There are those in the world who believe that the Holocaust during World War II did not happen. They disbelieve that the National Socialists (Nazis) deliberately killed millions even after Gen. Dwight Eisenhower and his soldiers documented thousands of dead bodies in concentration camps and thousands of starved prisoners in those same camps.
There are those in the world who believe that man causes more changes to the climate than does the sun, the oceans, the jet stream, volcanoes, etc. They disbelieve that the earth was much warmer and much cooler than now, many times, before man affected the earth. They claimed that their models showed in the 1980s that the earth would cool in the 1990s because of man and then claimed in the 1990s that the earth would warm in the 2000s because of man. When the opposite happened in both instances, they claimed man caused climate change and refused to make any more short-term climate predictions that could debunk their models. And thousands of those people are scientists.
So, how can people ignore facts? Especially such learned people like scientists? How can they cling to their beliefs when the facts show something different than their beliefs?
In his book “The Brothers,” Steven Kinzer offers a theory, on page 321, as to why people refuse to change their beliefs even when the facts prove them wrong. He states, “Researchers have learned that people’s brains are programmed to favor information that confirms what they already believe. Contradictory information threatens cognitive dissonance. The brain rebels against it. … In the 21st century, discoveries about how the brain works set off a mini-boom of books seeking to convey these discoveries to lay readers. They comprise a leap in understanding – not simply of psychology and human behavior, but of a force that, at times, influences world history. …
- “People are motivated to accept accounts that fit with their pre-existing convictions:
- Dissonance is eliminated when we blind ourselves to contradictory propositions.
- Groupthink leads to many problems of defective decision making … poor information search, selective bias in processing information.
- Declarations of high confidence mainly tell you that an individual constructed a coherent story in his mind, not necessarily that the story is true.
- Certain beliefs are so important for a society or a group that they become part of how you prove your identity. … The truth is that our minds just aren’t set up to be changed by mere evidence.”
Cognitive dissonance rages among the most learned of people. College graduates fall prey to groupthink, to bias, to identity just the same as primitive tribes did. Journalists. Lawyers. Politicians. Scientists. Peer pressure causes them to believe that the emperor is wearing clothes even though they see him naked. Pride keeps them from understanding that they made a mistake in judgment.
Climate change and the Holocaust are not the only examples of cognitive dissonance. It affects how people view just about everything … like the benefits and costs of Obamacare, like the lies told about Obamacare to get Americans to accept it, like when Obama claimed that Obamacare had no taxes in it to get it accepted in Congress and then claimed that the penalty was a tax to get the Supreme Court to accept it, like how no compromises were made with Republicans to get Obamacare passed, like the current problems in Iraq with ISIS because the USA pulled out all of its troops, like the impact of spending $50 trillion in the war on poverty over the last 50 years, that terrorists released from Gitmo are fighting against the USA, that rich people control both of the political parties – just different people – and pay off politicians in both parties for their personal desires, that the rich benefited the most from the actions of the Fed for the last six years, that the elderly suffered because of the actions of the Fed for the last six years, that the USA and Europe have used massive immigration (legal and illegal) for the last 20 years to offset the impact of the low birth rate of citizens at the request of businessmen with unwanted side effects to crime, culture, wages and social costs, that Obamacare actually helps insurance companies make more profits at an expense to taxpayers, that an unbiased grand jury found that Officer Wilson should not be prosecuted for killing a black man in Ferguson, Missouri, that 3,000 black plantation owners had black slaves on their plantations and helped finance the South in the Civil War, that black slave traders provided Africans to the white slave traders, that African tribes make slaves of other African tribes still today, and on and on.
How many Americans believe that Obama is smart just because he went to Harvard? What were his grades? Was he admitted with less than the requirements needed by white students? How many people ignore the lack of actual accomplishments of his administration and blame all of his failures on Bush or on Republicans or on what he inherited? How many ignore the fact that Democrats had complete control of Congress from 2006 through 2010? And control of the Senate from 2006 through 2014? How many ignore how all three of Obama’s secretaries of defense were at odds with him? How many ignore how Obama fired more than a hundred generals and admirals who disagreed with him? How many ignore how Obama used race, gender and class to divide Americans? How many ignore the fact that Obama is the first and only president who had no executive experience (not military, not industry, not government) before assuming the executive office of president? How many practice racism by evaluating Obama by a different set of standards than what they would use to evaluate Bush or Clinton or any white person? How many ignore that Obama is not wearing any clothes?
How can we end this age of cognitive dissonance? How can we look at facts for what they are? If we Americans really want to make America a better place, if we really want to save America, then we need to evaluate (without cognitive dissonance) the president on his/her ability at fulfilling the oath of office for the president. The oath for the president is: “I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
So, how is Obama doing at preserving, protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States? How is he doing at uniting Americans?
