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Home » 2012 Campaign » How to understand one third of all political arguments
Aug21 10

How to understand one third of all political arguments

Posted by Jonathan Haidt in 2012 Campaign, Civility, Politics

I came across this (tongue in cheek) lament about the hypocrisy of the other side, on Volokh Conspiracy (but it’s floating around the internet):

Why is the other side of the debates I’m on always so hypocritical? They always jump on what my side says, and yet they willfully ignore all the faults on their own side. Let’s be honest about the double standard: The other side gets away with stuff that my side would never get away with. It’s just like the other side to be so deceitful: They’re always looking to score any advantage they can. People like that drive me crazy, and it seems like most of the people on the other side are just like that.

It’s a perfect distillation of the main point of Ch. 4 of The Righteous Mind (and ch. 4 of The Happiness Hypothesis). But blogs being blogs, people then set out to debate it. One commenter offered the perfect summation of what happens in maybe a third of all arguments about things that Obama (or any president) does:

It isn’t just a matter of each side claiming that the other side is hypocritical, and you have to figure out which (or both). The following often happens:

1) Right criticizes Obama for doing X
2) Left (correctly) points out that Bush did X, and Right didn’t care then
3) Right (correctly) points out that Left cared when Bush did X, but don’t now.

 

Of course, the same happens in reverse with the Left initiating the first complaint. Essentially, both sides are actually admitting hypocrisy, but for some reason they only care that the other side is hypocritical. This is a truly horrible form of discussion, and a neutral observer does not need to think hard to figure out which side is “right,” because both sides are wrong.

Amen. It is indeed striking that the response to the charge of hypocrisy is rarely apology, it’s usually “but, but, but… you do it too.” That’s what you’d expect if we all carry around in our heads a little inner press secretary, or inner lawyer.

—————

Update: By amazing coincidence, Ramesh Ponnuru published yesterday a much more extensive and deeply insightful version of the “they’re all hypocrites” rant. His (tongue in cheek) rant should be required reading for all citizens. (hat tip to Independent Whig, below)

Update #2: By even more amazing coincidence, A. Barton Hinkle of the Richmond Times Dispatch, wrote an essay similar to Ponnuru’s the day before his was published. This one’s called “The Wrong Side Absolutely Must Not Win”. (Hat tip to Brian Keegan, below)

10 Comments

  1. The Independent Whig | August 21, 2012 at 5:55 pm

    Ramesh Ponnuru has similar thoughts in an article entitled “I’m Right, You’re Wrong and Other Political Truths,” on Bloomberg, here: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-20/i-m-right-you-re-wrong-and-other-political-truths.html

    Reply
  2. DNW | August 21, 2012 at 6:18 pm

    It might be worthwhile for someone to explore distinctions between the terms “hypocrisy” and “double standard”

    Hypocrisy is obviously an inconsistency between the moral preachment delivered, and the behavior of someone who claims to be, or to self-identify, as one of us. It’s a probably a more or less conscious and deliberate pretense. A so-called double standard involves an inconsistency, or seeming inconsistency, of judgment rendered according to some principle.

    It’s easy to identify a hypocrite once the facts are out. It’s less easy to evaluate the sin of judging by a double standard, especially if one considers expected consequences or benefits to supposedly vital interests, and whether “like” actors are really being judged differently; or, whether what is being evaluated are really in fact like actors or agents. It might be easy, it might not: If I make it a rule that no one shall be allowed to steal my pears, and then shoot a squirrel out of my tree while sparing my nephew who is later seen climbing up, no one rational would call that a double standard. Some however might complain – on what grounds could be debated – if I readily gave my biological brother balmy weather hospitality in my house while denying critical shelter to Maoist Bill Ayers, thus consciously condemning him by my refusal to slowly freeze to death in a sleet storm. And probably all would object if I regularly sentenced otherwise identical burglars to wildly different sentences with the only detectable difference between them in case or personal history being skin color.

    That aside, I figure most people probably will tolerate their side breaking the rules, or bending as they would say, because they trust their “intentions”, imagine their “better” connection with reality and more acute recognition of exigent circumstances. They trust their party not to “go too far” (in the wrong direction anyway) with their powers, and feel that somehow, that that particular instance of rule breaking will not be long noticed, remembered, or survive to stand as an eventually negatively redounding precedent.

