21st October 2009
Wired for Hypocrisy
“It’s not only the rich and famous who have made hypocrisy a fine art, though when advocates for the poor such as John Edwards build gargantuan homes, or family-values preachers such as Ted Haggard fess up to “sexual immorality”, they sure make it seem so. But garden-variety hypocrisy is so rife—the “environmentalist” who bought a Hummer because, come to think of it, driving lots of kids to soccer practice would use much less gasoline than if every parent made the trip; the “humanitarian” who turns down the charitable appeal because, on second thought, it’s much better for the poor to learn to fend for themselves—it seems as if the brain must have a special circuit for it.
