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Trump Campaign Co-Chair Carl Paladino "Apologizes" for His Gutter Racism (But Not Really)

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goddamnedfrank12/27/2016 9:27:50 pm PST

It’s the Just World Hypothesis in action. People’s psyche’s are trying to process an objectively unfair election result in which the clear and convincing winner of the popular vote lost due to an archaic and indefensible algorithm aided by confluence of factors including voter disenfranchisement, media collusion with the Russian State and official FBI misconduct. Now that result can’t possibly exist in a “just world” unless Clinton somehow deserved it, so it must stand as some kind of metaphysical proof that she really was a corrupt, patently awful person. The obvious problem is then trying to square that against the near personification of corruption and psychopathy Trump presents with his entire history along with every continued action and utterance.

The really magical thing about the Just World Hypothesis is it inflicts the thinking of people who actually do know better, it takes a real degree of introspection to combat. The reaction to seeing suffering or injustice that the observer cannot change is often a growing subconscious antipathy towards the sufferer or person who was wronged. We tend to want to believe we can help people who’ve been wronged and if we can’t we start thinking of reasons they deserve whatever fate has handed to them. People reflexively dislike the idea that life is just a random bunch of shit that happens, even though that’s pretty much entirely how reality functions.