Blah #@%* Blah
Obama school speech illustrates confirmation bias
By Kelvin Wade | | September 09, 2009 23:55
It's hard to understand how two groups of people can watch President Obama give a speech to millions of schoolchildren and come away with such divergent views of what was accomplished.
One side sees a speech on personal responsibility, setting goals and working hard. Another side sees Chairman Mao-like communism. They see subversive propaganda in which all that was left was for Leni Riefenstahl to film it.
I'm tempted to just caricature the Obama haters as knuckle dragging ignoramuses who are terrified of socialism yet can't spell or define it. It's easy to see a group of people who obviously don't have enough tinfoil in their protective hats that define themselves by opposing the four I's: illegals, infidels, immorality and intellectualism.
But by doing that, I'm just as guilty as right-wing punditocracy who characterize progressives as nonthinking, elitist, socialist, government-loving bleeding hearts. Blowhard Michael Savage famously says liberalism is a mental disorder.
But could both sides be making an all-too-human mistake?
I'm currently reading an excellent book called 'The Science of Fear' by Daniel Gardner that covers similar terrain of another great book called 'How We Decide' by Jonah Lehrer. Both books look at how and why we think the things we do and the cognitive mistakes we make in reasoning.
One of the biggest problems is confirmation bias. As a species, we naively think that we educate ourselves about a given topic and then choose what we believe, when the process is actually reversed. We determine what we believe and then select evidence that bolsters our belief. Evidence that disproves our beliefs are downplayed or rejected entirely.
Let's look at the Obama school speech. Have you ever taken an instant disliking to someone? Suppose that person is Barack Obama. So when you hear that President Obama is going to give a speech to schoolchildren, your confirmation bias views it in the worst possible light.
Even when presented with the evidence of the harmlessness of the text and Republicans like Laura Bush and Newt Gingrich endorsing the speech, you cling to your bias.
Of course, every political stripe is guilty of confirmation bias. Just exchange President Obama for President Bush.
Accompanying confirmation bias is often group polarization. Studies have shown that individuals' viewpoints become more extreme when aired in a group. That's why whacko groups like the Truthers, Birthers, Deathers grow more extreme and are willing to believe more and more as time goes on.
It may feel good cocooning ourselves with like-minded people, discrediting sources that don't reinforce our beliefs and only watching, reading or listening to favorable media.
But this is a piece of the puzzle of why right-left debate is often no more than two walled-off combatants spewing group think back and forth. It leads to a society where we can't agree on solutions because we can't agree on the underlying facts.
It leads to normally rational parents irrationally making their children afraid of their own president.
At some point we've got to look at the cognitive errors we're making. As long as we continue this, we're not patriotic Americans having honest debates. We're just the Hatfield and McCoys fighting over long ago slights. Peace.
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NOTES: It's a shame what passes for political discourse in this country. Why is it so angry? When I first started in this business, I was supposed to write a point-counterpoint column with a cantankerous older conservative, Lou Sturmer. We had several meetings before our column debuted and one thing we found that surprised both of us was how much common ground we found.
I once wrote a column about how moving it was to see Iraqi citizens vote for the first time. Seeing them dip their fingers in ink, a mark which could mark them for death, made me proud. I was proud to be an American. And I got savaged by liberals who wrote to me and said basically, "How dare you give Bush credit for anything?"
Try this: go up to a bunch of conservative Republican friends and say something positive about President Obama. Then just stand by and watch them dismantle your praise and point out something atrocious about him. The same would be true of liberals and Bush. It's absurd when you get to the point that you believe there is nothing positive the other side has to say. To ascribe evil motives to everything your political opponent does leaves us nowhere. We don't have to agree but there's a difference between disagreeing and hating.
