An American Culture Divide: Honor Culture

The program Hidden Brain that NPR broadcasts weekly recently aired a segment, Made of Honor, about honor culture. That strikes me as one source of the deep cultural divide that is tearing American society, politics and governance apart. This difference in cultural mindset tends to lead some modern Americans to distrust and dislike or even hate each other. I first came across this concept a few years ago, but this 54 minute broadcast lays it out with clarity and in detail. 

In brief, researchers believe that honor culture came to America mostly from southern Scotland immigrants. Most of those immigrants and their descendants settled mostly in the American south and west. Honor culture tends to thrive in small rural communities. In some contexts this can be a good thing. But when the honor of someone in such a community has received a threat to their honor, the results can be catastrophic. Even relatively small verbal insults to honor can lead to violence.

In a 2021 paper, To be Liked or Feared: Honor-Oriented Men’s Sensitivity to Masculine Reputation Concerns Depends on Status-Seeking Strategy, by the researcher interviewed for this program, Ryan Brown, the honor culture is described like this:

Cultures of honor are societies that strongly emphasize values of loyalty and integrity, as well as the need to defend and maintain one’s reputation. Research has focused heavily on men’s acquisition of repute as tough and masculine and their use of physical aggression for reputational defense, but much less is known about whether men display similar vigilance in managing their reputation for other elements of honor (e.g., loyalty, integrity). The two primary routes for men in honor cultures to acquire reputation—through acts of aggression or integrity—resemble evolutionary accounts of status acquisition in which men can gain status via dominance or prestige.

.... the present work tested the hypotheses that (1) honor endorsement would positively predict both status seeking strategies, (2) that dominance-strategists would be sensitive to masculinity threats and boosts, and (3) that honor-oriented men’s sensitivity to masculinity threats (and boosts) would be indirectly explained by the use of dominance-based, but not prestige-based, strategies to acquire status and reputation. Results supported these hypotheses. We also found evidence that the prestige-based strategy seemed to buffer against masculinity threats.

In honor culture the reputation of a person and their family is paramount. An insult can provoke a physical or sometimes violent reaction. Dignity culture mindsets tend to be less physically confrontational. One source described honor vs dignity culture differences like this: 

Honor cultures place importance on socially conferred worth, reputation, and a positive social image, all of which can be granted or taken away by others. In contrast, dignity cultures place importance on context independent, individual, and inherent worth, which is less affected by the social regard of others. Thus, responding to insults is more important in honor cultures than dignity cultures.

The soil that honor culture grows in: Two factors, (1) insecurity associated with poverty and economic instability, and (2) weak trust or belief in the rule of law tend to give rise to and maintain an honor culture mindset. When those two factors are prominent in a mindset, a solid personal reputation is needed to deal with both concerns, even if the concerns are mostly illusions. One's reputation is what will keep others from messing with a person, their family and their possessions. People know that a person with a solid reputation will respond aggressively and sometimes violently to threats or transgressions. Reputation is protection.

Although honor culture tends to be socially polite, threats or insults can easily and quickly escalate into physical confrontation or occasional violence. Because honor culture a social norm, it carried over into modern America even though the conditions that honor culture arose in centuries ago in Scotland[1] are no longer relevant. In a dignity culture, a person tends to retain their social status, but in an honor culture, lost status tends to be hard or impossible to regain so it has to be actively defended, by force if deemed necessary.

What about politics?

Ryan Brown's research finds a consistent but only modest correlation with honor and conservatism. But if honor's perceived political opposition can be singled out and made to appear to be disrespectful, that can create an illusion that the opposition is an enemy and thus subject to harsh treatment. I suspect that is why phrases such as "the enemy of the people" is used by partisan propagandists to foment negative emotional responses against political opposition. In politics, the enemy is not right in front of the average person. From the broadcast it is not apparent how important honor is in partisan culture wars. I suspect it is not trivial (~10% influential?) but do not have an empirical basis to attach a level of influence.

