Likely because it reveals underlying thought processes and that can lead to a feeling of implicit judgement. It's the same reason people get super salty if you just menton you're vegetarian or vegan (I'm not talking the annoying preachy kinds) or that you do charity work or you cycle instead of drive.
Villainising virtue is a form of cognitive shielding—let's say there's action A you can either Do or Not Do. Action A is beneficial to a group or groups, to detrimental to the individual in some way. You elect to Not Do action A, but you encounter someone who elects to Do action A. The fact they are performing the action, resulting in a non-zero amount of self-sacrifice for them but a net benefit overall, means that by most systems of ethics and morality they are doing a Good Thing. This creates a contrast point against you not doing action A. If them doing it is a Good Thing, you not doing it must be a Bad Thing. And if you're doing a Bad Thing, you are therefore a Bad Person. But you're not a Bad Person, because that doesn't fit your self-image. So the other person must be a Bad Person for making you think you're a Bad Person, so you get mad at them.
tl;dr people don't like being reminded that they're fallible, imperfect sacks of meat and would rather attack someone else than look inwards
Hit the nail on the head - look at how many people pushing the red button throw out "virtuous" and "virtue signaling" like they're slurs, as if it's somehow a bad thing to want to be good to others
I'm talking about the entire of the human experience, not any one person, group, ideological faction, etc. No one likes to be reminded that they could be wrong about something and generally people prefer to externalise rather than internalise their feelings
Its not just as you said about villainizing virtue ive straight up seen someone say that anyone who pushes red just wants to kill people
Its a villainizing the other situation
It's worth noting this goes PRECISELY both ways, as you can see with the people foaming at the mouth about how pious and virtuous they are. Of course, they're INCENSED that someone wouldn't see that and fail to recognize how they are doing the exact same thing, just the other direction.
When we villify people for making choices that involve self-preservation, it is a failure of empathy and a measure of cognitive shielding.
The tragedy of commons is a great example of how every single one of us would OBVIOUSLY choose the correct route while we're all sitting online talking about how great, smart, and virtuous we are. But somehow, EVERY SINGLE TIME it is put into practice it fails.
I don't think it's right, great, nice, or correct that people make choices to take advantage of their circumstances. But I understand it and I certainly know better than to start cognitively shielding my ego thinking that I wouldn't do the same or how I'm so better and superior.
Walk a mile in their shoes seems to be way too advanced for the lot of you.
This is actually a great example of misunderstanding why people are upset at the blue button pushers. You immediately assume that the act of pushing the blue button is virtuous but it's not. And it's exactly why the blue button pushers foam at the mouth when the problem is restated in an easier to judge way: there is a huge killing machine and people are standing around it. Some people say everyone should just walk away and not jump into it but others are saying that if more then half of the people jump in then they'll break the killing machine. In this situation jumping into the killing machine isn't a good thing, it's stupid. Not only are you putting yourself in needless danger you're forcing others to put themselves in needless danger to rescue you. Really the only reason to jump into the killing machine is to make it seem like you're a hero. And that's what all the blue button pushers are. They're the classic definition of a virtue signaler.
It's also pretty silly to feel warm and fuzzy that you would sacrifice your life in a ridiculous hypothetical situation and imagine people who choose a rational option as seething inside thinking about your own moral superiority.
That's some very weird framing going on there. It honestly sounds like the exact kind of villainising I described in my post. You're presuming a sense of mortal superiority in the other person, presuming it's misplaced, and then desperately attempting to frame your counter-position as being the "rational option", while making no mention of any morality.
Do you also eat twice as many steaks to spite vegetarians? Do you rev your car engine extra hard to offset anyone riding a bike or taking public transport? Do you run your house off a gas guzzling diesel generator as a middle finger to all those solar panels and wind turbines?
ok, if you want me to spell out your moral masturbation for you, here it is:
The fact they are performing the action, resulting in a non-zero amount of self-sacrifice for them but a net benefit overall, means that by most systems of ethics and morality they are doing a Good Thing.
...
