The Crime of Believing Something Different “Stuff”

There was a small exchange on YouTube that, on the surface, probably meant very little. Brian Hurle asked Linden Warden a remarkably simple question about Matt Taylor:

• “What is his problem?” 

• The answer was equally simple: 

• “He believes in stuff I don't.”

And yet, there is something extraordinarily revealing about those seven words. Because perhaps that is the problem with modern society.

Not that people disagree. Not that people hold different political opinions, philosophies, interpretations of events or ideas about the world.

The problem is that we have increasingly come to treat disagreement itself as evidence that something is wrong with the other person.

When Disagreement Becomes a Diagnosis.

Consider the logic contained within that answer. Matt Taylor is perceived to have a “problem” because he believes things that Linden Warden does not believe. But reverse the proposition.

• If Linden believes something that Matt doesn't, does that mean Linden has a problem?

• If Brian believes something neither of them believes, does Brian have a problem?

• If millions of people believe something different again, do they all have problems?

At some point, the argument collapses under its own weight.

Yet this mentality is everywhere. We increasingly encounter a peculiar social equation:

• I believe X.

• You don't believe X.

• Therefore, there is something wrong with you.

It is a remarkably primitive way of understanding human beings. And it is particularly dangerous in an age in which everyone has a broadcasting platform.

The Tribalization of Belief.

Human beings have always formed tribes. We like people who resemble us. We seek reassurance from people who share our assumptions. We instinctively gravitate towards communities in which our worldview is reflected back at us.

There is nothing inherently sinister about that. The problem begins when the tribe becomes more important than the truth.

Once someone becomes identified as belonging to “the other side”, their arguments can be dismissed before they have even been considered.

• Their motives are questioned.

• Their character is attacked.

• Their sanity may be questioned.

• Their history is dragged into the argument.

• Their supporters are mocked.

And eventually the disagreement ceases to be about an idea at all.

It becomes:

“What sort of person believes that?”

That is a profound shift. We have moved from debating propositions to judging people.

The Internet has Amplified the Problem.

YouTube and social media have created something historically unusual. An ordinary individual can now construct a media platform around their interpretation of the world.

That is potentially wonderful. It allows people who would previously have had no voice to speak. But it also creates enormous opportunities for tribal conflict.

• Algorithms reward engagement.

• Outrage produces engagement.

• Conflict produces engagement.

• Ridicule produces engagement.

• And certainty produces engagement.

The person saying: “I might be wrong, but let's examine the evidence.”

is rarely as entertaining as the person shouting: “I KNOW what this person is really like!”

The result can be an online culture where people are encouraged to become increasingly certain about people they have never met, situations they have never witnessed and motivations they cannot possibly know.

The extraordinary arrogance of assuming you know someone There is another problem hidden inside the statement:

“He believes in stuff I don't.”

It assumes that the speaker's understanding represents some kind of neutral position from which the other person can be diagnosed. But nobody occupies that position.

Every human being sees the world through accumulated experiences, prejudices, education, relationships, disappointments, hopes, fears and assumptions.

We all have filters.

The intellectually honest response to disagreement should therefore be curiosity.

• Why does he believe that?

• What evidence does he have?

• What experiences led him there?

Could I be wrong? Those questions open a conversation.

“What is his problem?” closes one.

The Bully's Paradox.

There is an especially uncomfortable irony when disagreement becomes bullying. The person doing the bullying may genuinely believe they are defending truth, justice or righteousness. But from the perspective of the person being targeted, the experience can be entirely different.

Imagine telling someone:

“You are wrong because you don't believe what I believe.”

Then repeatedly mocking them, discussing them, ridiculing them and encouraging others to view them negatively.

Eventually the person may find themselves asking: What exactly have I done? And the answer can be nothing more complicated than:

You refused to conform.

That is one of the oldest mechanisms of social control. Societies have always had mechanisms for punishing people who refuse to conform. Sometimes those mechanisms are formal and sometimes they are informal.

• The modern version can be remarkably subtle.

• You don't necessarily need to silence someone.

• You can simply make speaking uncomfortable.

• You can surround them with ridicule.

• You can turn their name into a punchline.

• You can create an environment in which anyone associated with them becomes part of the joke.

And eventually the individual is expected to retreat. But disagreement is not persecution There is an important distinction here.

• Not every criticism is bullying.

• Not everyone who disagrees with Matt Taylor is a bully.

• Not every negative comment is harassment.

And having a different interpretation of events is not automatically malicious.

People are entitled to criticise one another. They are entitled to say: “I think Matt is wrong.”

They are entitled to say: “I don't believe his interpretation.”

They are entitled to challenge evidence, arguments and conclusions. Indeed, a healthy society requires precisely that.

The problem arises when the argument changes from: “I disagree with what you believe.” 

To: “There is something fundamentally wrong with you because you believe it.”