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Topics touched on in the broadcast include these: 

32:30 - in experiments with actors staging a man verbally attacking his female partner, women in honor culture respond more positively to men showing honor in their attack - honor women try to soften a man's honor grounded attack in public more on a than when a woman is attacked on non-honor grounds (Tammy Wynett: Stand by Your Man)

35:00  - Afghanistan honor culture, probably the most extreme in the world - police responses to domestic violence generally favor men

36:15 - laws in honor states - stand your ground laws & castle doctrine self-defense rises in prominence over murder

~41:00 honor is in defense of self, family and group

42:00 mental health stigmas in honor culture - there is less investment in mental health care funding and availability in honor states 

43:30  honor and suicide - suicide from dishonor and self-inflicted shame among white men is higher, especially as age increases

~47:00 gun ownership - best predictor of suicide rates; suicide rate is higher in honor states than dignity states, regardless of gun ownership

48:13 - honor and politics - red vs blue states - consistent but modest connection between honor and conservatism; honor ideology disconnects from political ideology, but they can sometimes be combined - demonized political out-group in honor mindsets becomes the enemy and needs to be treated harshly (killed)

50:30 - honor means loyalty and caring for close people - but also it's sometimes a hair trigger for self-defense in face of disrespect

Footnote:

1. Honor cultures also arose in other places, including Africa and Asia. The most influential source in modern America appears to be the UK, mainly Scotland. 

Honest Discourse -- fake news, propaganda, and the market of ideas

 I recently discussed a topic in my Philosophy Cafe that you folks would probably get something out of.  It was a set of thoughts and musings about Honest Discourse, fake news, propaganda, and democracy.  Here you folks go -- my Phil Cafe discussion seed:  

 Musings on Fake News and honesty in a democracy

One of the better approaches I have seen to the morality of honesty, is a Libertarian argument.  It goes: 

·         we require knowledge to make effective decisions. 

·         and every lie told, degrades the quality of information available to us

·         therefore lying is a form of theft from everyone, and causes everyone else’s situation to worsen.  

There is a similar form of argument relative to the policy choices of a democracy, and fake news:

·         democracies must make choices about policy direction

·         those choices  will be effective only if there is a reasonably working Free Market of Ideas, plus valid data to evaluate and inform those Ideas

·         Fake news – propaganda – sabotages that free market of ideas, and poisons the data supply

·         Propagandists are therefore anti-democracy, by weakening effectiveness, also anti-the welfare of the nation they operate within (anti-patriots).

*What do you folks think of these two arguments, and how important/relevant do you consider them to our current political discourse? 

However, “rhetoric” (the art of persuasion, whether dishonest or not) was a skill taught in the ancient democracies, and there was nothing like a free press to provide them real rather than fake news.  So our ancient democracies were formed in an environment with dishonesty, and likely fake news as features.  Also, the idea of dishonesty in political speech, and the spreading of fake news, was considered a major public good by one of our major political theorists, Machiavelli.  And our current democracy has had political calumny, and propagandizing newspapers, plus a yellow press, as central features of its politics from the beginning. 

*So – is democracy robust enough to survive fake news, and intrinsic dishonesty by politicians and their supporters?  Does history show it is?  Or, because ancient democracies fell, and modern ones appear to be easily subverted, does it show they are instead fragile/unstable? 

I tend to trace the current situation to the Soviet Union, whose Communist party adopted the principle that “everything is politics”.  IE, power is the end all and be all of any moral thinking, and if one is in the right (Communism was a moral movement, to break the eternal monopoly of power of the robber baron oligarchs), then one SHOULD do everything possible to get and keep power, to prevent the evil “others” from displacing one’s morally just movement from implementing good policies.  In the area of honesty and news, this leads to what I call “Pravda truth” after the Soviet party newspaper, Pravda.  It very absurdly could change policy daily about what was “true” in a given subject, based on the party-identified political advantages of the day. 

