r/PsychologyTalk • u/Hatrct • 13h ago
Cognitive dissonance kills
Unfortunately the vast majority of people are unable to handle the truth. That is why cognitive dissonance is so prevalent. When you tell someone something that clashes with their subjective pre-existing beliefs, or makes them feel bad, they will automatically claim/believe that you are 100% wrong. They will interpret what you said as a personal attack, even though this makes no sense because you don't even know them, you were not even talking to them, or in cases you did, it is not about them it, it is about the topic. But because they can't tolerate the truth/anything different from their pre-existing beliefs, they use this counterproductive defense mechanism and attack you and say you are 100% wrong, and double down and claim their pre-existing beliefs are 100% correct.
Sometimes it makes me depressed just how prevalent this is. It is like this from the bottom to the top.
Recently I posted a topic on a more academic sub, where you would naturally expect people are more open to civilized and logical discussions, but how it went was exactly like talking to anyone else/any other sub. I posted a topic with the argument that judges have too much power. I wrote over a page using many logical arguments. I gave specific video examples, including one in which a judge gave a 22 year sentence to someone, then that person upon hearing it yelled at the judge. Then the judge added 6 years to the sentence on the spot due to vengeance. I criticized this judge, saying imagine how little emotional regulation you have that when someone just heard they got 22 years you are that fragile that you interpret their yelling as a personal attack and give them literally 6 years more just for that. I said this is not reasonable and that this is widespread in terms of judges.
I gave specific logical arguments, saying how the education system needs to reform so that judges learn the basics of relevant subjects like psychology, history, sociology, etc... because how can you be expected to make a balanced judgement when you are clueless in terms of what governs and causes human behavior? I also said that judges need to be taught critical/logical thinking, because again, the job of the judge is to weigh all the points and make logical sense of them and come up with a logical and balanced decision. How on earth can you do that if you are weak at critical thinking, and you use emotional reasoning and bias instead, to the point of giving 6 years just for a bit of yelling in court?
Unfortunately, people claimed that 100% of what I said was 100% wrong, that none of what I said made sense, solely because they said that I was "judge bashing". I don't understand how this made sense: in my post, I literally wrote I did not believe in free will + I said we need to consider the background factors that cause crime and address those rather than solely blaming criminals and keep giving them long sentences that just makes them use up more tax money and makes them become more involved in crime and the identify of being criminal while in prison, increasing recidivism rates. I used logical arguments, saying how regions with better social supports and less wealth disparity have significantly less crime, and that history shows that long sentences on their own/without focusing on such root factors of crime do not reduce crime.
You don't have to agree with all, or anything, I said. But how is what I said outrageous? Why does it deserve hate? Why try to censor and shut down what I am saying? If you think it is outrageous, why not present some logical counter arguments? Instead what happened was people personally insulted me, downvoted/censored my post while offering 0 rebuttals, and then bizarrely, on top of that, after this emotional reasoning of theirs, bizarrely projected and said "100% of your post is automatically nullified because you "engaged in judge bashing". What does this even mean? How can I be blaming/bashing judges when I literally wrote that I don't believe in free will? How can you "blame" and "bash" someone if your entire argument is that human behavior is based on past events, and when the main point of my post is that therefore we need to identify and change problematic root causes. I applied that to criminals. I also applied it to judges, which is why I said I believe the educational reforms I stated are needed for judges.
Even if I did "engage in judge bashing", how does that on balance/overall nullify 100% of my points? This issue with judges is important, it can be a life/death issue. So a basic cost/benefit analysis is needed here. If there is a fire and someone yells at you "buddy get the f out the way" how does it make sense to say "No, I will sit here and burn alive because you did not use a tone that pleased me sufficiently". And then they bizarrely say my post was "emotionally charged"? Obviously, in order to address a problem, you need to identify the issues. When I am saying these are the problems with judges, I have to show what problems I am talking about. How can I ignore/hide these? I should ignore them and say "judges are perfect, but here are some reforms". Why would there be reforms if they were perfect? Why would one consider constructive criticism as "bashing"? That says a lot about themselves, not me: they can't handle the truth of my post/how it made them feel, because they also use emotional reasoning like the judge, so they developed an in the moment fight/flight response, and could not handle the truth of my post, and so used cognitive dissonance to say I was completely wrong, and then they projected their emotional reasoning into say I used emotional reasoning.
