Hypocrisy Isn't Just for Politicians
Joe Scarborough had an interesting piece in Politico yesterday where he suggested that many on the left were engaging in moral hypocrisy by supporting President Obama’s actions in Libya while they condemned President Bush’s in Iraq. Simply put, Scarborough asks, “ How can the left call for the ouster of Muammar Qadhafi for the sin of killing hundreds of Libyans when it opposed the war waged against Saddam Hussein? During Saddam’s two decades in Iraq, he killed more Muslims than anyone in history and used chemical weapons against his own people and neighboring states.” He’s got a point. Although people can attempt to argue nuances, it’s hard to escape the label of hypocrisy when a person condemns others for actions or beliefs she herself embraces in similar situations.
Now, we know, the notion that politicians can be hypocrites may not come as shocking news to you. But what you may find surprising is just how readily most people will engage in the same behavior. Moral hypocrisy isn’t an aberrant occurrence; it’s a common aspect of the human mind.
If you don’t believe us, consider the following experiment we conducted in our lab. We brought people in and presented them with two different tasks that needed to be completed: one short and fun, one long an onerous. We told them that they had the option to assign themselves and the next person to the two tasks. We gave them a coin to flip, saying most people felt that was the fairest way to determine who was assigned to each task. Then we left them alone (except for the hidden video surveillance). What did they do? Over 80% of them simply assigned themselves the fun task, dooming the next soul to do the hard work. When they were subsequently asked to report how fairly they acted, they rated their behavior at about the middle of the scale – not overly fair, but not overly unfair either. But then we changed the game. Other people were brought in simply to watch the same actions unfold on the hidden video. That is, they saw another person enter the lab and assign himself the easy task without flipping the coin. When we asked them how fairly they thought this person behaved, quite a different pattern emerged. Everyone thought it was morally reprehensible. Hypocrisy – plain and simple.
But it gets even more interesting. Some of these “watchers” were told that the person they saw giving himself the better task without flipping the coin had a mathematical ability that was similar to theirs (and so was wearing a wristband of the same color as we asked the participants to wear). Now, of course, math ability should have no bearing here. Yes, that simple match – red to red or blue to blue wristband colors – was all it took for hypocrisy to be extended outward. If the “transgressor” was wearing the same color wristband as the participant who watched him screw over another person, the participant suddenly didn’t view his actions as unfair. But if the transgressor was wearing an opposing color, his actions were disgraceful (even though, objectively speaking, the actions were exactly the same). Apparently, it’s the same in Red and Blue America. Whether a decision by a president to engage militarily is defensible depends not so much on the objective facts, but on the match, or mismatch, in the political affiliations between the president and the observer.
If you don’t believe us, consider the following experiment we conducted in our lab. We brought people in and presented them with two different tasks that needed to be completed: one short and fun, one long an onerous. We told them that they had the option to assign themselves and the next person to the two tasks. We gave them a coin to flip, saying most people felt that was the fairest way to determine who was assigned to each task. Then we left them alone (except for the hidden video surveillance). What did they do? Over 80% of them simply assigned themselves the fun task, dooming the next soul to do the hard work. When they were subsequently asked to report how fairly they acted, they rated their behavior at about the middle of the scale – not overly fair, but not overly unfair either. But then we changed the game. Other people were brought in simply to watch the same actions unfold on the hidden video. That is, they saw another person enter the lab and assign himself the easy task without flipping the coin. When we asked them how fairly they thought this person behaved, quite a different pattern emerged. Everyone thought it was morally reprehensible. Hypocrisy – plain and simple.
But it gets even more interesting. Some of these “watchers” were told that the person they saw giving himself the better task without flipping the coin had a mathematical ability that was similar to theirs (and so was wearing a wristband of the same color as we asked the participants to wear). Now, of course, math ability should have no bearing here. Yes, that simple match – red to red or blue to blue wristband colors – was all it took for hypocrisy to be extended outward. If the “transgressor” was wearing the same color wristband as the participant who watched him screw over another person, the participant suddenly didn’t view his actions as unfair. But if the transgressor was wearing an opposing color, his actions were disgraceful (even though, objectively speaking, the actions were exactly the same). Apparently, it’s the same in Red and Blue America. Whether a decision by a president to engage militarily is defensible depends not so much on the objective facts, but on the match, or mismatch, in the political affiliations between the president and the observer.
