A Plea For More Honesty In Wine

There is no need for leaning on pretense if your point is a sound one

PRETENSE:

“an attempt to make something that is not the case appear true.”

“a claim, especially a false or ambitious one.”

This issue of the Fermentation Newsletter is about using pretense in the world of wine. I don’t know if pretense is used more commonly in the wine industry than in other industries and endeavors and I’m not here to say that its use as a rhetorical device is endemic in wine. I only want to point out that it is most commonly used in wine to deceive readers or listeners or the industry. And I think we can do better.

The resort to pretense in making one’s case is not always done on purpose. Sometimes the practice of using pretense to make one’s case amounts to a misunderstanding brought on by a person not studiously examining their own position or bias. Sometimes it is just rhetorical laziness. But sometimes it is used in a nefarious way. Let’s take a look.

PRETENSE IN WINE REGULATION