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Scapegoat vs Blame - What's the difference?

scapegoat | blame |

As nouns the difference between scapegoat and blame

is that scapegoat is in the Mosaic Day of Atonement ritual, a goat symbolically imbued with the sins of the people, and sent out alive into the wilderness while another was sacrificed while blame is censure.

As verbs the difference between scapegoat and blame

is that scapegoat is to punish someone for the error or errors of someone else; to make a scapegoat of while blame is to censure (someone or something); to criticize.

scapegoat

English

(wikipedia scapegoat)

Noun

(en noun)
  • In the Mosaic Day of Atonement ritual, a goat symbolically imbued with the sins of the people, and sent out alive into the wilderness while another was sacrificed.
  • * 1646 , Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica , Book II, ch 5
    • alluding herein unto the heart of man and the precious bloud of our Saviour, who was typified by the Goat that was slain, and the scape-Goat in the Wilderness
  • Someone punished for the error or errors of someone else.
    • He is making me a scapegoat .
  • * 1834 , Thomas Babington Macaulay, "William Pitt, Earl of Chatham" [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2332]
    • The new Secretary of State had been long sick of the perfidy and levity of the First Lord of the Treasury, and began to fear that he might be made a scapegoat to save the old intriguer who, imbecile as he seemed, never wanted dexterity where danger was to be avoided.

    Synonyms

    * fall guy, patsy, whipping boy

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To punish someone for the error or errors of someone else; to make a scapegoat of.
  • :: Don't scapegoat me for your mistake.
  • * 1950 , Rachel Davis DuBois, Neighbors in Action: A Manual for Local Leaders in Intergroup Relations , p37
    • People tend to fear and then to scapegoat ... groups which seem to them to be fundamentally different from their own.
  • * 1975 , Richard M. Harris, Adam Kendon, Mary Ritchie Key, Organization of Behavior in Face-to-face Interaction , p66
    • They had been used for centuries to justify or rationalize the behavior of that status and conversely to scapegoat and blame some other category of people.
  • * 1992 , George H.W. Bush, State of the Union Address [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/5047]
    • And I want to add, as we make these changes, we work together to improve this system, that our intention is not scapegoating and finger-pointing.
  • * 2004 , Yvonne M. Agazarian, Systems-Centered Therapy for Groups , p208
    • Then either the world or others or the self becomes the target for the human tendency to scapegoat .
  • To blame something for the problems of a given society without evidence to back up the claim.

    • Related terms

    * scapegoater * scapegoatism

    See also

    * escape * stool pigeon, stoolie English calques English catachreses English terms derived from the Bible

    blame

    English

    Etymology 1

    (etyl), from (etyl)

    Noun

    (-)
  • Censure.
    • Blame came from all directions.
  • Culpability for something negative or undesirable.
    • The blame for starting the fire lies with the arsonist.
  • Responsibility for something meriting censure.
    • They accepted the blame , but it was an accident.
    Derived terms
    * put the blame on
    See also
    * fault

    Etymology 2

    (etyl), from (etyl) blasmer, from . Compare (blaspheme)

    Verb

    (blam)
  • To censure (someone or something); to criticize.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , III.ii:
    • though my loue be not so lewdly bent, / As those ye blame , yet may it nought appease / My raging smart [...].
  • *
    • These peculiarities of Dorothea's character caused Mr. Brooke to be all the more blamed in neighboring families for not securing some middle-aged lady as guide and companion to his nieces.
  • * 1919 , (Saki), ‘The Oversight’, The Toys of Peace :
    • That was the year that Sir Richard was writing his volume on Domestic Life in Tartary . The critics all blamed it for a lack of concentration.
  • * 2006 , Clive James, North Face of Soho , Picador 2007, p. 106:
    • I covered the serious programmes too, and indeed, right from the start, I spent more time praising than blaming .
  • (obsolete) To bring into disrepute.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , II.viii:
    • For knighthoods loue, do not so foule a deed, / Ne blame your honour with so shamefull vaunt / Of vile reuenge.
  • To assert or consider that someone is the cause of something negative; to place blame, to attribute responsibility (for something negative or for doing something negative).
    • The arsonist was blamed for the fire.
    Synonyms
    * reproach, take to task, upbraid * (consider that someone is the cause of something negative) hold to account
    Derived terms
    * blamer

    Anagrams

    * English reporting verbs