It’s only wrong when YOU do it! The psychology of hypocrisy | Dean Burnett

Hypocrisy seems to be everywhere lately. How do people reconcile themselves to saying one thing and doing another? And are there benefits?

Thriller: why do our brains allow us to enjoy being scared?

In these times of political turmoil, aggressive online discourse, "post-truth" society and lord knows what else, one thing is hard to deny: there's a lot of hypocrisy flying around. People regularly and angrily lambast others for doing something, while doing pretty much the exact same thing themselves.

Pundits condemning young people for being "special snowflakes" for wanting to be sheltered from controversial views in "safe spaces", then having an apparent meltdown whenever they see anything even vaguely inconsistent with their opinions. Angry online types who condemn the BBC for "bias" while enthusiastically linking to sites that make no effort at all at neutrality. People who preach tolerance and respect but get outraged whenever anyone disputes their methods. The list goes on.