Counselor706
Literotica Guru
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- Apr 24, 2011
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SourceWhoever ultimately prevails among the more than two dozen Democratic candidates for the presidency in 2020, the clear victor may be Peter Wason. The English psychologist was the first to establish “myside,” or confirmation bias — the tendency of people to gather or interpret facts that confirm their assumptions or preconceptions. With every passing day, the same “myside” bias is becoming more and more obvious but less and less recognized in the media.
Democratic candidates and commentators have engaged in Trump-like comments with virtually no coverage, let alone objection, because it does not confirm their view that Trump is uniquely offensive and divergent from the norm. Trump supporters often are the focus of news coverage for what is viewed as their blind loyalty and their ability to tune out offensive or embarrassing statements by Trump. Yet, the media — and many Democratic voters — have entirely ignored Democratic figures engaging in almost identical conduct or commentary. They just do not hear it because of “myside” media and politics.
In the 1960s, Wason was able to achieve his results with a couple dozen subjects, but the 2020 election is proving to be the largest Wason experiment in history, on the scale of tens of millions. The reason is that, while Wason actually exposed his subjects to opposing facts (which were still rejected), today’s voters live in hermetically sealed echo chambers where they select news that confirms their bias. For many Democrats, even if they hear Trump-like comments from fellow Democrats, they blame Trump for creating the environment leading to those comments.
What remains is bias protected by a hard shell of hypocrisy: All is fair in combating Trump ... even becoming more like him by the day.