On September 11, 2001, the world witnessed one of the most horrifying
scenes ever broadcast on live television. A group of militant Islamic terrorists,
seeking retribution for the United States’ support of Saudi Arabia and Israel, attacks
on Muslims in the middle east, and sanctions against Iraq, hijacked four planes and crashed
them into the World Trade Center buildings, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania.
At least, that’s one version of the story.
Within hours of the attacks, someone suggested in an internet
chatroom that the attack appeared like a controlled demolition. Within a week,
the idea that it was an “inside job” was published in the French newspaper Le Monde.
Within six months, people around the world were ardently convinced that it was the work of the
CIA, that the US had done this to itself to justify aggression in the Middle East.
Yikes.
How do we get here? How do we all look at the same situation,
the same evidence, the same facts, and come up with such divergent ideas?
More importantly, when you encounter someone who believes in a conspiracy theory like this, when
you talk with someone who believes something you know to be false, how do you change their mind?
For many, the answer is to bring the facts. It’s about being prepared with research and
studies and history so that we can prove that we’re right, beat our opponent in a debate,
forcing them to accept our position… a strategy that we all employ, that we all think will work,
but know from experience doesn’t work.
For better or for worse, people are not convinced by facts. They don’t
change their minds because they lose an argument, are humiliated, or alienated.
But people do change their minds. One of the most famous 9/11 conspiracy theorists admitted
that he was wrong. There is something else that gets through to people. There is something else
that influences what we think and believe to be true, and my guess is that most of us are
not aware of it. Unless we understand what this is, each and every one of us will be susceptible
to manipulation by others and will never be effective at changing anyone else’s mind.
—
Let’s start with a man who changed his mind about the 9/11 conspiracy.
In 2012, BBC aired a mini-series called Conspiracy Road Trip. Each episode,
the host would gather a handful of people who were convinced of some outlandish belief and take them
on a fact-finding tour to see how they reacted to expert testimonies to the contrary. Predictably,
guests rarely changed their opinions, but that was sort of the entertainment of it all—when presented
with new evidence, they explained away what they had seen and doubled down on their theories.
A notable exception was the episode about the 9/11 attacks,
which concluded with one guest, Charlie Veitch, actually admitting that he was
wrong. He needed to accept that the evidence contradicted his theory.
So what did it for him, we wonder. Was it the demolition expert explaining how it would have
been impossible to plant and conceal the necessary amount of explosives to take down the towers? Or
the flight simulator that showed how easy it would have been to fly a plane into a building?
Maybe it was the explanation of how debris scatters and disintegrates.
No doubt, all of these things had some effect on him, but none of
them was significant enough on its own to convince him to disavow his stance.
In the end, the most influential factor, what lifted the veil from his eyes and forced him
to accept the evidence, was something that had nothing to do with the conspiracy theory itself:
it was his relationship to the other conspiracy theorists.
You see, at one point in the episode, the guests met with people who had
lost loved ones in the attacks. Charlie listened to a widow’s story with sadness,
hugged the woman as she cried. He believed in a conspiracy theory,
yes, but he wasn’t a monster, he thought. He felt empathy for her. As he expected everyone would.
But his fellow truthers didn’t. When they got back to the hotel,
they actually made fun of her. Some thought that she had been brainwashed by the FBI.
One went further to say that she was a hired actress, a plant by the BBC to trick them.
It was in this moment that something snapped inside Charlie. He realized that the people
around him, the ones that believed what he believed, the ones that he held onto
as his community of support, were people that he didn’t want to be associated with.
Now, obviously, the human mind is complicated and it’s impossible
to pinpoint the exact moment or reason why our minds change, but
I think that Charlie’s story teaches us something fundamental about how we come
to believe—or not believe—something: our beliefs are socially influenced.
While facts and evidence are obviously important in determining what we think is true,
this process never occurs in a vacuum. We want to be accepted for what we believe
and be surrounded by others who affirm us. For those who fall for conspiracy theories,
there is often an initial anxiety and questioning of the facts, yes, but it grows and becomes rooted
in someone because they find affirmation in people they want to be in community with.
It’s a thought process that is motivated as much,
if not more, by emotion and a sense of belonging as it is the evidence.