Politicians have long recognized that the unrestricted pursuit of “Pravda Truth” in politics can lead to national catastrophe.  This lead to a guideline in US politics “politics ends at the nation’s borders” or “at the edge of the sea”.  The idea was that political lies to gain power that don’t affect foreign relations are OK, but that once one gets involved with other countries, the harm to the nation from “Pravda Truth” is severe enough that politicians should forego any short term advantage Pravda Truth offers.   I consider the unrestricted application of Pravda Truth to our politics to have been initiated by Newt Gingrich,  and subsequently to have been adopted by much of the Republican party.  Its spread, primarily to Republicans since then, but increasingly across the entire political spectrum, strikes me as a new event – WORSE than what the US politics looked like relative to truth in the past. 

*Is my tracing of this extreme approach to truth to the Soviets appropriate? 

*Do you folks agree that Newt Gingrich was a key negative actor, and that the spread across the Rep party today, and beyond in the future, is a reasonable description of what is happening? 

*Is the current US truth environment really a major change of mode?

*If it is new, is the history I noted no longer relevant? 

One further point -- Fake News/propaganda for it to serve a political movement, faces a major challenge. A political movement benefits form its own Free Market of ideas, where it can find better policies, tactics, and rationales. But such a dialog cannot take place in a propaganda Fake News forum. The policy that is being propagandized for, cannot be debated or tweaked in a propaganda forum. It seem to me that such movements therefore must either operate secret discussion fora, which creates an extreme risk of leaks that could sabotage the propaganda, or must do without any self-examination and revision whatsoever.

* Is the problem of difficulty of tuning/revision of a political message actually a problem for Fake News movements?

*Can two levels of fora work?

*What happens to propaganda movements that cannot operate two levels of discussion outlets, the public and the secret?

Here is one possible answer to my last question: https://getpocket.com/explore/item/most-dictators-self-destruct-why?utm_source=pocket-newtab. It notes that propaganda movements that believe their own propaganda (don't operate an effective "realism" fora) make gross mistakes, that lead to their falling. Of course, there was almost 2000 years between the Roman Republic and the American Revolution, so history adds the caveat that they may fall, but then get replaced with another propaganda movement ...

 

by dcleve

Particle physics: Uh oh! Maybe we just found something new!!

CONTEXT

Muon is lower left, T (time) is the y-axis, the other stuff is 

fiddly bits of the universe (I think, maybe)

μ−
 → 
e−
 + 
ν
e + 
ν
μ

μ+
 → 
e+
 + 
ν
e + 
ν
μ

The mean lifetime, τ = ħ/Γ, of the (positive) muon is (2.1969811±0.0000022) μs (microsecond). Certain neutrino-less decay modes are kinematically allowed but are, for all practical purposes, forbidden in the Standard Model, even given that neutrinos have mass and oscillate. Examples forbidden by lepton flavor conservation are:

μ−
 → 
e−
 + 
γ

and

μ−
 → 
e−
 + 
e+
 + 
e−
 .

There you go, lepton flavor forbids it and that's that.  Right, I don't understand any of that either, but it sounds cool to nerds. Well, OK, sounds cool to me. Jeez, tough crowd. Everybody's a critic.

Muon: an unstable subatomic particle of the same class as an electron (a lepton), but with a mass around 200 times greater; muons make up much of the cosmic radiation reaching the earth's surface; muons are unstable elementary particles, heavier than electrons and neutrinos but lighter than all other matter particles; they decay via the weak interaction to at least an electron, and two neutrinos

The possible big gap in our knowledge

Aw, schizz. Here we go again. Once again, the human mind may be on the verge of another massive shift on its probably still-primitive understanding of the universe. The New York Times writes:

Experiments with particles known as muons suggest that there are forms of matter and energy vital to the nature and evolution of the cosmos that are not yet known to science.

Evidence is mounting that a tiny subatomic particle seems to be disobeying the known laws of physics, scientists announced on Wednesday, a finding that would open a vast and tantalizing hole in our understanding of the universe.

