Hypocrisy

Hypocrisy is common among my classmates and some of the adults I know. By hypocrisy I am simply referring to a major contradiction between their actions and their condemnation of those same actions when done by others. It seems possible that hypocrisy is the result of the ability of men to change and of their inherent state of immaturity, as Immanuel Kant defined it in his essay "An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?" Kant's definition in the very first paragraph is this: "Immaturity is the inability to use one's understanding without guidance from another."

There are so many hypocrites among my schoolmates. Eris exclaimed her agreement when, one day last week, I deplored the opinions of our peers and the pompous opinion that their inconsequential thoughts matter so greatly. Eris is perhaps one of the biggest offenders of my belief that opinions are meaningless and that they should not be presented as fact when there is no proof of their correctness. In class shares her green opinions with the room in a loud, obnoxious voice as though she were some mortal goddess and her words ought to be carved in stone. I really ought to give her the benefit of the doubt; Eris probably does not realize that her opinions are so foolish or that so many of the rest of us in class are bored to death when she talks.

It appears that, based on other conversation with Eris, she does not feel compelled to come to her own conclusions using her own understanding, in such a way that Kant would define as maturity, and Eris is more comfortable agreeing with the statements made by others even when her agreement contradicts her behavior. It also seems possible that because people have the ability to change (one of the categories or universal characteristics of existence according to Archie J. Bahm's Metaphysics: An Introduction), and some people are more moldable or gullible than others, and maybe this is why Eris and others are willing to agree with something that sounds like truth when it benefits them (i.e. when agreeing will put them in another's good graces) and then they backslide into the very behaviors they've just criticized.

I know many others like this, who act one way and in time, openly denounce the very same behavior. It is quite silly that I should be so annoyed by it when it is hardly a new experience but it is one of those things that retains its ability to bother me.