Quote of the Day (51)

Cognitive dissonance exists because it’s possible for otherwise-intelligent men and women to hold two points of view at the same time that mutually exclude at their core. ‘X’ and ‘Not-X’. That sort of thing.

I ran into this in a conversation with two women at work many years ago about the Liberal Prime Minister they had just helped elect. As I listed government policy after government policy with which I knew they both had serious issues, they nodded in agreement like twin bobbleheads of the sisters from Full House. These were indeed bad policies, and they were driving our country into the ground. We were all on the same page about that.

“So … why?” I finally asked.

The Wrong Kind of Consistency

It turned out they were both translators. Their livelihoods depended on Canada’s bilingualism. They believed the Liberals would enshrine Canada’s second official language (French) in perpetuity, while Preston Manning’s Reform Party, supported by a much higher percentage of Anglos, would probably scupper it one day. So they voted for a shot at job security, despite acknowledging innumerable Liberal deficiencies. They gambled that a morally inconsistent government would inexplicably remain consistent in the single area of governance that affected them most directly.

The Liberals gave them a sort of consistency, just not the kind they expected. Only one of these two women is working in the field today. Marginal French speakers from the Third World have swamped the Canadian market for English/French translators. That’s on the Liberals, whose immigration policies (with which both these women disagreed) increased Canada’s population by between seven and ten million over the last decade, many from places where French is spoken: Cameroon, Senegal, the Ivory Coast. These found work as translators in Canada despite the considerable differences between the variants of Parisian French spoken in Africa and the version we encounter when we cross the Quebec border. In many cases, these translators spoke French as poor as their English. The culprit in this boondoggle that brought down industry standards? Yet another Liberal government policy with which these women theoretically disagreed: DEI.

Moral of the story: There’s more than one way to lose your job. That, and if a government isn’t giving you what you want in nine out of ten policy areas, the chances it will continue giving you what you want in the remainder are somewhere between slim and none.

Interesting Churn

Far too many Christians live in ways that produce cognitive dissonance. There is what the Bible teaches, which, theoretically at least, we all agree will result in our long-term good and that of others. Then there is the easiest short-term fix for a pressing problem, achieved by ignoring scripture and charging ahead. Something’s gotta give.

Doug Wilson writes:

“Because of the Fall, the Lord God ordained that a certain level of leadership tension will always exist between husband and wife (Gen. 3:16). This can create some interesting churn in a woman’s heart — where she despises a man she can dominate, and at the same time likes getting her way.”

Over the years, I have witnessed this firsthand in the relationships of several married couples I really like. The wife agrees that she would admire her husband a great deal more if he would only start taking the lead in decision making, then promptly makes every major decision that confronts them as a couple, often well before the man is even aware that options exist. Is it as simple as she “likes getting her way”? Maybe.

What They Want

An old friend once said, “People get what they want.” The statement was more profound than it sounds at first. What he meant was this: You can tell what people really want not by what they say, but by what they do over time. They may complain about the consequences of their choices every day of their lives, but if they keep opting for the same self-destructive paths over time, what they really prefer becomes obvious.

Christian women can have admirable husbands or they can persist in grabbing the wheel and steering the relationship themselves. There’s no scenario in which they can enjoy both the benefits of godly leadership and the carnal pleasure of running the show.