Pretexts abound in human social life. Smoke shops sell drug para- phernalia—pipes, bongs, vaporizers—as devices for “smoking tobacco.” Executives “voluntarily” step down to “spend more time with family.” When a hotel invites its guests to “consider the environment” before leaving their used towels out to be washed, its primary concern isn’t the environment but its bottom line. But to impose on guests merely to save money violates norms of hospitality—hence the pretext.16
