Hey what’s up Thinkers! Kathy Gibbens here…
Welcome back to another episode of the FitABC podcast, which, by the way, my family calls the FitABC podcast b/c they think Filter It Through a Brain Cell is super long to say, lol, so they shorten it down to an acronym. I’m not sure what I think about it, but my daughter is asking for a FitABC hoodie! Maybe we’ll have to do something like that. I am working on some waterbottle stickers, though! I hope to have them ready to go next month!
Ok, let’s start off with a review of a fallacy we’ve covered in the past, and today we’ll be reviewing what was part one of a 12 part series I did on manipulation tactics. I felt like it was really important b/c, while they’re not technically fallacies, these manipulation tactics are used to make you question your own thoughts, to make you doubt yourself and they’re used to make you do, think or believe a certain thing. So, like fallacies, you have to be aware of them and on guard about falling for them!
So, the manipulation tactic we’ll review today is Gaslighting. Gaslighting is when someone tries to make you question your own reality or your own sanity. It comes from an old movie from the 1940s where a husband tried to make his wife think she was going crazy so he could admit her to a mental institution and steal her inheritance. Lovely, huh?
So, here’s a question to ask yourself if you think you’re being gaslit: “Is this person making me feel like I’m crazy when I know I’m not?”
If you want to hear more about Gaslighting, go back & check out Episode 46.
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Alright, let’s dive into today’s new fallacy: The Noble Motive Fallacy. And this one makes me smile b/c my husband's name is Noble! The Noble Motive Fallacy happens when someone believes (or wants you to believe) that something is true just because they have good motives for wanting you to believe it.
This is also sometimes called The Noble Effort Fallacy, The Good Intentions Fallacy or the E for Effort Fallacy.
One example of how this can happen is when someone is making a recommendation for something. Let’s say you fall off a ladder and break your arm. In an effort to make you feel better, I recommend taking Vitamin C…b/c Vitamin C helps everything, right?! I may truly believe that Vitamin C is really important for health and healing, but if I were to recommend it to you for a broken arm, regardless of how much I sincerely want to help, that’s a bad recommendation! Vitamin C is not the best treatment for a broken arm - you need to see a doctor and get an X-ray and get it put in a cast or, it may even need surgery to heal well.
Another example of this fallacy can happen in politics when people “fall in love” with a certain candidate b/c they believe them to be a “good person”. B/c they trust this person, they mistakenly believe that they have the best of intentions and therefore would never support or introduce legislation that is bad or harmful. Well, this couldn’t be further from the truth! We have to take the time to analyze each bill, policy or piece of legislation for what it is, not just take someone’s word for it b/c they seem to be a “good guy”! We saw this happen just this election cycle with a man in Georgia who is or claimed to be a “pastor”. He claimed to love people and want the best for them, and he said that there’s no room in a patient’s room for the woman, her doctor and the US Government…implying that the US Government had no place in deciding healthcare questions for women. Sounds nice, right? So if this pastor is saying this, he must be a good guy and we should therefore vote for him, right? That’s exactly what hundreds of Christians did, with even big, popular churches endorsing him b/c he was a “Christian” so he must have good values & morals. That couldn’t be further from the truth. This man, when you actually looked at his policies and the things he stood & voted for, couldn’t be further from supporting true Biblical values…even though he seemed to have and claimed to have the best of motives.
What’s wrong with the thinking behind the Noble Motive Fallacy is probably obvious to you: just b/c someone has or seems to have good motives doesn’t actually mean that it’s true! As always, you have to analyze the actual argument for what it is rather than just believing the person based on their good-hearted sincerity. It is possible to be sincerely wrong! Now, obviously, there are some areas where someone’s motive should be taken into consideration…for instance, in criminal trials, motive is a huge part of the argument! But, when it comes to finding the truth of a claim, belief or a recommendation, we have to look strictly at the argument itself & evaluate the argument or claim or belief to determine whether it’s true or not, regardless of how sincere the person who’s claiming it might be.
Another version of the Noble Motive Fallacy is people recruiting others into manipulative groups or even cults. An infamous example of this is what happened at Jonestown with a cult started by a man named Jim Jones. Jim Jones convinced hundreds of people to move to the country of Guyana with him to practice what he called “apostolic socialism”. He made all kinds of claims & promises, basically preaching a weird & twisted mix of ideas from religion and from socialism. Anyways, he convinced his cult members to move to Jonestown, Guyana and live in a socialistic commune, which, as socialism does, totally unraveled. In the end, he convinced over 900 people to kill themselves by drinking poison. Here’s the thing, Jim Jones and the people in his cult were totally sincere! They really thought that they had the right answers and that what they were doing was the right thing - they had ‘good’ motives! - and they recruited a lot of people into their group, who also sincerely believed it was right. Sincerity & good motive, however, does not make it right. It was a total disaster which resulted in massive loss of life & heartache for the people who lost loved ones in this incident.
So, the question to ask yourself if you think you might be facing, or even committing a Noble Motive Fallacy is this: “They may have good motives, but does that mean it’s true or right?” *repeat*
Remember: When you learn HOW to think, you will no longer fall prey to those who are trying to tell you what THEY want you to think and it all starts with asking one simple question: “Is that really true?”
