Subconscious processes in the brain can convince us we’re being good, even when we’re not
COMMENT
Here’s something that’s surprisingly common: people who strongly espouse moral or noble ideals, but regularly use them to justify attacking and mistreating others – something which is surely neither moral nor noble.
Isn’t this inconsistent? How can someone loudly insist they’re a good person while behaving in ways that totally contradict this, without mentally short-circuiting in some way?
The answer is that there are many psychological and neurological processes that allow people to engage in this behaviour that, for want of a better label, we’ll call ‘virtue bullying’.
A lot of virtue bullying could be seen as virtual bullying, which is to say it’s a lot easier online.
We’ve all seen Facebook posts that make some simple, morally solid claim, such as “Cancer is bad”, or “I support victims of [latest disaster]”, which are then followed by something like “Share if you agree. I bet 97 per cent of you won’t.”
Such posts are basically saying, “I’m a good, moral person… and I’ll manipulate you and malign your character until you agree.” This isn’t the behaviour of a good person.
But it’s not internet-specific. Wanting to protect children is a good, moral aim, but consider all the books and shows banned or attacked in the US under the guise of protecting children.
Indeed, the many atrocities committed in the name of a ‘kind, benevolent’ God or religion means history is awash with self-described good, moral people doing very bad things.
Good people treating others badly makes more sense when you realise there are several unconscious processes happening in our brains that help convince us we’re ‘good’, even if we’re not.
There’s the fading affect bias, which leads to memories linked to negative emotions being forgotten more easily; hindsight bias, which causes us to convince ourselves that a past event was inevitable; impression management, a phenomenon that leads to our brains constantly exaggerating our best qualities, and many others.
As one 2014 study found, our brains work hard to preserve, and enhance, our self-esteem. But self-esteem is heavily influenced by other people and our relative social ‘status’. We want to be liked and hate rejection. A 2011 study found that an effective way to