The result, physicists say, suggests that there are forms of matter and energy vital to the nature and evolution of the cosmos that are not yet known to science. The new work, they said, could eventually lead to breakthroughs more dramatic than the heralded discovery in 2012 of the Higgs boson, a particle that imbues other particles with mass.

“This is our Mars rover landing moment,” said Chris Polly, a physicist at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, or Fermilab, in Batavia, Ill., who has been working toward this finding for most of his career. Evidence is mounting that a tiny subatomic particle seems to be disobeying the known laws of physics, scientists announced on Wednesday, a finding that would open a vast and tantalizing hole in our understanding of the universe.

The particle célèbre is the muon, which is akin to an electron but far heavier, and is an integral element of the cosmos. Dr. Polly and his colleagues — an international team of 200 physicists from seven countries — found that muons did not behave as predicted when shot through an intense magnetic field at Fermilab.

The aberrant behavior poses a firm challenge to the Standard Model, the suite of equations that enumerates the fundamental particles in the universe (17, at last count) and how they interact.

“This is strong evidence that the muon is sensitive to something that is not in our best theory,” said Renee Fatemi, a physicist at the University of Kentucky.

The results, the first from an experiment called Muon g-2, agreed with similar experiments at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in 2001 that have teased physicists ever since. “After 20 years of people wondering about this mystery from Brookhaven, the headline of any news here is that we confirmed the Brookhaven experimental results,” Dr. Polly said. 

The team had to accommodate another wrinkle. To avoid human bias — and to prevent any fudging — the experimenters engaged in a practice, called blinding, that is common to big experiments. In this case, the master clock that keeps track of the muons’ wobble had been set to a rate unknown to the researchers. The figure was sealed in envelopes that were locked in the offices at Fermilab and the University of Washington in Seattle.

In a ceremony on Feb. 25 that was recorded on video and watched around the world on Zoom, Dr. Polly opened the Fermilab envelope and David Hertzog from the University of Washington opened the Seattle envelope. The number inside was entered into a spreadsheet, providing a key to all the data, and the result popped out to a chorus of wows.

“That really led to a really exciting moment, because nobody on the collaboration knew the answer until the same moment,” said Saskia Charity, a Fermilab postdoctoral fellow who has been working remotely from Liverpool, England, during the pandemic. 

There was pride that they had managed to perform such a hard measurement, and then joy that the results matched those from Brookhaven.

“This seems to be a confirmation that Brookhaven was not a fluke,” Dr. Carena, the theorist, said. “They have a real chance to break the Standard Model.”

Ye Gods, these yahoos want to break the Standard Model. Satanists!

The pipsqueak

The Muon g-2 ring studies the wobble of muons as they travel through the magnetic 

field -- note the two squirts in the lower center of the inner ring, they're people

Well, what can one say. A possible discovery more bigger that the 2012 discovery of the Higgs boson, the God particle[1], is mind blowing. 

Pipsqueaks inspecting the Muon-g2 ring in 2013 --

notice how all the shit is bolted to the concrete floor, 

that way when someone sneezes within about 50 miles, 

the experiment doesn't go to hell -- 

gotta keep vibrations to a minimum

Excellent Feng-shui (wind-water) is absolutely critical to success

That's our science moment for the day. Class dismissed.

Footnote: 

1. Never, ever call the Higgs boson the God particle. Physicists hate the 'God particle' name. After calling it the God particle several times when it comes up, the press is always (sometimes?) careful to say the God particle should never be called the God particle because . . . . I can't remember the reasons, but I'm sure they are good reasons. That is why I did not mention that some call the Higgs boson the God particle. God particle, God particle, God particle, . . . . .

Obviously, the God particle is not a muon, but it is important to be clear about these important things. Maybe the muon is an Angel particle? Woof! I bet physicists would hate that name. Angel particle, Angel particle, Angel particle . . . . .

The behemoth

The Higgs boson finding machine -- I'd point out the people,

but they're too small to be seen -- this pig is really big

Is Fear for Democracy and the Rule of Law Misplaced?

Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI): "Had the tables been turned, and President Trump 

won the election and those were tens of thousands of 

Black Lives Matter and Antifa protesters, 

I might have been a little concerned."

Apparently, the Senator was not at all concerned about hundreds of 

far right protestors trying to overthrow the government, or he is a liar?

CONTEXT

I am one person who sees American democracy and the rule of law under a deadly, sustained attack by what I now believe is the fascist GOP (FGOP) backed by a vast propaganda machine and supported by tens of millions of Americans who do not see much or any significant threat. In its intent, the FGOP is truly fascist. But what is left of democracy and the rule of law stands in its way of exercising the unrestrained power (and wealth) it lusts after. In my opinion, one does not need to wait for a fascist political party to be able to exert full-blown fascism before calling it out for what it is based on its intent.

In my opinion, the problem is grave and urgent. Others see some or much less seriousness and/or urgency. And some even see hope in America's conservative movement into what they believe is democracy and the rule of law. Some, probably most, of the latter group are operating on false beliefs and fears built on decades of deceit and emotional manipulation. They truly believe they are patriots doing what is best for America.

Some others also see the problem as serious and urgent. The following is a comment in a recent discussion here that sheds some light on the perceptions of reality and facts the fear for democracy and the rule of law are based on. The concern is focused what to do about domestic terrorism and our apparent inability to deal with it. In my opinion, a major part of our inability to deal with it is significantly grounded in the alignment of the FGOP with violent extremist far right groups. And as the comment points out, US law is inadequate to meet this threat. Acceptance of domestic terrorism such as the 1/6 coup attempt by the FGOP is evidence of the marriage of the FGOP with right wing violence. 

COMMENT: 

I don't know how such [violent] groups can be broken up under current law. People are free to associate and to be crackpots and nut jobs

It's true that under current law militias and armed groups that carry out domestic terrorism can't be broken up. But my point, in part, is that the current laws may be inadequate given the known scale of the threat. There is a glaring discrepancy between the laws that apply to international vs. domestic terrorism despite the fact that it has long been the latter that poses the gravest threats to the country. There are several good articles on the confused state of the laws used to prosecute the actions of domestic terrorists. As it stands, one former State Dept. Official, Jason Blazakis, says that existing law is a "difficult and arbitrary patchwork that makes it hard to prosecute certain acts, like politically motivated mass shootings," according to The Intercept. He gives an example:

“When someone like [Tree of Life synagogue shooter] Robert Bowers kills18 people in a Pittsburgh synagogue, and he’s not considered a domestic terrorist because he used a handgun and not a weapon of mass destruction. It really points to the absurdity of the law as it exists today,” Blazakis told The Intercept. “If that were an individual inspired by ISIS, they’d be charged with an act of terrorism.

The article (cited above) is pretty good, and discusses the pros and cons of making legal changes to address the policing of domestic terrorists. Civil Libertarians are right to worry about reforms. One reason that violent groups armed to the teeth are not legally classified as terrorist groups is because of the overreach that occurred during the 60s and 70s with anti-war groups, Black Panthers, and others. The Church Committee, after Watergate, with its enemy lists and surveillance of many ordinary citizens, made it hard to monitor and track Americans out of a warranted concern for the violation of privacy, and fear of gov't abuse of power.

Meanwhile, Biden is aware of the problem and ran on a pledge to:

Work for a domestic terrorism law that respects free speech and civil liberties, while making the same commitment to root out domestic terrorism as we have to stopping international terrorism

Pretty vague, but an admission that there is a discrepancy between our legal and political responses to intnt'l and domestic terrorism. Imagine if someone like the Pittsburgh shooter or Dylan Roof had been even tenuously connected to ISIS-- say by watching their videos online. The moral, political and legal sense of gravity would be much greater. Instead we get "there are good people on both sides" mentality continuing even after 1/6. Instead we have members of congress insisting that they need to carry guns in the Capitol. As one editorial puts it, there ought to be moral clarity about the equivalence of terrorism inspired by Jihadists and homegrown extremism. Another one weighs the potential for abuse of power and violation of Americans' civil liberties against the equally important imperative to get more serious and systematic about this plague of domestic terror.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2021/03/15/domestic-international-terrorism-deserve-same-legal-treatment-column/4684258001/

