On the scale of armies, facelessness has little effect on motivation. Anonymous soldiers kill anonymous soldiers. The evolution of weapons has ensured anonymity by increasing the distance between opponents: From spears, bows, and trebuchets to canon, missiles, and today’s faceless robots, the mechanisms of war have separated enemies and made them faceless. Yet, in their anonymity governments maintain their motivation to fight. On the scale of individuals in conflict, however, identifiable faces support a continued conflict. Consider now what occurs when an individual has a potential conflict with a faceless bureaucracy.
Here’s an interesting result from a study on rationalization as it affects motivation. According to Kristin Laurin of the University of British Columbia, we tend to have more favorable attitudes toward enacted policies after they become enforceable than we have when they are merely proposed changes to the status quo: “…it’s rationalization: When something becomes a part of the present reality, even when it’s something you don’t like, you find ways of tricking yourself into thinking it’s not quite so bad,” she explains.* Laurin calls the acceptance of a newly enacted policy the result of a “psychological immune system.” Do you think her study has merit?
I didn’t personally like legalizing pot, for example, but I’m already immune to the idea to which I objected before Colorado enacted the policy. Is my rapid acquiescence to an inexorable change proof that Laurin is correct? The title of the online story covering her Psychological Science article is “People rationalize Policies as Soon as They Take Effect.” In my case, a really rapid acquiescence to a reality over which I have no control.
I might note that we don’t really have to accept policies we don’t like. We can struggle to effect a change of change. There are numerous examples of people refusing to acquiesce to policies enacted by nameless authorities. Take the struggle of parents nationwide in reaction to Outcomes Based Education (OBE), a teaching methodology that included making an entire class retake a test if a certain percentage of the class failed the test. Yes, you can imagine it: Under OBE children who aced a test were required to retake the same test when their classmates failed it in a colossal waste of time for those who studied. Parents fought the system, eliminating it rather than acquiescing to the policy emplaced by largely anonymous school boards and administrations.
You probably have your own examples of those who continued to struggle against policies that organizations, agencies, legislatures, and even churches imposed upon their constituents. You might also have examples of the “psychological immune system” in action. Maybe you have acquiesced to some policy changes you initially resisted.
Is Laurin’s “psychological immune system” just a manifestation of fatigue? Do people just grow tired of struggling against a somewhat amorphous anonymity peopled by the faceless? Is yielding a sign of weakness? Or, should we recognize that there are battles worth fighting and battles not worth fighting?
Are policy changes derived from anonymous sources more easily accepted than those that derive from identifiable individuals? You connect a face, you fight. No face, no fight, or rarely a fight.
Colorado has no face. As one on the periphery of the pot issue, I have no identifiable individual upon whom I can pin the pot policy though I’m sure that someone in Colorado can affix faces to policy. For me it was a “legislative act” in another state. But interestingly, Outcomes Based Education also had no face for most people. Yes, both legalizing pot and structuring OBE had initial proponents who had faces, but as both policies progressed they moved to the level of facelessness. The policies became entities unto themselves. The difference in the post-enactment reactions is that the parents who fought against OBE weren’t fighting against OBE’s proponents’ faces, but rather for their children’s faces.
We acquiesce because much of our world is structured anonymously. We fight when we see the enemy’s face or the face of someone we wish to protect. The former is a matter of “against,” whereas the latter is a matter of “for.”
*Association for Psychological Science (APS) online at https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/people-rationalize-policies-as-soon-as-they-take-effect.html
Here’s an interesting result from a study on rationalization as it affects motivation. According to Kristin Laurin of the University of British Columbia, we tend to have more favorable attitudes toward enacted policies after they become enforceable than we have when they are merely proposed changes to the status quo: “…it’s rationalization: When something becomes a part of the present reality, even when it’s something you don’t like, you find ways of tricking yourself into thinking it’s not quite so bad,” she explains.* Laurin calls the acceptance of a newly enacted policy the result of a “psychological immune system.” Do you think her study has merit?
I didn’t personally like legalizing pot, for example, but I’m already immune to the idea to which I objected before Colorado enacted the policy. Is my rapid acquiescence to an inexorable change proof that Laurin is correct? The title of the online story covering her Psychological Science article is “People rationalize Policies as Soon as They Take Effect.” In my case, a really rapid acquiescence to a reality over which I have no control.
I might note that we don’t really have to accept policies we don’t like. We can struggle to effect a change of change. There are numerous examples of people refusing to acquiesce to policies enacted by nameless authorities. Take the struggle of parents nationwide in reaction to Outcomes Based Education (OBE), a teaching methodology that included making an entire class retake a test if a certain percentage of the class failed the test. Yes, you can imagine it: Under OBE children who aced a test were required to retake the same test when their classmates failed it in a colossal waste of time for those who studied. Parents fought the system, eliminating it rather than acquiescing to the policy emplaced by largely anonymous school boards and administrations.
You probably have your own examples of those who continued to struggle against policies that organizations, agencies, legislatures, and even churches imposed upon their constituents. You might also have examples of the “psychological immune system” in action. Maybe you have acquiesced to some policy changes you initially resisted.
Is Laurin’s “psychological immune system” just a manifestation of fatigue? Do people just grow tired of struggling against a somewhat amorphous anonymity peopled by the faceless? Is yielding a sign of weakness? Or, should we recognize that there are battles worth fighting and battles not worth fighting?
Are policy changes derived from anonymous sources more easily accepted than those that derive from identifiable individuals? You connect a face, you fight. No face, no fight, or rarely a fight.
Colorado has no face. As one on the periphery of the pot issue, I have no identifiable individual upon whom I can pin the pot policy though I’m sure that someone in Colorado can affix faces to policy. For me it was a “legislative act” in another state. But interestingly, Outcomes Based Education also had no face for most people. Yes, both legalizing pot and structuring OBE had initial proponents who had faces, but as both policies progressed they moved to the level of facelessness. The policies became entities unto themselves. The difference in the post-enactment reactions is that the parents who fought against OBE weren’t fighting against OBE’s proponents’ faces, but rather for their children’s faces.
We acquiesce because much of our world is structured anonymously. We fight when we see the enemy’s face or the face of someone we wish to protect. The former is a matter of “against,” whereas the latter is a matter of “for.”
*Association for Psychological Science (APS) online at https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/people-rationalize-policies-as-soon-as-they-take-effect.html
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