As this fascinating primary season has worn on, I've been trying to figure out why I'm so inclined to see Barack Obama and John McCain favorably.Obama's lack of intense focus on talking about budget balancing and my irritation with McCain-Feingold over the years would seem to make it hard for me to support them.
Within-party, head-to-head, considering only on-paper policy positions, would lead me to see Mitt and Hillary more favorably.
Why can't I vote for them?
It's because I just don't like them and that overrides my thoughts about their stated policy positions.
There's something I perceive about them that I just find irritating.
This recent Times article by David Brooks argues that I'm by no means unique. He holds that we're not as smart as we think or wish we'd be.
Relying on a healthy dose of social science research, he posits that being human, we make flash judgments about people's character and that can override the sensibilities we tend to pride ourselves in.
(Space constraints being what they are in the paper, he doesn't extend the argument in this column, but you can see where sociobiologists would be able to spin yarns about how this is actually a favorable trait for us to have and what kind of survival outcomes it can lead to.)
It can be disconcerting in some ways to find out that you're only human...especially when you extend this realization to product marketing (which is really no different than a political campaign, unfortunately), but on the other hand, it does end up satisfying that I can at least rationally understand my own irrationality.
1 comment:
[a large-eyed creature gives Luke a rough shove and starts yelling at Luke in an alien language which Luke doesn't understand]
Dr. Evazan: [explaining] He doesn't like you.
Luke: Sorry.
Dr. Evazan: I don't like you either. You just watch yourself. We're wanted men. I have the death sentence on twelve systems.
Luke: I'll be careful.
Dr. Evazan: You'll be dead!
Post a Comment