- The Tattered Coat - http://www.tatteredcoat.com -
Cognitive Dissonance, the Bush Administration, Cindy Sheehan, and the War in Iraq
Posted By Matt On 16th August 2005 @ 17:45 In Politics, Best Posts, Cindy Sheehan, George W. Bush, Plame Investigation, War | 15 Comments
I’ve continued to think about Suzy Shedd’s comments about Cindy Sheehan, and wanted to explain a little more fully why I think she hit the nail on the head, and why her comments resonated so strongly with me.
I’ve long thought that cognitive dissonance was a major reason why the American public was so slow to turn against the War in Iraq (and I’m using the past tense there, since an overwhelming majority of Americans have finally come to their senses). While it’s true that suppression and distortion of information slowed the long march towards truth, it’s also clear that the American people continued to support the war in the face of increasing evidence that the Bush Administration lied the country into war.
The psychological concept of cognitive dissonance helps reveal why it took so long for so many Americans to realize that President Bush has been leading the country in the wrong direction. Here is one explanation of the term:
Beyond this benign if uncomfortable aspect, however, dissonance can go “over the top”, leading to two interesting side-effects for learning:
* if someone is called upon to learn something which contradicts what they already think they know — particularly if they are committed to that prior knowledge — they are likely to resist the new learning. Even Carl Rogers recognised this. Accommodation is more difficult than Assimilation, in Piaget’s terms.
* and — counter-intuitively, perhaps — if learning something has been difficult, uncomfortable, or even humiliating enough, people are less likely to concede that the content of what has been learned is useless, pointless or valueless. To do so would be to admit that one has been “had”, or “conned”.
The parallels, I hope, are clear: many Americans voted for George Bush in good faith; they believed that he would take his office seriously, that he would not lie to the American people, or be so callous as to send America’s sons and daughters into harm’s way without good cause.
As the evidence has mounted that Bush lied to the American people during the build-up to war, Americans who were duped tended to ignore or explain away that evidence. Cognitive dissonance helps reveal why the right wing noise machine has had so much success over the past few years — it tells the American people what they want to hear: that everything is on track, that the war is going well, that democracy in Iraq is just around the corner, that the Administration is doing everything it can to protect our soldiers, that President Bush knows what he is doing.
American supporters of the President, in other words, wanted to be duped. The alternative would have resulted in a painful shattering of illusions. Any glimpse of the plain truth staring them in the face would have led to cognitive dissonance, to the jarring recognition that not only were they lied to, but that they themselves bore responsibility for allowing themselves to be conned.
And so, like pottery in a kiln, their belief in the President set and hardened. They looked to right-wing commentators for comfort, and found it. All of the damaging news could be discounted, if only it was viewed from the proper angle. Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, and others provided the glaze that would keep America’s citizens in a daze.
The lack of planning for post-war Iraq? Just inter-departmental bickering. Abu Ghraib? Just a few out-of-control grunts. The Downing Street Memo? Just old news, promoted by those with a grudge against the president. Valerie Plame? She had it coming. The scarcity of proper humvee armor? Not the administration’s fault. Richard Clark, Paul O’Neill, and Larry Johnson? All disgruntled employees badmouthing the old boss.
When those American citizens are the mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters of soldiers who have died in the war, cognitive dissonance multiplies exponentially. It’s one thing to try to accept that a President lied the country into war. It’s something else entirely to try to accept that one’s child died not for a noble cause, but for a lie.
This, then, is Cindy Sheehan’s bravery: she has had the courage to look the facts in the face, and to understand that though her son died honorably, fighting in a war for which he volunteered, he was betrayed by the commander-in-chief who sent him into battle.
Or, as Suzy put it:
President Bush finds it hard to meet with Cindy Sheehan because he knows that the eyes that will meet his gaze have been emptied of sympathy, emptied of friendship, emptied of lies. In the face of her painful truth, Bush withers and runs like a creature whose ugliness is revealed in the bright light of day.
Cindy Sheehan stands bereft of the child she birthed so long ago, filled with sorrow, but lit with the hard wisdom that comes from sacrifice.
Bush cowers in the shadows of his Crawford manse, surrounded by the fears he has stoked, knowing that a step into the light would expose what the shadows have hidden from view for far too long .
And the American people, watching this epic encounter, are slowly waking from slumber, slowly realizing that those sharp tinglings on their skin, while painful, remind them that they are alive, and that they can still make a choice between darkness and light.
15 Comments To "Cognitive Dissonance, the Bush Administration, Cindy Sheehan, and the War in Iraq"
#1 Comment By Karl On 16th August 2005 @ 21:50
I’ve been meaning to write about cognitive dissonance, its effect, and this administration for quite a while. Well said Matt. Well said.