If Barack Obama discovered the cure for cancer in the basement of the White House, I'm positive that the headline on Fox or Limbaugh or Hannity would be something like, "Obama Cures Cancer but He's Planning On Only Giving the Cure to Blacks" or "Obama finally reveals the cure for cancer." And of course, if you're a conservative, you're probably thinking the same thing if it had been Bush. And that's one of the things that wrong with our discourse.
A few weeks ago I wrote a column saying people shouldn't use Hitler, Nazi Germany, the SS and other symbols when making political arguments involving either party. I think it's something people are so used to saying that they don't realize the horrific minimizing they're doing to one of the most godawful atrocious periods in human history. I deliberately wrote a graphic column to remind people of the horror they were speaking of. I thought it would be a good wake up call that we can vigorously argue any topic without going to appalling extremes. And before conservatives belt out the all too familiar, "What about Bush?", I've never condoned using Nazi comparisons to any president. When i've been in political discussions, if someone mentions Hitler, that's the end of the conversation. Anyone who knows me knows that I thought George W. Bush to be incompetent. Dangerously so. I looked at Dick Cheney as a dangerous, reckless individual. But Hitler? Heinrich Himmler? Eichmann? The Schutzstaffel? The Einsatzgruppen? Get the hell out of here. But the real education for me was, I never would've thought so many people would defend the Nazis. "Obama is like Nazi Germany in the beginning." "The Nazis just went too far."
What's frigtening about the level of political discourse in this country is that there is no discourse. It's all sound and fury signifying nothing. It's people regurgitating talking points from Limbaugh and Olbermann. It's people who have Google at their fingertips, but instead of wanting to dig for answers, are content to have their thoughts thought for them. As long as we're separate societies with our own news, our own facts...as long as we're willing to cherry pick information and reject or minimize info that conflicts with our beliefs, we're just sheeple.
You can't have a debate or discourse if no one is listening. Then it's just noise. It's psychological masturbation. It's confirmation bias and group polarization.
We're right. They're wrong. They couldn't possibly have anything constructive to say. They're idiots. They're morons. I know I'm right. Fight. Yell. Disrupt. Bring your weapons. Refresh the tree of liberty. They did it to Bush first. Remember what they did to Clinton?
Blah fucking blah...
One side sees a speech on personal responsibility, setting goals and working hard. Another side sees Chairman Mao-like communism. They see subversive propaganda in which all that was left was for Leni Riefenstahl to film it.
I'm tempted to just caricature the Obama haters as knuckle dragging ignoramuses who are terrified of socialism yet can't spell or define it. It's easy to see a group of people who obviously don't have enough tinfoil in their protective hats that define themselves by opposing the four I's: illegals, infidels, immorality and intellectualism.
But by doing that, I'm just as guilty as right-wing punditocracy who characterize progressives as nonthinking, elitist, socialist, government-loving bleeding hearts. Blowhard Michael Savage famously says liberalism is a mental disorder.
But could both sides be making an all-too-human mistake?
I'm currently reading an excellent book called 'The Science of Fear' by Daniel Gardner that covers similar terrain of another great book called 'How We Decide' by Jonah Lehrer. Both books look at how and why we think the things we do and the cognitive mistakes we make in reasoning.
One of the biggest problems is confirmation bias. As a species, we naively think that we educate ourselves about a given topic and then choose what we believe, when the process is actually reversed. We determine what we believe and then select evidence that bolsters our belief. Evidence that disproves our beliefs are downplayed or rejected entirely.
Let's look at the Obama school speech. Have you ever taken an instant disliking to someone? Suppose that person is Barack Obama. So when you hear that President Obama is going to give a speech to schoolchildren, your confirmation bias views it in the worst possible light.
Even when presented with the evidence of the harmlessness of the text and Republicans like Laura Bush and Newt Gingrich endorsing the speech, you cling to your bias.
Of course, every political stripe is guilty of confirmation bias. Just exchange President Obama for President Bush.
