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Indeed. I do not pity the man who is forced to reconcile the apparent belief that the government is always right with a government official claiming that the g

• nullc 14y ago
  No pity required— that man doesn't exist. If people actually thought that way they'd be disabused of the notion after the first few counterexamples they encounter. Just-world, like other stereotyping biases is so insidious because the mistaken belief starts with the truth: "The government is usually right, so it's (very likely) right in this case (and the rightness justifies the outcome)". You can, perhaps, debate the "usually" but that misses the point: In terms of _justice_ and human rights it is improper and immoral to reason using coarse prior probabilities: You should be no more likely to convict a black person because statistically black people commit more crimes, people should be judged on their own merits. The underlying fallacy in many instance of just-world is the mistaken belief the its proper to apply your belief that the world is generally just to a specific case of potential injustice. So there is no dissonance for most— they think "well, I always believed the government was only usually right. No one is perfect, and see— the system worked!".