In chapter eight’s reading, I thought the section on justification was the most interesting. Justification is when a person doesn’t admit that something was wrong and does not take responsibility. Instead, they try to claim that there were positive affects of the incident. The author provides a few examples, one of which being “I was talking to my ex, but nothing happened so it’s fine.” This is an example of direct minimization justification which is downplaying the incident, like trying to brush it off.
Another example was “I stopped by the hospital to visit my father” as an excuse for being late. This is an example of principled justification which seems to me a sort of “for the greater good” kind of thing. Justifications like this are difficult to be upset about, because if they are valid, who could be mad at someone for being late because they had to visit someone in the hospital?
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3 comments:
It does seem hard to get upset about that but thats when I step in! Ha! I hate excuses and still give people crap because I value your word. Like the last example, I just want to tell people, "Admit you planned on going their in the first place and had not intention of being here on time." Maybe I'm just mean but who else is gonna say it! :)
I really enjoyed reading about what you had to say about justification because I feel that it's something everyone everyone does. Everyone makes justifications in order to cover their butts. If I were running late to work, I normally call to say that yes, I'll be late, but it's only because I'm stuck behind a really long train. It might seem wrong, but when I know I'm doing something wrong or going to be late, I will try to make my points valid. Everyone does it.
Yea, like goofy said, people use justifications all the time. We have a hard time taking responsibility for our actions. A justification will work even better mixed with a concept from an earlier chapter that talked about if it resinates with someone who has been through the same thing, or feels for it for some reason, they will accept it easier.
Like if I am late for work and I say that it is because my car got broken into. If my boss had that happen to him recently, he would sympathize and say, "Oh man, that really stinks, it just happened to me last week." And the fact that I was late would not be as relevant.
That makes me think that justifications can also be so effective because they can work as distractions. Like, my boss remembering what happened when he got his car broken into.
-Aleks
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