Accompanying confirmation bias is often group polarization. Studies have shown that individuals' viewpoints become more extreme when aired in a group. That's why whacko groups like the Truthers, Birthers, Deathers grow more extreme and are willing to believe more and more as time goes on.
It may feel good cocooning ourselves with like-minded people, discrediting sources that don't reinforce our beliefs and only watching, reading or listening to favorable media.
But this is a piece of the puzzle of why right-left debate is often no more than two walled-off combatants spewing group think back and forth. It leads to a society where we can't agree on solutions because we can't agree on the underlying facts.
It leads to normally rational parents irrationally making their children afraid of their own president.
At some point we've got to look at the cognitive errors we're making. As long as we continue this, we're not patriotic Americans having honest debates. We're just the Hatfield and McCoys fighting over long ago slights. Peace.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
NOTES: It's a shame what passes for political discourse in this country. Why is it so angry? When I first started in this business, I was supposed to write a point-counterpoint column with a cantankerous older conservative, Lou Sturmer. We had several meetings before our column debuted and one thing we found that surprised both of us was how much common ground we found.
I once wrote a column about how moving it was to see Iraqi citizens vote for the first time. Seeing them dip their fingers in ink, a mark which could mark them for death, made me proud. I was proud to be an American. And I got savaged by liberals who wrote to me and said basically, "How dare you give Bush credit for anything?"
Try this: go up to a bunch of conservative Republican friends and say something positive about President Obama. Then just stand by and watch them dismantle your praise and point out something atrocious about him. The same would be true of liberals and Bush. It's absurd when you get to the point that you believe there is nothing positive the other side has to say. To ascribe evil motives to everything your political opponent does leaves us nowhere. We don't have to agree but there's a difference between disagreeing and hating.
If Barack Obama discovered the cure for cancer in the basement of the White House, I'm positive that the headline on Fox or Limbaugh or Hannity would be something like, "Obama Cures Cancer but He's Planning On Only Giving the Cure to Blacks" or "Obama finally reveals the cure for cancer." And of course, if you're a conservative, you're probably thinking the same thing if it had been Bush. And that's one of the things that wrong with our discourse.
A few weeks ago I wrote a column saying people shouldn't use Hitler, Nazi Germany, the SS and other symbols when making political arguments involving either party. I think it's something people are so used to saying that they don't realize the horrific minimizing they're doing to one of the most godawful atrocious periods in human history. I deliberately wrote a graphic column to remind people of the horror they were speaking of. I thought it would be a good wake up call that we can vigorously argue any topic without going to appalling extremes. And before conservatives belt out the all too familiar, "What about Bush?", I've never condoned using Nazi comparisons to any president. When i've been in political discussions, if someone mentions Hitler, that's the end of the conversation. Anyone who knows me knows that I thought George W. Bush to be incompetent. Dangerously so. I looked at Dick Cheney as a dangerous, reckless individual. But Hitler? Heinrich Himmler? Eichmann? The Schutzstaffel? The Einsatzgruppen? Get the hell out of here. But the real education for me was, I never would've thought so many people would defend the Nazis. "Obama is like Nazi Germany in the beginning." "The Nazis just went too far."
What's frigtening about the level of political discourse in this country is that there is no discourse. It's all sound and fury signifying nothing. It's people regurgitating talking points from Limbaugh and Olbermann. It's people who have Google at their fingertips, but instead of wanting to dig for answers, are content to have their thoughts thought for them. As long as we're separate societies with our own news, our own facts...as long as we're willing to cherry pick information and reject or minimize info that conflicts with our beliefs, we're just sheeple.
You can't have a debate or discourse if no one is listening. Then it's just noise. It's psychological masturbation. It's confirmation bias and group polarization.
We're right. They're wrong. They couldn't possibly have anything constructive to say. They're idiots. They're morons. I know I'm right. Fight. Yell. Disrupt. Bring your weapons. Refresh the tree of liberty. They did it to Bush first. Remember what they did to Clinton?
Blah fucking blah...
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