I have this question, and here is a person that I like, think is trustworthy,
and want to be around that has an answer, so yeah, let me listen to what they have to say.s
And so what we see in the case of someone like Charlies is that it was not the
evidence in itself that convinces someone of the theory, and it is not the evidence,
outright, that can break him of it. It was his relationships. It was looking around
and realizing that he didn’t trust these people anymore, that he didn’t want to be
associated with them anymore, that then gave him the freedom to ask, “Do I actually believe this?”
—
What I find particularly unsettling about Charlie’s story is that it is not just the
story of a conspiracy theorist—it’s the story of humanity. I see myself in his experience.
Now I like to think of myself as a pretty intelligent, adaptable,
free-thinking guy. I can see things from other people’s perspectives,
entertain new evidence, and even change my mind when I see that I’m wrong.
The idea that I could be influenced by bias is not something I take kindly to.
Until I realize that there are plenty of decisions in my life, plenty of things that I like or
don’t like, accept or deny, that are based in large part on what the people around me think.
I’ll give you an example. A few months ago I was listening to some baseball commentary
and this guy I couldn’t stand starts speaking. I think to myself, “Ugh, this guy. What an idiot.”
I listen for a bit, and it turns out, he says something pretty insightful. Huh. I hear him
speak a couple of times over the next few months and realize, “You know, this guy isn’t
that bad. He’s not the best, but he’s fine. Why did I think he was so terrible all these years?”
And then I remember: growing up, my dad couldn’t stand him. He used to complain
that he didn’t know what he was talking about, made fun of the things he said.
And so, at 10 years old, and for twenty plus years after, I implicitly agreed.
Now, for all I know he could have gotten better and isn’t the same announcer he was 20 years ago,
or maybe my Dad is still right, but you see my point: when someone we
like and trust says something, that has an effect on us. Without our even knowing it,
we might find ourselves influenced—not by pure reason, not by the evidence alone—but
by a desire to be in community with other people.
Think about how often we do this. It starts as kids with our parents but continues on with our
friends, our careers, our news networks, our religions leaders. Think about the sports teams
we like, the interests we have, our political stances, our opinions about any little thing.
When someone we like and trust says something, we are far more likely
to agree with them without verifying what they say or critically questioning our own beliefs.
As silly as they may seem, celebrity endorsements actually do work, even if on a subconscious level.
And it works both ways. How many times in my life I’ve found myself having an opinion of something,
not because of the thing itself, but because people I didn’t like
had an opinion of it. It was as if I said in my mind, “Well that person,
who I don’t trust at all, likes this, so I probably won’t like it.”
I look at the way people hate things like Taylor Swift, Pumpkin Spice, the Latin Mass, Boston
sports teams, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. There are a lot of people in this world that
have very strong negative feelings about each of these things, and maybe they’re warranted.
But I wonder, if you’re a person who really hates one of these things,
how much of it because of the actual thing itself and how much of it because
of your discomfort with the type of person that likes these things.
Whether we want to admit it or not, there is a social dimension to our sense of truth. Drawing us
one way or another isn’t always our evaluation of the facts, but how we feel about it’s proponents.
The fact of the matter is that none of us is a purely objective,
bias-free thinker. We are greatly influenced, not just the message, by the messenger.
When we trust the person who introduces an idea to us,
we are more likely to accept it. When we don’t trust them, we are more likely to question it.
This… is unsettling, for sure. But it also presents us with
two great opportunities if we’re willing to do some soul searching.
—
While
the realization that we might be a bit biased is far from encouraging,
it does offer us a fairly easy solution to one of the world’s biggest problems, namely,
our inability to communicate effectively with one another. Why don’t some people
accept the truth when they’re presented with it, and what we can do about it?
The first answer, unfortunately, requires that we admit that sometimes we are the ones
who refuse to accept the truth. Whether it’s because the people we trust espouse untruths or
because our enemies are actually right, there are times, we should all be able to admit,
that we have ended up on the wrong side of things for irrational reasons.
Can we admit that? Can we be honest enough with ourselves, with our feelings towards another,
to say “The only reason I like this is because my best friend likes it.” To say,
“The only reason I don’t like this is because the leader of the ‘bad’ political party said it.”
