No, it removes the personal judgement from the word "victim," where we decide whether a particular victim deserves their punishment as a preliminary to discussing their situation.

edit: i.e. where sympathetic people who are killed are victims, and unsympathetic people are killed are being portrayed as victims. It's an attempt to distract from the material facts of a situation with arguments about language.

Yes, and when they are really playing they become the victim of their own ploy.

Hancock is being proved right about his accusers.

But inventing spurious ad hominem accusations instead of offering a plausible counter-narrative is not a good look.

"He will get to the edge of something, but he won't say it, because he knows that his followers already know it. He can say, 'I didn't say that,' and he didn't say it, but everyone knew what he said because it was already known, right?"

How much accusation do you need?