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/todaysdebate/2021/02/22/joe-biden-domestic-terrorism-law-ask-merrick-garland-editorials-debates/6766577002/

Btw, Canada designated the Proud Boys as a "terrorist organization" in February, something most Americans do not support in the US largely because of the 1st Amendment concerns you mentioned ("the right to be a nut job, and associate with other nut jobs").   https://www.vox.com/2021/2/3/22264722/canada-proud-boys-domestic-terrorism .... Another reason many Americans wouldn't support it is that a recent survey found that 1 in 3 of them agree with the following statement:

The traditional American way of life is disappearing so fast that we may have to use force to save it.

Perhaps warning signs like that result should give us more reason to consider labeling these groups as domestic terror organizations-- at least those well-armed groups that have a record of planning and executing acts of terror. I know there's a slippery slope issue, but I wouldn't rule it out. Maybe Canada got it right. If the Proud Boys, for ex., had been labeled that way legally, it's would be hard to imagine someone like the former guy saying "Stand back and stand by" on national TV. Legal proscriptions are powerful. Dangerous if abused, but this crazy culture of "armed patriots at the gates" should, perhaps, be dealt with by banning such groups. I know it won't happen any time soon, just as the "right to an assault rifle" is as American as apple pie, apparently.

Still, I think more drastic measures than most people here want to see are needed. No other country has such a lax posture towards citizens arming themselves to the teeth in the name of "liberty." Many European and Asian states banned guns (except carefully monitored use for hunting) long ago and no longer have the homicide rates they once did. Mass shootings every few weeks, domestic terror and hate crime at the magnitude we have them is absolutely unacceptable. Maybe armed and violent groups should not expect what you called "the right to associate and be crackpots and nut jobs." At least not the sort of nut jobs that make it their business to commit politically motivated acts of domestic terrorism. If we followed the Canadian model here then I think we would be able to break up some of these threat groups. Of course, in the short term all the armed fanatics would react with wildly increased violence. It is hard to institute peace-conducive policies in a blood-stained country that still has a cowboy ethos in large chunks of the population. That's why we never seem to get meaningful gun law reforms.

Questions: Is there a current major threat to democracy and the rule of law? Is there an alignment of the FGOP with violent far right groups? If so, is that evidence of fascist intent by (1) the republican party leadership, and/or (2) rank and file republicans? Are existing laws inadequate to meet the domestic terrorist threat, is the FGOP simply too accommodating of far right violence, or is there some combination of both? 

QANON POSTS 4TH QUARTER PROFIT DESPITE FAILED PREDICTIONS

 Washington D.C. — The political landscape is littered with left and right-wing groups ranging from minor lobbying to Conspiracy Theory. None have become more popular than Far-Right Group QAnon. QAnon has posted numerous theories that the government is run by a secret cabal of pedophiles and lizard people. With a surprising cult-like following, QAnon has taken the spotlight from major media groups and cast itself as the front runner in Conservative news.

Along with a massive following on the internet, QAnon has become a power in the financial markets, listed as WAKO on the Nasdaq market. Bolstered by huge donations and sponsors like Reynolds Aluminum Foil and My Pillow, the group has posted a strong 4th quarter,  earning $1.7 billion.

QAnon organizer, site host, and CEO Jason Galenis released a statement on his website WAKO.com, the main site for QAnon users.

“We are pleased with our strong fourth-quarter earnings. We couldn’t have done this without the generous donations of our beloved fans. Rest assured that your money is going to… good use, fighting for truth, justice, and the American way”.

Analysts on Wall Street have been trying to figure out how this is possible after nearly every prediction made by the WAKO group has not come to fruition. Predictions that in January, after the election, a military coup would have resulted in Congress being arrested for treason and Trump remaining President.

