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Scapegoat vs Victim - What's the difference?

scapegoat | victim |

As nouns the difference between scapegoat and victim

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 victim is original sense A living creature which is slain and offered as human or animal sacrifice, usually in a religious rite; by extension, the transfigurated body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist.

As a verb scapegoat

is to punish someone for the error or errors of someone else; to make a scapegoat of.

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

    victim

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (original sense) A living creature which is slain and offered as human or animal sacrifice, usually in a religious rite; by extension, the transfigurated body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist.
  • Anyone who is harmed by another.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1905, author=
    • , title= , chapter=1 citation , passage=“There the cause of death was soon ascertained?; the victim of this daring outrage had been stabbed to death from ear to ear with a long, sharp instrument, in shape like an antique stiletto, which […] was subsequently found under the cushions of the hansom. […]”}}
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-08, volume=407, issue=8839, page=55, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= Obama goes troll-hunting , passage=According to this saga of intellectual-property misanthropy, these creatures [patent trolls] roam the business world, buying up patents and then using them to demand extravagant payouts from companies they accuse of infringing them. Often, their victims pay up rather than face the costs of a legal battle.}}
  • An aggrieved or disadvantaged party in a crime (e.g. swindle.)
  • A person who suffers any other injury, loss, or damage as a result of a voluntary undertaking.
  • An unfortunate person who suffers from a disaster or other adverse circumstance.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1907, author=
    • , chapter=6, tritle= The Younger Set , passage=“I don't mean all of your friends—only a small proportion—which, however, connects your circle with that deadly, idle, brainless bunch—the insolent chatterers at the opera,
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-29, volume=407, issue=8842, page=28, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= High and wet , passage=Floods in northern India, mostly in the small state of Uttarakhand, have wrought disaster on an enormous scale.
  • (label) A character who is conquered or manipulated by a villain.