JUDGE, JUDGE, JUDGING
By: T. Franklin Murphy | August 2016
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You Judge! You’re Terrible!
Undetected emotions interject, powerfully influencing action. A flow of energy creates impressions that guide future responses and we judge.
Absurdity and inconsistency mark the no-judgment era. Values and virtues previously accepted fade when it’s not vogue to acknowledge unacceptable behavior. The no-judgment ideology appears progressive, given the ugly history of bigotry. But a nation, society or group with no accepted values teeters on chaotic destruction. The non-judgment dogma easily spreads—it sounds good, so we pass it along. But when someone violates the no-judgment creed, we jump to action, pointing out the flaw for committing an unforgivable sin, “You Judge, you’re terrible.”
Is the only acceptable judgment judging the judger? #judgement #bias #wellness #psychology #flourishinglife Life demands evaluation between healthy and unhealthy, supportive and unsupportive, safe and unsafe. We must choose; and the act of choosing requires assessing facts, evaluating costs, and predicting rewards. Before a mindful choice, we must evaluate many factors, including assessing others—their intentions, strengths and weaknesses. When a person asks to borrow money, we must evaluate their money management skills and integrity. Evaluating pasts, we make inferences about the future. This cognitive skill protects against carelessly squandering money to swindlers, marrying psychopaths, or from divulging sensitive personal information to gossipers. We rely on cognitive resources by assessing memories to predict the future. But thought alone is not enough. Undetected emotions powerfully influence action. The flow of energy creates impressions that motivate action. These impressions push to avoid the suspicious stranger, forego trips to the ATM during late hours, or deny permission for a child to spend the night at little Sammy’s house. We don’t know for certain these events pose danger; we only suspect the possibility and act defensively. Some risks are not worth the gamble; so, we judge.
The judgment process discerns differences, attaches meaning, and predicts. Sometimes judgment is cognitive based; but often unconscious and automatic. Judgment taps multiple brain functions, integrates information and then motivates behavior. Unfortunately, judgment is subject to error. Predictions of character, patterns of events, and personal experience occasionally fail. We draw a definitive conclusion from limited information. Life is too complex, and we know too little. "Undetected emotions interject, powerfully influencing action. A flow of energy creates impressions that guide future responses." Judging isn’t bad; but individual judgments can be. Inhumane, unjust, and criminal behavior flow from bad judgment. Unconscious and automatic actions conserve mental energy—act now, justify later. These actions are swayed by invisible biases. Human atrocities live here, justified by self-righteous biases, ill-conceived labels are created from isolated and unreliable facts. Fear of differences, painful histories, and ego protection frustrates the judging process, interjecting misguided beliefs into the delicate equation.
While any judgments are derailed by misinterpretations, status-judgments are misguided from the start. Status-judgments have a bitter narcissistic flavor. Status-judgments rarely have definable utility; they are concerned with social positioning, addressing social anxieties and insecurities. Instead of examining complex causes of feeling affect, the simpleton projects a cause upon someone or a group of someones, escaping the task of complex examinations. From the uniformed lazy mind, hate infiltrates reason. The twenty-year old boy plows his car into the protesters, the sniper kills police officers—more fear, more hate, more destruction. The unjust status judgments down ranks others with a hope of raising social position. Often the single voice is strengthened by a chorus, the masses of fools seeking confirmation for their hatred. The hurtful tune unifies a common unjust cause, viciously condemning an entire group of people. Racism, persecution, and scape-goating breed here. These zero-sum judgments—I win, you lose—lack forward-thinking utility.
Evolutionary tendencies and cultural reinforcements encourage status-judgments. They provide immediate gratifications at the cost of significant long-term damage. Relationships suffer, societies destabilize, and fear expands. The obsessive fear driven actions impedes pursuit of healthy personal and societal goals—dignity, justice and compassion. Dignity shouldn’t be subject to competition. Life is complex. Choices are difficult. We never can gather enough facts to eliminate the possibility of error. We must make choices with limited information. We still can identify unfair inferences, harmful status-judgments, and self-excusing justifications. We still make judgments for safety and opportunity but do so while simultaneously guarding against hurtful biases that trample the dignity of others. A history of deplorable judgments stains the ‘judgment’ concept. The word has a negative connotation; to separate bad judgment from good judgment, a new word has been inserted--discernment. The problem with linguistics is a new word doesn’t solve the complexity of an issue. No matter which term we use, we are still subject to cognitive shortcuts that interfere with fair assessments.
I worry that by discarding the word 'judgment', and renaming the decision-making process with discernment masks the underlying problem. We christen the new word as divine, easing ourselves of the necessary burden to monitor our judgments. We say we are discerning; but still fail to detect misguided, incomplete and dignity-denying labels. To protect judgments from error, we don’t need a new word; we need more attention, watching for the dangerous pitfalls of bias. Through compassionate mindfulness, we un-tether judgments from social competitiveness. Our growth enlightens true causes of anxiety, allowing for a more targeted cure. We must continually examine harsh judgments, asking do they motivate positive action or simply boost social status by down-ranking others? If a judgment and following action doesn’t accomplish personal and social goals, challenge those judgments. Please support FLS with a share:
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Topics: Bias, Judging
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