[10] The expression "mistakes were made" is commonly used as a rhetorical device, whereby a speaker acknowledges a situation was handled poorly or inappropriately but seeks to evade any direct admission or accusation of responsibility by using the passive voice.
Comedian Harry Shearer has coined the term ifpology for its frequent appearances on "The Apologies of the Week" segment of Le Show.
[14] One of the first references was in The New York Times by Richard Mooney in his 1992 editorial notebook "If This Sounds Slippery ... How to Apologize and Admit Nothing".
A famous example involved racially insensitive remarks made by golfer Fuzzy Zoeller about Tiger Woods: "It's too bad that something I said in jest was turned into something it's not.
[18] On September 16, 2015, Matt Damon made what Salon termed a "non-apology" apology when he said, "I am sorry that [my comments] offended some people, but, at the very least, I am happy that they started a conversation about diversity in Hollywood.
"[19] This was in reference to the backlash against Damon after he made comments about diversity to African American film producer Effie Brown on the September 13, 2015 debut of the HBO show Project Greenlight that were criticized as condescending.
Speaking on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in July 2020, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez dismissed what she called a non-apology apology from Rep. Ted Yoho for describing her as a "fucking bitch".
[22] Humorist Bruce McCall, in a 2001 New York Times piece entitled "The Perfect Non-apology Apology", defined the term as referring to "sufficiently artful double talk" designed to enable one to "get what you want by seeming to express regret while actually accepting no blame," and suggested some tongue-in-cheek apologies, such as: Nobody is sorrier than me that the police officer had to spend his valuable time writing out a parking ticket on my car.
Deborah Levi offers the following possibilities:[24] While the non-apology apology is clearly unsuited to situations where an expression of remorse, contrition, and future change are obviously desirable (e.g. the "happy ending" apology), it may prove extremely useful in situations where little can be done to assuage the apparent offence or prevent its repetition, as when an airline apologises for a delay, in the full knowledge that a future repetition is inevitable.
[25] Negotiators often use this tactic to calm tense situations: "an apology can defuse emotions effectively, even when you do not acknowledge personal responsibility for the action or admit an intention to harm.