‘There’s more virtue in changing your mind than sticking to your guns’
Weliketotakealotof credit for our beliefs – even the ones we inherited which we did almost nothing to obtain. Still, we wear those values like badges of honour; signalling to those around us that we are informed people of substance and principle as opposed to that other sorry lot. That other lot, whose only function is providing the perfect absolute against which we, the enlightened, define ourselves. ‘Cyber-nats’, ‘yoons’, ‘Tory scum’, ‘loony lefties’ and more recently terms like ‘social justice warrior’ have become commonplace and are deployed to reduce the groups we disagree with to a more manageable size. Dismissing challenges to our beliefs makes them easier to retain and sticking to your guns, at the expense of all other considerations, appears to be the aim of the game.
But what if you are privately reconsidering your position on an issue? What if new information has come to light? Maybe you’ve gone through an intellectual growth spurt having recently escaped the cannabis-scented smoke plume of your inebriated, cliché-ridden, twenties? We all know what sticking to your principles looks like but what about the process of coming to terms with the fact your politics have changed?
I’m sure I’m not just speaking for myself when I say that the foundation of my left-wing beliefs was something I inherited, much like a religion. While I believe many of those values have undeniable benefits, it’s almost certain that had I been born and raised in a community where another ideology was prevalent, like Christianity or conservatism, then I’d likely have adopted – and felt as strongly about – that instead.
Oddly, the fact our beliefs are often as much about the blind chance of circumstance as they are about our own personal integrity doesn’t stop us walking around with an unearned sense of moral superiority. Or is that just me? But if most of us really examine our beliefs, beyond the platitudes we spout in public, we are likely to find some element of pretention at play. Not only that, but many of the values we claim are for the benefit of others are often self-serving.
Take socialism, for example. Socialism is, in theory, about providing a decent quality of life for everyone in society. But that wasn’t always my main motivation for being a socialist. If I’m honest, I didn’t like being poor, I was angry at the wealthy and I wanted to rearrange society so that I wasn’t at the bottom.
It just so happened that there were lots of other people who felt this way too and our individual self-interests aligned, creating the illusion of collective altruism. In truth, it was about what I wanted and needed first and foremost and this was the lever that shifted all my other beliefs. Yet I genuinely believed that, because I was a socialist, this meant I was a more moral and compassionate person than, say, a social democrat or a libertarian.
Left-wing ideas remain cornerstones of my thinking but I have since recognised a capacity within myself to indulge in the very selfserving hubris I spent my twenties accusing others of engaging in. It’s made my beliefs less fundamental and, in many ways, deradicalised me, so to speak.
Social media has given us a public platform to transmit our beliefs. Our threads and statuses, where we announce our opinions and condemn that other lot are now logged and retrievable for all time. But one thing you don’t see a lot of on social media is people humbly announcing when they were wrong about something. Or, worse, when they have changed their mind about something they used to believe.
The fact that it’s so rare to see people change their mind is probably why not that many of us do it. We don’t even know what such a thing looks like, so entrenched in our worldview have we become.
But secretly, haven’t you ever pondered the rationale of the people you think are wrong? Haven’t you ever felt that niggling sense of doubt in the pit of your soul despite having just doubled-down on your political opinion on social media? Haven’t you ever been wrong and, as a result, were forced to wonder what else you might be wrong about?
In a global civilisation dogged by political and religious tribalism, occasionally asking ourselves where we may be mistaken becomes a radical political act. Isn’t it a bit convenient that we always find ourselves, not only on the right side of history but, on the right side of every argument? It’s ludicrous when you think about it. How could a person reasonably entertain such a yarn while believing themselves to be informed? But that’s what many people do; encouraged by political leaders who need to reappropriate anger as a recruitment tool as well as a form of political propulsion.
Yes, it’s important to stay true to your principles, but it’s okay for those principles to change too. Never be cowed by people who say otherwise. There’s arguably more virtue in admitting you’re mistaken than there is in stubbornly believing you haven’t been wrong since you were a teenager. Because, for all the integrity people attribute to themselves for sticking to their guns, isn’t it a bit self-serving to take credit for hand-me-down beliefs? Or worse, for insisting on wearing those beliefs with a misguided sense of pride your entire life, regardless of how frayed or ugly they become? ldarren Mcgarvey is also known as Loki, a Scottish rapper and social commentator @lokiscottishrap