That is where disagreement becomes dehumanisation.

What if we reversed the question?

Perhaps Brian Hurle's question could have been answered differently.

Instead of:

“What is his problem?”

perhaps the more interesting question would have been:

“Why does he believe differently from you?”

That question changes everything.

• It assumes there is a human being behind the opinion.

• It assumes there may be a reason.

• It creates the possibility that the person has encountered information, experiences or interpretations that have led them somewhere different.

And perhaps most importantly, it leaves open the possibility that neither person possesses the complete picture.

That is intellectual humility. And intellectual humility is desperately needed.

The Danger of Ideological Certainty.

One of the strangest developments of modern life is that people can become simultaneously more informed and less curious.

We have access to more information than any generation in history. Yet we frequently consume that information inside ideological bubbles. We don't necessarily search for information that challenges our worldview. We search for information that confirms it. The result is confirmation bias on an industrial scale.

Every new piece of information becomes ammunition. If it supports us, it is “evidence”. If it contradicts us, it is “propaganda”, “lies”, “nonsense” or evidence of the other person's stupidity.

Eventually the worldview becomes unfalsifiable. And once a belief becomes unfalsifiable, it stops functioning as an investigation of reality and starts functioning as an identity.

“I am right” becomes “I am good” This is perhaps the deepest problem.

People don't merely want to believe they are correct.

They increasingly want their beliefs to demonstrate that they are morally superior.

If my beliefs are good, and your beliefs are bad, then perhaps I am good and you are bad.

That is enormously seductive.

• It provides certainty.

• It provides belonging.

• It provides an enemy.

And it provides a simple explanation for a complicated world. But human beings are rarely that simple.

• A person can believe something stupid and still be fundamentally decent.

• A person can believe something intelligent and still behave terribly.

• A person can be wrong about one thing and right about another.

• A person can change their mind.

• A person can contradict themselves.

• A person can make mistakes.

That is what makes us human.

The Freedom to be Wrong.

There is something else worth defending: The freedom to be wrong.

A genuinely free society cannot only protect opinions that turn out to be correct.

If freedom of thought means anything, it must include the freedom to explore ideas that other people dislike. Otherwise freedom becomes conditional upon conformity.

Of course, there are limits. Threats, criminal conduct, deliberate deception causing harm and targeted harassment are different matters. But merely holding an unpopular belief should not make someone socially illegitimate. Nor should disagreement automatically transform the person holding the belief into an enemy.

Perhaps the real question is “What is our problem?”

So perhaps the most interesting interpretation of that YouTube exchange is not:

“What is Matt Taylor's problem?”

It is:

“What is our problem?”

• Why have we become so uncomfortable with people who think differently?

• Why do we feel compelled to persuade everyone around us?

• Why does somebody else's disagreement feel like a personal attack?

• Why do we sometimes prefer destroying the credibility of another person to examining the possibility that they might have a point?

• And why do we increasingly confuse consensus with truth?

These are much more important questions than whether Matt Taylor believes the same things as Linden Warden.

A Society Capable of Disagreement.

A healthy society isn't one in which everybody believes the same thing. That would not be a healthy society. It would be a society of conformity.

A healthy society is one in which people can disagree passionately while still recognising the humanity of the person standing opposite them.

It is possible to say:

“I think you're completely wrong.”

without saying:

“You are worthless.”

It is possible to say:

“I don't believe you.”

without saying:

“You are insane.”

It is possible to say:

“I think your interpretation is mistaken.”

without turning the disagreement into a campaign against the individual.

And perhaps most importantly, it is possible to say:

“I don't understand why you believe that. Tell me.”

That final sentence may be one of the most powerful tools we have left. Because curiosity creates dialogue. Dialogue creates understanding. Understanding does not necessarily create agreement. But agreement was never supposed to be the purpose of human conversation.

Sometimes the purpose is simply to understand why another human being sees the world differently.

The Final Irony.

There is an extraordinary irony in the original statement.

“He believes in stuff I don't.”

That sentence was presumably intended to explain what is supposedly wrong with Matt Taylor. Yet it may actually explain something much larger about the society we have created.

• A society in which difference is increasingly interpreted as defect.

• A society in which disagreement becomes disloyalty.

• A society in which criticism becomes personal.

• A society in which people construct tribes around shared beliefs and then treat outsiders with suspicion.

And a society in which the question isn't always:

“Is this person right?”

but:

“Is this person one of us?”

That is the real danger. Because once belonging becomes more important than truth, anybody can become the enemy.

Today it is Matt Taylor. Tomorrow it could be you. And the only reliable defence is the principle that should have been there from the beginning:

• You don't have to believe what I believe.

• You don't even have to like what I believe.

But you should be able to disagree with someone without deciding that there must be something wrong with them simply because they think differently.

Perhaps that is not a weakness. Perhaps it is civilisation.