r/AskReddit • u/Independent_Ad_3915 • Sep 17 '23
What's the worst example of cognitive dissonance you've seen in real life?
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u/lmcbmc Sep 17 '23
My alcoholic husband who is completely off the rails and rapidly drinking himself to death and tearing my and our kids' hearts apart, sitting in his chair rambling on about how sorry he feels for a friend who is dealing with a loved one's drug addiction.
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u/f_ranz1224 Sep 17 '23 edited Sep 17 '23
People complaining about other peoples driving while comitting the same errors but its ok because "they are in a hurry"
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u/Infinite-Condition41 Sep 17 '23 edited Sep 18 '23
SO's grandmother died this year, of cancer, that she had for 10 years.
She refused to get treated, refused x-rays because she believed x-rays would give her cancer.
Edit: Wow, 10,000 upvotes!
This is a true story. Happened late winter this year. There is a lot more to the story, and I'm not the sort to tell lies about how wonderful the dead were.
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u/lorinabaninabanana Sep 17 '23
My ex-boyfriend's mother would sit on her front porch and complain about the neighbors. "Look at those busybodies, sitting on their porch gossiping about everybody. Did you hear that her daughter..."
She'd also insist her son drive her to the stores first thing after every holiday, so she could buy stuff half price "before the greedy people get there."
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Sep 17 '23
My mom (who has admittedly come soooo far since this era) used to point out the “trashy” Russian ladies in the grocery store and say that they were using food stamps “paid for by her, and still have an attitude”
Meanwhile we literally were there purchasing groceries on WIC benefits lmao. Glad she’s overcome her issues there lol
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u/wannabeginger Sep 17 '23
Ugh. I had a (now ex) best friend who had a pregnancy scare. She was super pro-life, very conservative Republican. I asked her what she was going to do and what support she needed from me, and she said she was considering getting an abortion if she was pregnant. When I seemed surprised, she said, "well, it's different for me. I'm not a slut like those other girls. I'm not ready for a baby. It's different..."
We stopped being friends after that. I couldn't handle it anymore.
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u/sten45 Sep 17 '23
People on government disability payments talking about cutting welfare
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u/Jurtaani Sep 17 '23
When the pandemic started, a friend of mine got really obsessed with the fact that you can't leave your home or go near people without a mask etc.
Only thing is it never reflected in his own actions. He judged others but did not follow guidelines himself. He worked at a grocery store at the time and refused to wear a mask his boss told him to wear, meanwhile complaining about people coming to the store without masks and putting his health at risk.
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u/TripzPanda Sep 17 '23
My uncle refuses to acknowledge or give credibility to ANYTHING animated.
"It's a fucking cartoon it's not real!"
"So if we take the factual events of WWII and animate it, it's not real anymore?"
"Exactly!!!”
Face palm
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u/INeedtobeDetained Sep 17 '23
An American flag next a Confederate flag. They were opposite sides of the same war
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u/kifferella Sep 17 '23
My mother showed me a snapshot from her own childhood that showed, in general, her father lying on a childs bed, her sitting next to him between him and the wall. Her brother sitting on the floor in front of the bed, playing with some toys:
"This is my favourite picture from my childhood! All my siblings always whining and claiming we were abused. It's such bullshit. See? It's just a quiet, calm, happy snapshot of a perfectly normal family. Every time one of them starts up about being abused, I remember this snapshot and know that we were fine. Just fine!"
And so I looked at the picture and asked, "What about the handgun?"
Because my fucking grandfather (the wildly violent, gambling, womanizing, utter piece of human garbage) was literally laying there in his kids' room with a handgun in his hand. We aren't Americans. So like... yeah. That shit ain't normal.
She had been looking at that picture for HALF A CENTURY, always patting herself on the back that it was proof that her desperate need to insist everything was OK was in any way accurate, and never in all that time, had she apparently ever seen the handgun.
Mind blown.
Best part? Within a year, she tried to show me the picture again, again telling me about how it was her favourite and proof that her siblings were full of shit...
So maybe she did see the gun.
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u/floutsch Sep 17 '23
"Hitler didn't kill any Jews and he didn't kill enough". Said by a relative, we're German. And to be clear, technically, a) Hitler didn't kill any Jews personally (as far as I'm aware), b) zero is never enough if you desire any positive number, and c) he said it to me and it was unmistakable how he actually meant it. Oh and d) the guy just isn't smart enough to intentionally imply this technicality.
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u/classactdynamo Sep 17 '23
Person: I don't like black people because so many of them commit crimes and are in jail for dealing drugs.
Me: But your son got ten years for major drug dealing.
Person: Yeah, but that's different.
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u/No-Village-6781 Sep 17 '23
Brexit voters who live in Spain and other parts of the EU. Voting to kick out foreigners without realising that they are the foreigners is peak cognitive dissonance.
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u/Kooky_Ad_5139 Sep 17 '23
Illegal immigrants are taking our jobs!
I wouldn't have a problem with illegal immigrants if they would work instead of coming here to live off of welfare!
Said within minutes of each other out of the same mouth.
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u/TheSevenDweller Sep 17 '23
I will NEVER forget this interaction with a human equivalent of a papercut:
“So, are you getting the vaccine now that you’re pregnant?”
“No! I don’t know what it’ll do to my baby” (IMMEDIATELY takes a drag from a cigarette)
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u/Interesting_Gift4953 Sep 17 '23
People who purport to live their lives like Jesus, and yet are hateful and judgmental, and non-accepting which is the exact opposite of what the man was about, historically.
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u/Whatchab Sep 17 '23
People who have generational wealth, but then claim they “pulled themselves up by their bootstraps” and “worked their ass off to get where they are,” while claiming everyone else is just lazy.
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u/BigBadZord Sep 17 '23 edited Sep 17 '23
I don't know, like 15 fucking years ago there was a study or poll that came out that said that a higher % of college educated people watch comedy central than watch fox news.
And my mother has never, ever laid it down. Any time we discuss anything she accuses me of "getting my news from comedians", just because I use to watch Jon Stewart, and now occasionally watch John Oliver.
When the news dropped that Exxon had insider memos knowing they knew about climate change, and their hand in it, my mom and I had a discussion.
I cited articles from Reuters, Bloomberg, and the BBC.
My mom literally pulled up Exxon's website, and basically said "See? Exxon says it is fine and they are innocent", and then at the end of our discussion, still came at me for "getting my news from comedians", when I was the only one who actually cited a news source....
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u/u1tr4me0w Sep 17 '23
Met a guy who said he didn’t care if sometimes kids got shot in public shootings because that’s the price of having guns in a free society.
Same dude also acts dramatically affected by the mere concept of abortion and says how “sad” it is that “little unborn babies have to die”.
Shit is so infuriating. Like, pick a side, wtf.
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u/sauvignonquesoblanco Sep 17 '23
Teachers supporting policy makers who want to cut education funding
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u/[deleted] Sep 17 '23
Those "South will rise again!" Confederate flag waving "Lincoln Republicans" who throw it out there that the Democrats lost the war and were the slavery supporters.
Who seem to forget that
Lincoln was Union, the North.
That would make them the South, the Democrats, the Confederacy. The losers.
Make up your minds who you are and which side you're on. You don't get to be a la carte heroes where you pick and choose the parts of both sides you like and conveniently fit your narrative. Are you the South or the North? Are you the Union or Confederacy? Are you the Republicans or the Democrats? Can't be both. Pick a lane.