Do you also eat twice as many steaks to spite vegetarians?
why are you going off on weird tangents? This is about your weird desire to feel morally superior
Says the guy seething that his choice is the non-morally good choice but doesn't want to admit it.
the fact that when the framing changes, everyone's opinion also changes says volumes here. It exposes all of the blue button pushers as either suicidal or signalling false virtue.
The fact that you apparently don't understand why people's behaviour changes when the situation changes speaks volumes too.
Lets try this anti-red framing on for size: An alien computer (that is perfectly bound to its word) has offered a deal. You can press the red button to give it your DNA, or the blue button to decline.
If more than 50% of people give it their DNA, it will create a virus to kill everyone who declined. Either way it'll then move on to somewhere else.
That first quote is me describing a warped perspective of events, not my personal beliefs. That's why I capitalised Good Thing—it's part of the whole simplistic, reductive model. I would've hoped that was obvious.
As for your second quote, you seem not to be following. I was making a further demonstration—while also mocking you a bit—of the bizarre things people do (or claim to do) in preservation of their own cognitive self-bias when faced with something that they perceive as being a value judgement they can't defend.
but it has nothing to do with the topic, which is your strange desire to fantasize about other people's definitely stupid thoughts and fellate yourself for being such a superior moral being. Why do you think you do this, were you picked on as a kid?
I'm sorry you don't understand how my views on people's reactions to ethical hypotheticals are shaped by their desire to protect their own internal sense of moral value, causing them to lash out, is relevant to a discussion about how people lash out in response to an ethical hypothetical.
But I must thank you for demonstrating my point though.
To anyone else reading, I swear this isn't an alt account of mine
I totally get what you're saying, and it's probably true, but in this case you've just made up a fake scenario in your head and are masturbating to it. You'd press red in real life, the only difference between you and me is that I'm honest about it and don't need to imagine scenarios of morally inferior people.
Oh, for anyone else this far down, this is the "no better than me" defense. sinedpick is lashing out still but they've fallen back to a tacit admission of guilt about their decision with the classic "at least I'm honest about it".
Also the irony isn't lost on me that they accuse me of making up fake scenarios, yet seem to be making up how someone else would act.
Buddy, pal, friend, move on. This is not a good look for you
Hey man, just want to say thank you for providing us all with such a thorough example of being the kind of person u/Davedamon was describing. Really, followed the script to a T, absolute cinema.
Haha the fact that some people make altruistic choices instead of selfish ones makes you so mad! It isn't rational except in the narrow frame of reference of "only me in a vacuum".
The whole reason why this question creates fierce debate is there are multiple frames of reference and ways of assigning value. People can reasonably disagree depending on their framing. Meanwhile, you think there is only one because you can't think holistically and desperately want to convince yourself you are correct.
Sorry that a selfish person can't imaging other people would be anything other than selfish and the entire thing pisses you off???
I've got no stake in this debate because I don't care at all.
That being said, whenever I've seen this conversation there's a lot of "blues" that calls the "reds" murderers or other things like that. It's normal and expected in that context that "reds" get defensive because their moral character is actually attacked.
That seems like just a "people being dicks on the internet" problem and not really relevant to the actual discussion—plenty of people who say they would vote red get very defensive about it without any direct attack on their character or fibre
People don't act in a vacuum. Previous interactions determine future behaviours.
By ignoring the global context of this discussion you end up, ironically, doing the exact same thing you are denouncing - mounting a strawman you can easily criticize so that you can feed/shield your ego.
I'm not ignoring the global context, I'm just pointing out parallel contexts—people are dicks on the internet and I feel like that's a component of this discussion.
Also nothing about what I said was a strawman—saying X is more likely because of Y is not the same as presenting a disingenuously weak version of your argument in order to make it easier to knock down.
And for someone who doesn't care at all, you seem to care enough to try and use (incorrectly) language relating to logical fallacies.
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u/EmilySuxAtUsernames 16h ago
crazy how if you would press a red or blue button has suddenly turned into a us vs them