#2 Trackback By Rowhouse Logic - The Absence of Sound Reasoning On 16th August 2005 @ 22:38
Damn
Nothing I can add to this one. Enjoy.
…
#3 Comment By Rana On 16th August 2005 @ 23:49
Beautiful.
#4 Comment By Mark On 17th August 2005 @ 09:14
Wish I could add some insight, but I think you nailed it perfectly.
Simply outstanding, Matt.
#5 Comment By blue girl On 17th August 2005 @ 09:34
Really great post, Matt. Really, really great.
#6 Comment By Samantha On 17th August 2005 @ 12:56
I agree with your post, but most of it can be attributed to apathy. Americans really don’t care anymore. And those who do care, are labeled, simply because they are questioning authority, which is a big no-no when it comes to this Administration. Also, our society has accepted dissent as something absolutely horrible.
#7 Trackback By SkaroffBlog On 18th August 2005 @ 16:09
Comes Together
Thank you Matt for a post that I very much needed to read.
…
#8 Comment By ellroon On 18th August 2005 @ 16:58
Excellent work! Answers a lot of questions on why so many people still support Bush. You would get the striking out (counter-protests, shotgun blasts, and pickup truck drivebys) from those who are terrified of being found wrong. They obviously must do anything that prevents them from looking weak, therefore unmanly or submissive. (Which also explains the gay and liberal bashing.)
Have sent your article on.
#9 Comment By LateToTheParty On 20th August 2005 @ 02:04
W as Gollum! I love your post re cog dis, and I love your painting the resident in his true form as Gollum: **Bush withers and runs like a creature whose ugliness is revealed in the bright light of day.**
#10 Comment By William Leatherwood On 24th August 2005 @ 00:00
Cindy Sheehan has responded to President Bush’s comments concerning meeting her and has posted her response in The huffington Post. The first statement Cindy Sheehan makes that comes off as anti-democratic is this one and I quote Cindy Sheehan- ” Does anyone else know what “democratic” means? It simply means majority rule. Not some high-minded, free-floating, pie in the sky ideal. It means 50 percent plus one.” Cindy Sheehen in that particular statement actually attacks 51 % majority rule as a bad form of government and if you can read anything else into that, defending that statement, please make your comment at the end of this post. I would like to say to Cindy Sheehan that 50 plus one is much better then Saddam’s 1 % plus brutal totalitarian rule in which the 1% Saddam, rules 99 % of the entire population. Maybe Sheehan has met with some socialist organizations that oppose democratic forms of government. I did notice that a socialist website called ‘Socialist Worker Online’ is running a rather large article advocating Sheehans position. Cindy Sheehan actually gave an interview to the Socialist Worker Online, she spoke to Socialist Worker’s ERIC RUDER which is mentioned at the beginning of the article. In her interview with the Socialist Worker Online she says and I quote ” Some people may think that we’re fighting terrorism over there. But when is that job ever going to be complete? Terrorism is just a new “ism.” It was “communism” when I was growing up.” Here Cindy Sheehan is discounting the validity of the threat of communism in the past as just a made up ” ism.” I believe history taught us that communism brutally oppressed and killed millions of innocent people and is still somewhat of a threat today in places like North Korea where millions have died from starvation due to KimYong II, brutal rule. Cindy Sheehan later went on to say and I quote ” I DEFINITELY think that we should support war resisters in the military”. I will leave that statement up to the readers interpretation, but it sounds to me to border on subversion and treason. Here is Cindy Sheehan’s interview with the Socialist Workers Online in its entirety http://www.socialistworker.org/2005-2/549/549_06_CindySheehan.shtml .
