We’re Not All That Different, You Know

The USA seems to be drastically divided, but it’s not. Yes, there are nut jobs everywhere, spouting fabulous falsities and questionable conspiracies.

I’ve been accused of promulgating conspiracies, like “the drug companies are suppressing cures” when that’s not a conspiracy, it’s a monopoly. The goal of a monopoly is to crush the competition and maintain market share. Since the Reagan administration, nobody seems to care about monopolies. We all worship fondly, Teddy Roosevelt who broke up the trusts, but now, “Meh, what’s huge monopoly now and then?”

We’ve actually written on this subject previously, and even pointed out all the reasons the last guy in the White House got there, but when the Angel of Comedy, the greatest humanitarian to walk her talk all the way . . . passed away, people everywhere showed us how alike we all are and how we will believe whatever we want to believe . . . even when faced with the opposite, or, in very simply terms, the truth.

The Boomerang Effect

We’ve covered this before and I’ll cover it again: When someone who believes something is given the facts, the truth about that belief, and it contradicts that person’s beliefs, that person will believe the lies and distortions even stronger. 

And why? How could this possibly be?

Well, one reason is this: (and I know I’ve posted this before . . . )

Norepinephrine is a neurotransmitter that triggers a protective state when we believe our thoughts have to be protected from others. One who is attached to a belief system who comes up against arguments contrary to that belief system experiences a rush of “fight or flight” chemicals such as adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol, normally associated with survival. In this defensive state, the primitive part of the brain interferes with rational thinking and the limbic system knocks out most of the working memory, physically causing narrow mindedness.

Journalism

When I first saw that meme of Betty White talking about “vaginas,” I felt it was just too perfect, but not in character. And remembering back to, “If it’s too good to be true, it probably is,” the journalist in me had to find the truth.

I checked out Snopes, but it wasn’t there. So I searched the web for the actual quotation, using only a segment “those things can take a pounding,” and when I found it, I started narrowing it by date. I seem to recall that the earliest it had been reported, if memory serves, was 2013. And it was attributed to Sheng Wang, a comedian and writer.

As we’ve pointed out (why do I have to repeat myself???), “The truth never stood in the way of a good story.”

The next time someone posted this meme, I did another search and sure enough found three places where Betty White denied ever saying the line.

Here is one: https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/music-theatre/2013/11/lily-allens-hard-out-here-mocks-every-stupid-sexist-pop-video-youve-seen-last-five-y

And this next search brought me to Snopes, that finally had picked it up: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/betty-white-grow-some-balls/

Why People Believe What They Want to Believe

First, what is a belief?

I could write a paper on this alone, and surely many have but to put it simply, it’s a “feeling” that something is true. It doesn’t have to be backed up by facts, those bothersome things, because facts never factor in to feelings.

Debates based upon beliefs go nowhere. You simply must back up a believe with a fact, and facts have context.

I tend to steer clear of political arguments with people who have never questioned their beliefs. Again, you’ll be arguing with feelings inside someone who cherry picks their facts.

Now to the big question: why do people believe what they believe?

First off, all too often they want to believe what they believe. It gives them security and a whole bunch of warm and fuzzies.

It’s this second point that psychology and psychologists focus on:

But I’m going to divert here a tad. You’ve all heard about thinking “outside the box.” Well, that box is your belief system. You live inside that box.

The box defines you. It is your identity, or in Freudian terms, your ego.

In existential thought, losing that identity can create a lot of angst, fear, and dread. We all have a definition of self, and our belief system is part of that. In illustrating this point, existential philosophers like to focus on people in periods of transition. The teacher who leaves that job behind to work for local government. There is a period of anxiety when that person is no longer a teacher and not yet a government worker. Even students changing majors go through this. And it’s those who think most deeply who can get enwrapped and caged inside this anxiety when questioning who they really are. And this is one reason people don’t like to question who they really are or question their belief system.

When one is attached to a belief, anything contrary to that belief is seen as an attack. And this following bit I’ve written and posted everywhere because for cognitive psychologists, it answers a lot of questions:

Norepinephrine is a neurotransmitter that triggers a protective state when we believe our thoughts have to be protected from others. One who is attached to a belief system who comes up against arguments contrary to that belief system experiences a rush of “fight or flight” chemicals such as adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol, normally associated with survival. In this defensive state, the primitive part of the brain interferes with rational thinking and the limbic system knocks out most of the working memory, physically causing narrow mindedness.

Yes, I’ve posted it again because when someone is attached to a belief and you show them they are wrong, I’ll guess upwards of 99% of the time, they don’t just give in and say, “You’re right. I’m wrong.”

Even the journalist in me cannot do that because first I have to confirm who is really right. If I get confirmation, then I’ll either admit to err or show that person where they went wrong.

It would be a lot healthier world if people could admit to being wrong, but we don’t and that could be why the title: We’re not all that different.

Getting Back to Betty

With Betty White’s passing came a flood of tears. We really lost a great one. Not only a great and funny actress/performer, but a great human being who walked her talk. Yes, she could say some things a bit risqué, but did avoid vivid, outright, blatant naughtiness. It was not her style.

And in her passing, memes of all her wonderful quotations have flooded the web, and among them is that misattribution.

As a journalist who knows who said it and who he got it from, I’ve been correcting friends, as kindly as possible, like: I don’t want to piss on your parade, or I love the meme but you might want to know . . . .

And the range of responses is mind-blowing. People are just attached to their beliefs.

My favorite response was “Well, thanx. But. Either way. Thank you Betty.”

Yes, we all love Betty, but there “either way?” There is no either way in the truth.

Betty White is not Schrödinger’s cat, nor is she an electron in two places at the same time saying different things. And no, we cannot agree to disagree.

She has admitted that she never said that and would never say that. Case closed.

But still . . . people cannot admit to being wrong because they think they are admitting to being flawed.

Why not just admit to being in favor of the truth?

Well, probably because we’re just not all that different. We might reject one conspiracy theory, but believe something that is equally false. Humans believe what they want to believe.

The Source of the Joke

It took Snopes a bit of time to look into this. And they’ve been wrong in the past. A great example is our investigative piece about the time the cartoonists slipped Bugs Bunny’s “Johnson” past the censors. They simply did not perform the due diligence I did.

I have listened to Hal Sparks for a long time. He is a very brilliant and astute young man. I’ve even seen him in concert and shook his hand telling him he was a brilliant young man.

I remember his routine on Showtime . . . around 2010, if memory serves me.

And along the way I discovered Lily Allen who said something to the effect: “Sure, grow a pair. Grow a pair of tits.”

And the moment I saw the meme with Betty White, I found the line attributed to Wang and today, as I perforce went looking one more time, I found the Comedy Central special on which he said those famous words:

In my first attempt to debunk the meme, Betty White had not yet denied ever saying this line. Since that time, she has and was interviewed by The Guardian.

And now that everyone everywhere is praising her while insulting her by putting words in her mouth that she would have never said, let’s publish her exact words: “That’s what I hate about Facebook and the internet. They can say you said anything. I never would have said that. I’d never say that in a million years.”