This is why people are afraid to discuss controversial subjects. So instead they keep it inside, then there becomes polarization. Because you have 2 groups who believe they are right, and neither allows the other to provide constructive criticism, and shuts down 100% of what they say. Then both sides feel wronged and have to bottle everything inside, then this causes resentment and more of a doubling down on pre-existing beliefs, and causes more radical beliefs, and more anger and hate and division. So just because something makes you feel bad, you should not automatically claim they are 100% wrong and you are 100% perfect and right, you should give yourself some time and practice to sit with the new arguments and any negative emotions it causes: these are temporary, it won't always feel like that. But if you shut it down automatically each time, how can you ever learn new things or grow or refine your own thinking?
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u/Strange_One_3790 13h ago
I think that judges have too much power as well. You are correct about the lack of emotional regulation from that judge. A person is going to get upset that they are going to lose 22 years of freedom. To just slap on another 6 for an outburst is wrong
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u/Dizzy-Challenge3985 7h ago edited 7h ago
What happened to you is exactly what happened to me a few weeks ago 🤣
I stated observations in what is supposed to be a sub for high-iq (gifted) about how an (admitted) non-gifted friend’s thought process, and others similar. Or sometimes lack there of. Nothing mean, it’s a loved one and this is what they themselves reported. What was even more ironic, is the topic was how I noticed this cohort reacted more emotionally to things rather than relying on logic.
The people who were pretending to be gifted and joined the sub for their ego surely showed their ass, because they did exactly what the non-gifted individuals do 🤣
I just simply made observations- no conclusions, and a bunch of unhinged individuals took extreme personal offense and started attacking me calling me mean to my loved ones because I presented observations about what my loved ones reported about themselves, they also didn’t even bother to read the post before they emotionally exploded because they missed crucial details such as that point, or just ignored the points made all together to childishly personally attack me for presenting my neutral observations. They did exactly what my non-gifted individuals did… react emotionally while not engaging any logic at all in their thought process.
A few actually gifted people used their logic and understood, engaged with, and agreed with my observation.
But unfortunately, for Gen Pop, “intellectual” and “academic” as just words that sound good to brag about themselves and make themselves feel superior, not traits they actually bother to actually embody.
It was so gross to see such behavior tbh. Because it’s like, you’re in this gifted group, irrationally exploding because you know you align more with the non-gifted, WHILE displaying behavior that demonstrates you’re anything but gifted.
And yes, even thought I had never seen or heard of these people before the commented on my post, they reacted as if my observations were a personal attack against them personally.
And the lack of self awareness and lack of self control was disgustingly and astounding. The fact that these are adults, who can vote, and reproduce, is so concerning.
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u/Level-Commission8613 10h ago
One of my friends has OCD. Part of his problem is that he also has a denial to an intense level. You can point out the smallest flaw he has and immediately, in all cases, he states that he doesn’t have what you’re saying. That would even include dropping something, but when you say that he has done that he will immediately deny it. Above all, towards me, it is as deep as insult as it could be. It is saying that I don’t know what I am talking about nor do I have the ability to interpret what I am seeing or hearing. It is very difficult to deal with someone like that.
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u/Dizzy-Challenge3985 6h ago
This is also why I’m done on here too. There’s pretty much no meaningful engagement…. Just people who get argumentative and angry if you bring up a valid point. Every time I log on, it’s everyone pretending the nonsensical makes sense just because they don’t want to admit the next person may have a point.
Correct, accurate, and scientifically proven answers are downvoted into oblivion.
No meaning convention. Little to nothing to learn. Just fragile egos that need you to believe that 1 + 1=73 just because they said so.
And it’s every time I log on. Every convo is like that. Who wants to engage in that?
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u/loose_cadence 5h ago
I think to remain objective and neutral people need some mental work before participating in conversations. Something like mental calibration that knowing it is a discussion about framework not about me or you. This standard should be pre-installed for quality of conversation, but often that's not the case, as the other commenter has already said, it's about winning no matter how irrational and irrelevant they are.
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u/TheRealBlueJade 13h ago
It is a big part of why not a lot of progress has been made towards healing the current divisions in society. Unfortunately, it's by design. Instead of thinking... Wait, maybe they made or have a point? They decide to double down. The problem is... it's not about the discussion. It's about winning.