    Reply
  3. Brian Keegan | August 22, 2012 at 2:40 am

    This is either from or similar to a lengthier piece written by A Barton Hinkle of the Richmond Times Dispatch, arguing generically that the “other side” must not win. It’s pretty comical.

    You related the tendency of threads to devolve into a certain type of debate. My buddy Tully has a quick name for this sort of stuff, he calls it CPD for comparative political demonology. If you participate in enough threads with people from both “sides,” you discover that threads have an overwhelming tendency to devolve into a battle over which side is worse, via battles of anecdotes. People are quite good as seeing that the patterns occur on both side, but they’re just as certain that the other side is much worse, and that because the other side is much worse, what their side does in response is “fair play.”

    Reply
    • Jonathan Haidt | August 26, 2012 at 3:25 pm

      Thanks so much for this link, now posted at the end of the main text above. And these are helpful terms — battle of the anecdotes; our side is justified by fair play…

      Reply
  4. Scott Wagner | August 25, 2012 at 6:20 am

    I believe the phenomenon we’re talking about is a result of the combination of naive realism and our objectivity assumption. Naive realism (WYSIWYG) allows us to assume we see the whole truth, and our objectivity assumption (our inability to inspect the nonconscious mind to find the biases we use; and we see no bias as we carefully inspect our conscious mind) allows us to affirm to ourselves that we are unbiased observers. We see their stupidity/evil/bias but don’t see our own, thanks to naive realism: then we use our objectivity assumption to seal the deal, providing ourselves confidence that we’re objective. This generates an autopiloted form of tit-for-tat, as both parties, freed from seeing their own bias, feel that the other started the problem or escalated it. As Brian intimated, the nonconscious bias eventually reveals itself pretty clearly via tacit admission of bias, the kind of thing we’re familiar with in arguing young siblings, with wan justifications for behavior as necessary followup to superior evil, etc. This routine is essentially a product of the human condition, of rattling around in only the well-lit portions of our own minds, with no outside reference.

    A related corollary is the way our asymmetrical view into bias allows *both* parties to win *every* argument, as poll results of debates almost always show. That nice slug of assured victory is why Anne Coulter and Al Franken drool to get back in the fight. The end result of the argument loop and tit-for-tat is greater certainty for both, which is, after all, what both our nonconscious minds are primarily after. In this sense, it’s quite accurate to say that the two arguers nonconsciously collude to do the kindness of reinforcing safety/certainty/consistency for each other. the made-up faces up front are vituperative, but in the back rooms of our minds, there’s a long round of high-fives going on. I think this collusion phenomenon is quite important, and went over it in more detail in the second half of .

    Reply
    • Scott Wagner | August 25, 2012 at 6:27 am

      [continuing] a post at http://www.reachtheright.com/2012/01/25/264/#more-264

      Reply
  5. ethan | August 25, 2012 at 9:34 pm

    Precisely, and the solution is to discard tribalism (in group loyalty, obedience to authority,etc) or at least as much as is rationally possible.
    The beehive right has more of this, and there the democrats have their share of obama fanatics.
    Reject tribalism/labels to both parties….

    Not just reject tribalism of the 2 parties because that messes with the tribalism of the nation state (as you do), or encouraging the democrats to get rid of whatever tiny differences they have with conservatives.

    You should read VAST LEFT and Glenn Greenwald… You don’t watch MSNBC and fox to get the truth, read non polarized tribalistic media from them…

    Reply
  6. ethan | August 25, 2012 at 9:37 pm

    “… we adopt the principle of universality: if an action is right (or wrong) for others, it is right (or wrong) for us. Those who do not rise to the minimal moral level of applying to themselves the standards they apply to others — more stringent ones, in fact — plainly cannot be taken seriously when they speak of appropriateness of response; or of right and wrong, good and evil.
    In fact, one of the, maybe the most, elementary of moral principles is that of universality, that is, If something’s right for me, it’s right for you; if it’s wrong for you, it’s wrong for me. Any moral code that is even worth looking at has that at its core somehow.”
    – Noam Chomsky
    (I would highly recommend reading him)

    Reply
    • Brian Keegan | August 30, 2012 at 10:47 pm

      What if rejecting tribalism for universalism is a pipe dream?

      Reply
  7. Brian | November 13, 2016 at 1:13 pm

    Good post. But what can be said if there’s a pattern of the hypocrisy being asymmetrical?

    Where one side offers an average amount of hypocrisy and the other side consistently takes a maximalist approach?

    Reply

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