I recently came across a video which talked about an interesting phenomenon called cognitive dissonance. It’s highlighted in many things, but this video’s subject was the discussion between meat-eaters and vegans. Incredibly, in a study, only drug addicts came under more prejudice than vegans.
What was most interesting, though, is that it’s not that omnivores dislike herbivores, per sae. Instead, they find it difficult to face the dichotomy of choice that vegans reflect back at them, which causes an adverse reaction.
At the heart of this paradox is cognitive dissonance, which is the psychological tension caused by holding conflicting beliefs.
Social scientist Hank Rothgerber found that one of the 14 defences we use to reduce our moral guilt is to attack the person that triggered these feelings. It’s understandable. We’ve all been taught to disconnect our emotions towards the animals that we eat, even though most of us wouldn’t normally approve of hurting animals. So, to protect ourselves, we poke fun at the person who would mirror those difficult choices back at us.
Of course, cognitive dissonance isn’t exclusive to our dietary choices. There are multiple examples, like our choices on smoking, exercise, streaming password sharing, what products we buy, etc. We all do it.
However, whenever we find ourselves justifying or trying to rationalise our choices, I always feel it’s a great opportunity to decide whether to reconsider them, or remain conflicted. A tough call, but personal growth does favour the reflective and I’ve found the more honest we are with ourselves, the easier life becomes.