“But He Doesn’t Believe He Lost”
I was watching Bill Maher the other night, the day after the first televised session of the January 6th congressional committee. He had former U.S. Counselor to Trump, Kellyanne Conway on. They were discussing the previous night’s hearing.
Bill Maher mentioned that many in Trump’s inner circle, even his own daughter, Ivanka, thought he had legitimately lost the election.
Truth and Alternative Facts
Then he looked at Kellyanne and said, even you thought he had legitimately lost the election.
She said she did, but then said, “but he doesn’t believe he lost.” I realize she meant this in a legal sense, but that statement goes back to the three articles I wrote previously on Truth and the Post-Truth society.
It is such a good example of the dangers of a post-truth society where anything anyone believes can pass for truth.
Kellyanne has a history of saying things like this. Back in 2017, then White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer made demonstrably false claims about attendance numbers at Trump’s Inauguration. When confronted with those false claims at the time, Kellyanne countered by saying, “we have alternative facts.”
Of course you can’t have alternative facts. Facts are facts, and just because someone wants to believe something contrary, doesn’t make it so.
Facts and Opinions
The distinction that has to be made is between facts and opinions. As the saying goes, “everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts”.
For example, let’s say someone wants to believe the world is flat, meaning that if you set sail towards the horizon and didn’t stop, you would eventually fall off the end of the earth.
I can’t force someone to believe the earth isn’t flat, but I also wouldn’t want that person in any kind of a navigational job.
When someone’s opinions, not backed by facts, become a danger to other people, then unsupported opinions have to be checked.
Can I Judge Another’s Actions?
When I was teaching philosophy, I would often run into this brand of individual relativism (each individual determines their own morals). Most people in the class thought the murder of innocent people was wrong, but some students would make the kind of statement Kellyanne did, claiming the murderer thought it was okay, so who were they to judge.
They strangely thought murder of an innocent person was wrong, but just for them. It wasn’t wrong to the person who committed the murder. They weren’t willing to extend their belief to cover other people. They didn’t feel they had that right.
Sometimes that can be a very thoughtful and open-minded position if we are talking about subjects that are open to debate, like someone’s belief or non-belief in God. Those kinds of questions are up for debate and discussion, but in the end, it is a decision each individual has to make for themselves.
But the murder of innocent people is not one of those subjects.
Yes, it’s possible the murderer had a terrible upbringing and was abused as a child, but that still doesn’t excuse their action. Those kinds of extenuating circumstances can be sorted out during the trial and sentencing.
Is it Just My Opinion Killing Babies is Wrong?
I also gave my students the made up example of someone who loved stealing babies from strollers when the parents weren’t looking, and then later killing them.
When making these types of moral examples, I always choose babies because they are the very definition of innocence, and nobody but a psychopath could argue that murdering them was acceptable.
Most students claiming to be moral relativists would say that they thought that killing babies was wrong, but some weren’t willing to extend that belief beyond themselves to the baby killer.
Who were they to do that? they asked. As the Bible says, “judge not and you shall not be judged.”
I tried to make clear that in cases like these we had to make judgments. We didn’t want those people running around in society committing atrocious crimes.
As I said before, everyone has the right to their opinion, but not to their own facts.
Those Holding Unsupported Opinions Must Be Challenged
When Kellyanne said that Trump didn’t believe he lost the election, he was entitled to that opinion, but the facts don’t back him up.
The evidence is overwhelming that the 2020 election was legitimate, so Trump publicly propounding the Big Lie goes against all the evidence.
Again if we are dealing with public issues, where others are affected, that person has to be judged and condemned.
We are not dealing with a rational person who, when given facts, will if necessary, amend their position.
To cling to a belief despite all the evidence against it is called “willed ignorance”. You literally have to shut down your mind and will your own ignorance to hold on to such a view.
People who fall into that category have serious psychological problems.
It would be like a guy who is chasing after a girl who is not interested in him. She shows this by how she acts towards him and what she says to him. Even friends tell him she is not interested, yet he continues to pursue her believing she loves him.
His Belief Doesn’t Make it So
His belief doesn’t make it so. Objectively he is wrong and to continue his pursuit will only cause him more misery. It is the modern version of hell that occurs when people deny “reality”.
So when Kellyanne says Trump doesn’t believe he lost the election, that just tells us that Trump, as his Attorney General Bill Barr claimed, “is detached from reality” and we certainly don’t want that kind of person anywhere near the presidency.
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Photo by Kyle Johnson on Unsplash