The next statement Cindy Sheehan makes is both inaccurate and untruthful and I quote
“This is the biggest smokescreen from him yet. I didn’t ask him to withdraw the troops, I asked him what Noble Cause did Casey die for.” Actually Cindy Sheehen didn’t ask Bush, she demanded that he “bring the troops home now”, here is a quote from her statement made on August 18 2005 and carried by ABC News “”If George Bush comes out here today or if we leave here at the end of August, this is only the beginning, and we’re not going to stop until our troops are brought home”, I would suggest that means a withdrawal what would you think it means? Also in this ABC article written by Eric Noe it is stated ” In addition to requesting a meeting with Bush, Sheehan is now calling for an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. She promised to send a similar message if the president agrees to meet with her.” Here is the complete article you be the judge http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1045556&page=1&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312 . Is ABC lying, did they just make that up? I have myself watched Cindy Sheehan on national television say time and time again “bring our troops home now” but she has stated that she has never intended to ask Bush that question. I smell another lie. Whats really strange is in Cindys own article she just released today she says this and I quote ” Then bring our troops home. The status quo in Iraq is awful”, if you ask me she cant even get through one article without contradicting herself. She goes on to imply that America is spreading “imperialism ” by what she says is 14 permanent bases being set up in Iraq the size of Sacramento, California. I dont know if there is any United States military bases on the entire planet Earth the size of a large U.S. city,if there is please let me know ok. By the way the interview Cindy Sheehan gave to the Socialist Worker is the same Socialist worker who ran this article entitled ” The Meaning of Marxism” in which they praise Marxism to no end. Here is the link to that garbage http://www.socialistworker.org/Featured/MeaningOfMarxism.shtml
#11 Comment By Suzy Shedd On 24th August 2005 @ 13:34
Context is a very useful thing, and I strongly endorse learning to use it as a reading comprehension skill. Ms. Sheehan makes it very clear that the fact that something is democratic means only that a majority endorse it, not that it is good or highminded. We can hardly argue this, when at various times in our history, the majority have supported abominations like slavery. In this context, she is rejecting the notion that a “democratic” Iraqui constitution, particularly one that compromises the rights of women, is a justification for killing American soldiers and Iraqui citizens. I see no insult to democracy in recognizing that it is not perfect and has, from time to time, allowed bad decisions to occur. Truth is not an insult; it should be a spur to improvement.
As for the rest of Mr. Leatherwood’s post, I am afraid he is missing the point: very few people, if any, look to Ms. Sheehan as a guru of foreign policy. I, for one, have little interest in her beliefs about politics overall. What I support is her central message: the President and his administration have repeatedly lied to the American people; the war in Iraq has needlessly killed thousands of Americans and Iraqis, with no increase in safety for the US; the President works for us, is accountable to us, and should be willing and able to tell us, now that his lies have been exposed, his REAL reasons for manipulating a spineless congress into an illegal war. (I highly recommend Joe Conason’s article at salon.com on this issue.)
Fussing about what Ms. Sheehan said when or to whom is a transparently silly attempt to divert attention from the power of her primary message. Holding an elected president accountable for his actions strikes me as being a highly democratic exercise.
#12 Comment By Cat On 9th September 2005 @ 14:06
Hi Matt, I was directed here by Mark at http://spaces.msn.com/members/tke919/
That was a wonderful, eloquently written post that so aptly explains something I have been struggling to understand - how people still support Bush after all the lies.
I was going to respond to Mr Leatherwood, but Suzy Shedd has already done that very well.
Mr. Leatherwood seems to be spending a lot of time trying to discredit Cindy Sheehan, while not once addressing any of the issues that Ms. Sheehan has brought up; namely the lies the president told to justify sending the US to war. It seems as though he caught her in one contradiction. By my count that’s Sheehan: 1 lie, Bush, 1000’s of lies. Hmmmm……thanks for taking so much time to point that out, Mr. Leatherwood.
#13 Comment By Ben Tan On 9th January 2006 @ 18:36
Matt, a well-written piece with nice application of cognitive dissonance. But … quite biased. You use cognitive dissonance to excuse the American public for being slow to realize the folly of the war in Iraq but characterize the Bush administration’s actions as outright “lying”. To be fair, why haven’t you considered applying cognitive dissonance to the core members of the Bush adminstration to hypothesize that they continued to make foolish mistakes, justifications and pronouncements on Iraq because of the same inability to accept that they had been wrong to start a war in Iraq? In other words, why not excuse the Bush administration in the same way you have excused the American public?
#14 Comment By Matt On 9th January 2006 @ 20:31
Thanks for your response, Ben.
But . . . I wasn’t trying to “excuse” the American public; rather, I was trying to explain its reluctance to hold the Bush Administration accountable for what you rightly call “the folly in Iraq.”
I think you’re exactly right that the Administration itself has been affected by cognitive dissonance. Bush’s bubble, which keeps him from hearing voices of dissent, makes it easier for him and other members of the Administration to believe that they made the right decisions.
In neither case, though, does cognitive dissonance excuse anything. It simply helps explain why people stuck with Bush for so long in the face of countervailing evidence.
#15 Comment By Carey On 12th September 2006 @ 19:06
I teach classes in persuasion and cog diss is a major theme. Matt’s done a marvelous job of discussing dissonance in layman’s terms AND relating it to something important, relevant, and current. My students will be reading this eloquent piece.
Article printed from The Tattered Coat: http://www.tatteredcoat.com
URL to article: http://www.tatteredcoat.com/archives/2005/08/16/cognitive-dissonance-the-bush-administration-cindy-sheehan-and-the-war-in-iraq/
Click here to print.