"The saying, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it,” suggests that materialism drives us. It’s even harder to get a man to understand something when his community and identity depend on his not understanding it"
It's easy to point the way this is true among Trumpists and Republicans when it comes to COVID, masking, vaccines, Trump's corruption and incompetence, and the authoritarianism of Trumpism.
But we've seen it on the left, notably in overestimating risks associated with nuclear power while underestimating the environmental risks and costs of wind and solar.
Most recently, we are seeing among criminal justice reformers on the left regarding rising crime and defunding the police.
We've seen a lot of downplaying increasing violent crime, to themselves and others. A lack of recognition of the desire by low-income people of color for more and better police rather than fewer police.
And the complete rejection of the fact that the research tells us that, despite some clearly criminogenic practices on the part of many officers, more police on the street leads to less crime.
The idea that police don't prevent crime became an article of faith that has become very hard to dislodge. Either because people want to believe it or because it's too unpopular among their peer group to hold a position that isn't directionally critical of police across the board
To be honest, as a criminal justice reformist, those were difficult for me to take on board. They are all facts that rub me the wrong way.
OTH, most of my social media social circle are associated with scientific skepticism so while mostly left-wing, there isn't the cost of accepting inconvenient truths.
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