The World Would be a Better Place if We Realized We're All Kind of Awful
I spend a lot of time asking myself, “Why is everyone so angry all the time?” And trust me, I get it. There’s plenty to be angry about in a world filled with injustice and inequality. But today, I wanted to focus on something else. I want to discuss anger that comes from when we perceive someone as doing something immoral. This has been a topic of interest for me since I was canceled in 2019, and it’s why I started reading so many books on moral philosophy and psychology. I truly believe this world would be a much better place if we realized that we’re all kind of awful.
Bear with me because we’re going to start in a weird place, but I promise it’ll make sense later. So, let’s discuss cookbooks.
Although I have thousands of followers on Twitter, I don’t get a ton of engagement. Sometimes, a tweet gets way more action than usual, and it’s typically for something random I ask or say. This is one of them:
This was a random thought I had at the grocery story. My son and I cook a lot, and I read a lot. As I work on my next book, I’m debating on working with a publisher, and when I’m talking with people in the industry, they often use cookbooks as an example. Personally, I just don’t get it. I always find it interesting what we’re willing to spend our money on, and cookbooks make absolutely no sense.
Check out the top cookbooks on Amazon:
The average price of these about $20…Why?
We live in the digital age, and my son and I cook new recipes regularly and try to cook at least once or twice a week. I can tell you from personal experience that you can find any recipe online for free. I simply Google it or go to Pinterest, and I find recipes instantly. I also really enjoy looking up recipes on YouTube, and what’s stranger is that one of the top cookbooks from the image above is by Joshua Weissman, a YouTuber. I subscribe to Joshua for free on YouTube. I’m sure he has different recipes in there, but if you’re being frugal, this is silly.
I’m not an economist, but I’ve had plenty of them on my podcast and read a ton of their books. I’m pretty sure they’d all be baffled as to how we spend money on these books as well.
In response to my tweet, the most common response I got was that online recipes are inconvenient. It’s true. When you Google a recipe, it’s typically a blog, and to meet SEO criteria, they write a long post, and we just want the ingredients and recipe. But, as I mentioned, my son and I cook quite a bit, so I know this only takes about 10-15 seconds to scroll past the text.
But this brings up a bigger topic, which is that we value convenience more than money. And as we’ll discuss, we value it more than our personal morals as well.
In this next tweet, we started discussing convenience, time and money. I’ll still argue to the cows come home that buying cookbooks doesn’t make sense, but I’ve noticed this tendency we have for a while now.
As many of you know, I’m not a huge fan of our current state of capitalism. Jeff Bezos is one of the richest men on earth, and in my opinion, he’s not a great person. The same goes with most of these tech founders like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. Every other day someone is exposing them for something terrible they’re doing like mistreating workers or destroying democracy. On the back of these stories, the call to boycott them is almost instantly.
When this happens, I just kind of giggle.
Although I’m 100% behind the sentiment, I know that nothing is going to happen from it. One thing any rational person knows is that the internet gives you the prime opportunity to moral grandstand. Nobody on the internet knows you or your daily habits. You might have one tab open for Twitter where you’re tweeting #BoycottAmazon and #BoycottFacebook, but you have two other tabs open where you’re using your prime subscription to order underwear for next day delivery and another tab for talking trash on Facebook.
Why do we do this? Because it’s convenient. As much as Jeff Bezos sucks, Amazon is just far too convenient. If people will spend $20 on a cookbook to avoid scrolling past text for a free recipe, do you think they’re really going to stop using Amazon? We rationalize and justify our actions in ways we refuse to admit because good ol’ self-deception and cognitive dissonance set in pretty quick to protect our idea of who we are.
I thought about this as well when all of the outrage was in the news about Uber and Lyft. These companies mistreat their drivers and underpay them while not providing benefits because they can and drivers are private contractors. There are stories of Uber employees tracking friends and exes through the app. But will you stop using them? Of course not.
I live in Las Vegas, and I remember the horrible years of taxis. Taxis are not only expensive, but they’re inconvenient as hell. Are you really going to boycott ridesharing services out of existence and go back to that? And having to pick up your own fast food instead of having it delivered? Probably not.
It goes even further, too. It’s not just these tech titans. Look at the clothes you’re wearing. Look around your house at all your nicknacks. Who made your dishes? Where’d your shelf come from? How’d you get such a killer deal on those electronics?
A reality that we love to forget about is the fact that our stuff comes cheap because it’s created with cheap labor. Sometimes, it’s not even cheap labor; it’s slave labor.
Not only would it take up a ton of time to research everything we own or are thinking about buying to see what’s ethical, but we don’t want to know where it came from. Apple facilities had to install nets at their factories in Asia to catch people trying to commit suicide for Christ’s sake, but most of us still have iPhones.
So, how’d we get from cookbooks to here, and why’s it matter? Go back and check the title of this piece.
The World Would be a Better Place if We Realized We're All Kind of Awful.
My point is that most of the fights and arguments and people we dislike are all based on our morals vs their morals. We know what’s right, and we’re the morally justified ones. But at the end of the day, we’re all kind of awful.
Not to toot my horn, but I a lot to make this world a better place, and it’s still nowhere near enough to think I’m better than anyone. I haven’t had any meat in over four years. I try to recycle whenever possible, and I even cut those stupid plastic rings that come with sodas and packs of small gatorades. I donate to charity. I volunteer my time. I’m a recovering addict who tries to help people who are struggling. And my hands still aren’t clean.
Whenever I’m about to morally grandstand on someone, I remember that I’m about to sass them on social media while using my computer or phone that was made unethically.
We’re all kind of awful, and when we remember that, we can cut people some slack and stop fighting so much. None of us are these beacons of morality, so chill the hell out. We don’t just value convenience over money, we value it over our morals. We can work on it all we want, but we’ll never be squeaky clean.
I’m currently writing a book about how we’re manipulated by the news, social media, technology, advertisers, and each other. It dives into the psychological history of manipulation, our biases, tribalism, and more.
To stay updated follow me on Twitter and Instagram @TheRewiredSoul and subscribe to the Substack.