[richmarr]

It's incredibly easy to be this casually cynical, but reality doesn't match this simple worldview.

When you start to meet people in positions of power you realise that they're not a bunch of sleazy villains, they're complicated people who (for the most part) think they're doing the right thing in a difficult and often contradictory environment.

[vijayr]

You maybe right, but I have a hard time understanding how people can believe they are doing the "right thing", while trampling on their own citizens' privacy and basic rights.

I can understand if it is a super complicated trade treaty, but something straightforward like "don't spy on your people, that too with not much oversight etc" - is that too hard to understand?

[richmarr]

> I have a hard time understanding... trampling on their own citizens' privacy and basic rights

Confirmation bias goes a long long way.

Take gerrymandering, which is as undemocratic is it gets. If you already believed yourself to be one of the 'good guys', it wouldn't be hard to convince yourself that gerrymandering (as a tool of last resort) is an acceptable way to hold at bay the forces of moral degeneracy... especially when other 'good guys' tell you its okay, and you can find some character flaw or weakness in your opponent that you can use to licence your own.

Confirmation bias is well documented, but check out Daniel Effron's work on 'moral licencing'. He showed that people tend to horse-trade ethics, excusing biased or self-serving behaviour with the points scored from virtuous behaviour... one example being an experiment where the subjects exhibited increased racial bias when they'd previously been given an opportunity to state that they'd voted for Obama.