Only under the naive assumption that we assess things in isolation and not comparatively and in historical perspective.
>It's akin to saying, "We excuse X for doing something bad because Y (something to which we are ideologically opposed) did the same bad thing".
No, it's more akin to saying "You singled out X as the cause of something bad when it's also an attribute of Y".
E.g. something like: "- Python is slow because it's a GC language". "- Nope, Java and Swift also have GC and are very fast".
Also note that I never said anything about "excusing" -- I actually condemn both.
>In other words, it's the "side", not the "principle" you are arguing. If you take that position you can be an apologist for practically anything that happens.
What you can actually be is pragmatic, someone who assesses things in historical and relative perspective, instead of taking sides and singling out.
It's amazing how someone that begins by saying that "this discussion is only about X, anything else is irrelevant", accuses someone adding the stats for Y for comparison as "taking sides".