Trust me when I say that this is no easy task. It is difficult to
untangle our feelings for things and relationships with people.
Our life isn’t so neatly compartmentalized, objectively ordered in every way. How can
you possibly separate your feelings for loved ones with something you’ve held to for decades?
Because it’s not simply that you like something because they like it—admitting that you don’t
like something that your loved one does could cause strain on the relationship.
Taking a stance against a friend, stepping outside of a group, potentially standing
alone by your convictions regardless of what anyone thinks is a huge social risk.
There’s a reason why we have this bias in the first place:
we want to be accepted. We want to feel like we’re a part of someone
else’s life… even if it doesn’t make sense. Even if the facts don’t line up.
And so we have to ask ourselves: do I have the courage to stand for what I believe,
even if others don’t? Am I willing to seek the truth, even if that separates
me from my friends, even if that puts me in league with people I don’t like?
Whoo. That’s tough stuff. Tough stuff for sure, but if we claim to be a people who want the truth,
what other choice do we have? Unless we recognize that we can be biased, that emotion influences
our decisions, we will always be a people resistant to truth, easily manipulated by others.
Of course, we know that the problem doesn’t always lie within us. We encounter people all the time
who simply won’t listen to what we have to say, that are so stuck in their ways that there is
nothing that’s ever going to change their mind. What do we do when the problem is other people?
For me, it’s back to Charlie Veitch and the conspiracy theorists. Here was a man who believed
that 9/11 was an inside job. He was presented evidence for years and held to his beliefs.
How many of us, had we met him along the way, would have dismissed him
as a lost cause, as crazy, and beyond convincing? And yet, look what happened.
He changed his mind. Not because someone finally articulated the argument in the perfect way,
not because he was logically defeated… but because the people he trusted began to shift. What changed
wasn’t the facts he was hearing, it was his relationship with the people he was listening to.
Sometimes, the problem isn’t so much in what we’re saying as it
is the fact that we are the one’s saying it. For better or for worse,
there are people in this world that don’t like you or me, don’t trust what we have to say,
and so it doesn’t matter what we say or how we say it, they are not going to be convinced.
If this is the case, our answer cannot be to double down on facts. It cannot be to work
extra hard to show them that they’re wrong and we’re right. The problem isn’t with the message,
it’s with the messenger, and so if we are ever going to make a difference, ever going to have
a hope of them listening to us, we need to put our energy in building the relationship.
Why is it that this person doesn’t trust me? What is it about me—what I say and do,
what I stand for, who I associate with—that leaves someone cautious of what I have to say?
There is no doubt that some of this is outside of our control
and we shouldn’t go around changing who we are just to get people to like us,
but I can guarantee that there is something we could do better. I guarantee that we
could be more attentive to the way we present ourselves to others, the way we talk to people
we disagree with, the way we either welcome or do not welcome people into our lives.
In Paul VI’s letter Evangelii Nuntiandi, “Proclaiming the Gospel,” the pope captures
this idea perfectly. He says, “Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers,
and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.”
In other words, people are not be convinced by what you say, they’re convinced by who you are.
People are not convinced by what you say, they’re convinced by who you are.
And so if we want to change someone’s mind, if we want to share the truth that we’ve
found—something that all Christians should want to do—the first and most important thing
that we must do… is form a relationship, is gain trust, is show the person in front of
us that we are on the same team and care about the same things they care about.
Too many important conversations have been shut down even before they started because
one person offended another. Too many important lessons have been missed because the one speaking
didn’t respect the one they were speaking too. Too many opportunities for evangelization
have been lost because the evangelist didn’t present themself as a person worth following.
We have got to take this more seriously. In our interactions online, in the way we present
ourselves to the wider society, if people view us as fake, unfriendly, untrustworthy,
heartless, interested in nothing but money, interested in nothing but fame, whatever it is…
they are not going to listen, no matter what we have to say.
If you want to change someone’s mind, change the way they perceive you. I tell you, even if someone
believes in a conspiracy theory with absolutely no basis, if they know that you respect them,
if they know that you are trustworthy and someone they want to be like, the truth will prevail.