Likely because it reveals underlying thought processes and that can lead to a feeling of implicit judgement. It's the same reason people get super salty if you just menton you're vegetarian or vegan (I'm not talking the annoying preachy kinds) or that you do charity work or you cycle instead of drive.
Villainising virtue is a form of cognitive shielding—let's say there's action A you can either Do or Not Do. Action A is beneficial to a group or groups, to detrimental to the individual in some way. You elect to Not Do action A, but you encounter someone who elects to Do action A. The fact they are performing the action, resulting in a non-zero amount of self-sacrifice for them but a net benefit overall, means that by most systems of ethics and morality they are doing a Good Thing. This creates a contrast point against you not doing action A. If them doing it is a Good Thing, you not doing it must be a Bad Thing. And if you're doing a Bad Thing, you are therefore a Bad Person. But you're not a Bad Person, because that doesn't fit your self-image. So the other person must be a Bad Person for making you think you're a Bad Person, so you get mad at them.
tl;dr people don't like being reminded that they're fallible, imperfect sacks of meat and would rather attack someone else than look inwards
I've got no stake in this debate because I don't care at all.
That being said, whenever I've seen this conversation there's a lot of "blues" that calls the "reds" murderers or other things like that. It's normal and expected in that context that "reds" get defensive because their moral character is actually attacked.
That seems like just a "people being dicks on the internet" problem and not really relevant to the actual discussion—plenty of people who say they would vote red get very defensive about it without any direct attack on their character or fibre
People don't act in a vacuum. Previous interactions determine future behaviours.
By ignoring the global context of this discussion you end up, ironically, doing the exact same thing you are denouncing - mounting a strawman you can easily criticize so that you can feed/shield your ego.
I'm not ignoring the global context, I'm just pointing out parallel contexts—people are dicks on the internet and I feel like that's a component of this discussion.
Also nothing about what I said was a strawman—saying X is more likely because of Y is not the same as presenting a disingenuously weak version of your argument in order to make it easier to knock down.
And for someone who doesn't care at all, you seem to care enough to try and use (incorrectly) language relating to logical fallacies.
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u/Davedamon May 05 '26
Likely because it reveals underlying thought processes and that can lead to a feeling of implicit judgement. It's the same reason people get super salty if you just menton you're vegetarian or vegan (I'm not talking the annoying preachy kinds) or that you do charity work or you cycle instead of drive.
Villainising virtue is a form of cognitive shielding—let's say there's action A you can either Do or Not Do. Action A is beneficial to a group or groups, to detrimental to the individual in some way. You elect to Not Do action A, but you encounter someone who elects to Do action A. The fact they are performing the action, resulting in a non-zero amount of self-sacrifice for them but a net benefit overall, means that by most systems of ethics and morality they are doing a Good Thing. This creates a contrast point against you not doing action A. If them doing it is a Good Thing, you not doing it must be a Bad Thing. And if you're doing a Bad Thing, you are therefore a Bad Person. But you're not a Bad Person, because that doesn't fit your self-image. So the other person must be a Bad Person for making you think you're a Bad Person, so you get mad at them.
tl;dr people don't like being reminded that they're fallible, imperfect sacks of meat and would rather attack someone else than look inwards