cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/35769143
Hi StarTrek.website, I'm Karim Diané aka Jay-Den Kraag from Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, AMA! (Responding to questions Thursday @4pm!)
this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2026
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Right. Cognitive dissonance. We all suffer it sometimes. I guess it takes uncommon courage and clarity to work through it. Most people would rather do the least effort to preserve their sense of being a good person.
Being sexist is bad
They are good
They don't like this show because it has a woman lead
That's sexist
But they're good
Can't change "sexism is bad". Can't change "they are good". Only thing left to change is the reason they don't like the show. Easy-peasy.
Well, it's like that Occam's Razor, right? It's simpler to believe: "I don't like it because of (excuse)" instead of "Some of my fundamental beliefs are completely wrong and I need to re-examine them." Such a person may feel that this is not quite the full story, but are all our thoughts completely examined? It's not necessarily malicious to say: I've figured this out 'well enough' for now, and I can move on to something else.
This is an important distinction because then to tell such a person that they're "bad" or that they "hate" is completely meaningless to them. They don't consciously hate, they just adopt oppressive philosophies and they've never needed to examine them.
The Oatmeal did a comic worth reading about this: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe
Some people are really loathe to do any self reflection or assessment. I gather their sense of self and worth is very fragile, and looking too hard might make it collapse.
Like, some people you could say "Eating meat is bad for these reasons" and they'll just lash out. Not enough emotional HP to tank the hit.