” / methodology war?
(I don’t think I agree with your first paragraph, but I do think it’s fair to argue that “but not all readers are in high income countries” is whataboutism until I more fully expand on what I think the practical implications are on impact evaluation. I’m going to save the discussion about the practical problems that arise from being first world centric for a different post, or drop them, depending on how my opinion changes after I’ve put more thought into it.)