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> A group will never admit they were wrong. A group will never admit, “We made a mistake,” because a group that tries to change its mind falls apart. I’m hard p
by dahart 5y ago
> A group will never admit they were wrong. A group will never admit, “We made a mistake,” because a group that tries to change its mind falls apart. I’m hard pressed to find examples in history of large groups that said, “We thought A, but the answer’s actually B.”
Germany openly regrets Nazis and Hitler. In the US we admit that letting McCarthy run amok was a huge mistake. Globally billions of people admit that we were wrong to let short term economic interests steam-roll the environment for the last century.
This article feels like a “my logical-to-me sounding hypothesis must be true because I haven’t thought of any counter-examples” rationalization. It doesn’t examine any cases of groups admitting being wrong, and there are lots in history. It doesn’t ask the question why is a group being wrong is a legitimately harder conclusion to come to, even from people external to the group. There usually are debates and individuals causing things to go one way or another.
- akdor1154 5y ago> Germany openly regrets Nazis and Hitler. If you were looking for the least-subtle example of the author's schism theory, i think you found it. :) Though I get your point - maybe the missing piece is "a schism will split the group... but in the very long term, it might be healed."
- dahart 5y agoNot sure I’d agree Germany ever split or experienced a schism. It went one way for a while, then another, and the group as a whole admits not wanting to repeat it.
- native_samples 5y agoThe relevant example here is Europe, not Germany. Germany regrets Hitler because Europe split, but the allies defeated it and then imposed their world view on the losers. The Nazis that disagreed were hung, imprisoned, killed or committed suicide. If Hitler had won this thread could have looked very different.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago> In the US we admit that letting McCarthy run amok was a huge mistake. Who is this "we" ? I strongly suspect that a large number of those who voted to re-elect the previous president likely incline a little bit in McCarthy's favor. He was anti-commie, anti-leftie, pro-america, and really a model for some parts of contemporary conservatism. Yeah, ok, so a few innocents got hurt, but look ... with all those people in front of McCarthy's committee ... a bunch of them had to be commies, right? No smoke without fire, etc.
- dahart 5y agoYou make a good point. In my defense, I was thinking of McCarthyism and the feature that it conducted mock trials, committed character assassinations, and accused people of being guilty by association. A lot of that has been quite roundly condemned by “us”, by which I mean the courts (including the Supreme Court), governments, historians, and the public. Even if some of the politics live on, and even if there are splinter groups who would do it again, I feel like it’s fair to say a solid majority of our group does admit the tactics of McCarthyism were an error, no?