Other failed QAnon predictions include Elvis returning from the lizard people planet Kalepto. Hot pockets being microwaved and used as bricks to build the border wall. And, The ink in tattoo’s reacting with chemtrail chemicals to cause cancer.

https://gishgallop.com/qanon-posts-4th-quarter-profit-despite-failed-predictions/

On the Meaning of the Post-Truth Concept and Its Effects

A 2019 research paper, The Upsurge of Irrationality; Post-truth politics for a polarized world, discusses how researchers see the recent descent of political discourse into the mess it is today for tens of millions of Americans. It nicely describes what concepts such as post-truth mean and how they can influence thinking and political and social policy. The following are some quotes from the paper.

Truthiness

.... the term “truthiness”, coined in 2005 by the comedian Stephen Colbert and defined as “the quality of seeming or being felt to be true, even if not necessarily true.” So, truthiness is not necessarily falsehood or propaganda: it can be mere ignorance shaped by emotion, “gut feeling” and overreliance on intuitive thinking. Nevertheless, while truthiness was used primarily for political satire .... post-truth is not a joke any more.

Post-truth

Current social polarization has led to an upsurge of collective irrationality in which formerly underground unwarranted beliefs and radical discourses have become mainstream. .... controverted shared values have been replaced by alternative epistemologies shaped by identity-related empirical misconceptions that are at the core of current cases of “culture war.” This state of affairs has recently been called “post-truth.”

There are several interconnected concepts considered as major forms of collective irrationalism, such as pseudoscience, science denialism, fact  resistance, and alternative facts. Post-truth has emerged as a higher-order concept that describes the current sociological state of affairs in which all these forms of irrationality thrive. This recent term is defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”

The meaning of post-truth goes beyond being a fool or a liar — “in its purest form, post-truth is when one thinks that the crowd's reaction actually does change the facts about the lie (...) what seem to be new in the post-truth era is a challenge not just to the idea of knowing reality but to the existence of reality itself.” In this regard, although political lies have always existed, “post-truth relationship to facts occurs only when we are seeking to assert something that is more important to us than truth itself. Thus, post-truth amounts to a form of ideological supremacy, whereby its practitioners are trying to compel someone to believe in something whether there is good evidence for it or not.” So, while truthiness locates the responsibility for lying, post-truth is more vague and collectivist in this regard, providing no clear way to define who is responsible, when, and to what extent. Hence, post-truth gives rise to “a world in which politicians can challenge the facts and pay no political price whatsoever.” 

Comments

The paper’s author points out that there is reliable evidence to believe that unfounded beliefs in post-truth rhetoric is not just innocuous folklore. Adverse effects on political campaigns and regressive cultural backlashes have been documented, but the full ramifications are still playing out and thus unknowable. Counterproductive effects of motivated reasoning and false public opinion significantly adversely affect attitudes toward vaccination and climate change. Solid evidence also indicates that conspiracy theories containing post-truth content are also damaging.[1]

The paper’s concluding comments include these: “Post-truth is not an urban legend: it is a harmful collection of alternative epistemologies with a postmodern background that arises from the kind of intergroup struggles that shape the current polarized socio-political landscape. So, post-truth can be interpreted as a result of self-defensive cognition regarding social identity — a process that is fostered by social networks, perceived moral superiority, and partisan media that generate affective [emotion-based] feedback loops, strong perceived threats, and boost against ethical dissonance.” 

Footnote: 

1. The author writes: “The amount of negative social attitudes and outcomes associated with conspiracy theories is overwhelming. For example, they are associated with less pro-social behavior, science denial and misunderstanding, collective narcissism, moral absolutism, partisanship, Machiavellianism and personal willingness to conspire, political cynicism, unhealthy behaviors — such as the use of alternative medicine, anti-vaccination and unsafe sex —, prejudices, political extremism, and reduced intentions to decrease carbon footprint.” (citations removed)

Apparently, belief in false conspiracy theories can be downright dangerous to one’s health and to the health of democracy.