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Comment by dsign | Hacker News Reader

> At the same time, I feel like most everybody feels that they themself are a good, kind, caring person.

FWIW, take my data-point: no.

You probably don’t like it any more than I do, but the people who, for example, are fighting every day to remove rights from minority groups do, in large part, believe that they are kind.

Brainwashing is a helluva drug.

They do not view the systematic attack of minority groups as “evil” because they have been brainwashed in to believing that the groups they are attacking are evil, so, to them, their hypocrisy is justified as righteous.

a good example is the work of daryl davis who managed to convince people to leave and denounce the kkk. i believe that the reason his approach worked is because those people believed that they were good people, and they left the kkk once they realized that they were actually wrong and prejudiced. if they had seen themselves as evil they would not have left, because doing so would have meant to stop being evil. but they left because they realized that being in the kkk was a contradiction to how they saw themselves.

My understanding of Davis’s work is that some key parts of it also include finding common ground with the other person, treating them as a decent and reasonable person, and letting them come to their own conclusions. There is a respect and humanity baked in to his method

yes, exactly, he treated them like they saw themselves.

it wouldn't work if that understanding wasn't there on both sides.

from my own experience i find it most frustrating when i try to tell someone that their actions are hurtful, and they respond "nah, i am just like that, i can't change", because they have a negative image of themselves.

"“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."

Going on a huge tangent here, but this mindset is part of why I can barely stand Reddit, but simultaneously can tolerate 4chan. Stuff is barely taken seriously but at the same time many there are aware of that and will simply take off once satisfied for that period. Some reddit dwellers seem to feel like it's the life mission to "fight X" and they genuinely believe they are making the world a better place.

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