Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts | 
 enlarge | Authors: Carol Tavris, Elliot Aronson
Publisher: Mariner Books
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
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Rating:  68 reviews
Sales Rank: 3793
Media: Paperback
Edition: Reprint
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.9
ISBN: 0156033909
Dewey Decimal Number: 302
EAN: 9780156033909
ASIN: 0156033909
Publication Date: March 2008
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Product Description
Why do people dodge responsibility when things fall apart? Why the parade of public figures unable to own up when they screw up? Why the endless marital quarrels over who is right? Why can we see hypocrisy in others but not in ourselves? Are we all liars? Or do we really believe the stories we tell? Backed by years of research and delivered in lively, energetic prose, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) offers a fascinating explanation of self-deception—how it works, the harm it can cause, and how we can overcome it.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 63 more reviews...
 Interesting arguments and well-written January 1, 2009
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I found the arguments in this book compelling; it is also written well. Once I started on this one I put all my other books and magazines down.
Excellent, comprehensive, disturbing December 28, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
We make mistakes. We do not admit them. We justify them. We rationalize them. But of course, we do not know we are in denial. We have opinions about people, formed on the basis of their gender, race, color, religion, ethnicity, sexual preferences, and much more. These are stereotypes, which can degenerate into prejudices and worse. Memories can deceive us. Experts, especially self-styles ones, can do more harm than good. This is the crux of the book, and the authors spend the bulk of the book describing this process in a variety of situations.
The book is well written. It is well organized. Persuasive, passionate, well-researched. The cons, if you have to pick, are that the book could does not get deep enough into any of the topics that it covers in its chapters, so you would necessarily have to look someplace else after reading this book on the areas that it dwells on. A minor quibble, that some people may have, is with its brief mention of political denials and self-justifications.
Gays, blacks, Jews, Chinese (immigrant workers in the US), Japanese (interred during the Second World War), parents, children, spouses, students, - no stereotype, no denomination, no group, is left out.
Impressive as the initial material in the book is, I believe that the real value of this book comes through in the latter chapters. Chapter 3 ("Memory, the Self-justifying Historian"), Chapter 4 ("Good Intentions, Bad Science"), Chapter 6 ("Love's Assassin: Self-justification in Marriage"), Chapter 5 ("Law and Disorder")
Excerpts from the book:
"Cognitive dissonance is a state of tension that occurs whenever a person holds two cognitions (ideas, attitudes, beliefs, opinions) that are psychologically inconsistent..... people don't rest easy until they find a way to reduce it...." [page 13]
"Children learn to justify their aggressive actions early: .... Aggression begets self-justification, which begets more aggression." [page 27]
"Dissonance is bothersome under any circumstance, but it is most painful to people when an important element of their self-concept is threatened - typically when they do something that is inconsistent with their view of themselves." [page 29]
The longest journey begins with the first step. Well... "How do you get an honest man to lose his ethical compass? You get him to take one step at a time, and self-justification will do the rest." [page 37]
"In a sense, dissonance theory is a theory of blind spots." [page 42]
"Prejudices emerge from the disposition of the human mind to perceive and process information in categories. 'Categories' is a nicer, more neutral word than 'stereotypes', but it's the same thing. [page 57]
Stereotypes can be useful at times, because they act as "energy-saving devices that allow us to make efficient decisions on the basis of past experience .... quickly process new information ... often with considerable accuracy." [page 57] but "the downside is that stereotypes flatten out differences within the category we are looking at and exaggerate differences between categories" ... "a stereotype might bend or even shatter under the weight of disconfirming evidence, but the hallmark of prejudice is that it is impervious to reason, experience, and counterexample." [page 60]
Why we continue to be prejudiced is also part of our selves and "so hard to eradicate... they allow people to justify and defend their most important identities - their race, their religion, their sexuality - while reducing the dissonance between 'I am a good person' and 'I really don't like those people'." [page 65]
Memory plays a very important role in the whole process of self-justification... "because memory is reconstructive, it is subject to confabulation. .... In reconstructing a memory, people draw on many sources." which can lead to "source confusion." [page 73]
"Memories create our stories, but our stories also create our memories. Once we have a narrative, we shape our memories to fit into it." [page 77]
"False memories allow us to forgive ourselves and justify our mistakes, but sometimesa ta high price: an inability to take responsibility for our lives." [page 93]
False memories can also lead to tragic consequences, as with the case of Holy Ramona, who at the insistence and suggestions of her therapist, came to 'remember' that she had been sexually abused by her father. After a court foudn the therapist guilty of planting false memories and the father innocent, Holy experienced dissonance, and chose instead to continue believing in these false memories, even to the extent of becoming a psychotherapist, and "encouraging some of her clients to recover childhood memories of their own sexual abuse".
"We give ourselves credit for our good actions but let the situation excuse the bad ones." [page 169]
"... but the evidence shows clearly that while inebriation makes it easier for people to reveal their prejudices, it doesn't put those attitudes in their minds in the first place. [page 63]. So the next time you find yourself saying, 'but I was angry, drunk, tired, etc...', keep this in mind.
How do perpetrators go about "minimizing their moral culpability"? Using several ways, as you would expect.
"The first, naturally, was to say that they did nothing wrong at all." [page 193]
"The second strategy was to admit wrongdoing but excuse or minimize it." [page 194]
"The third strategy, when perpetrators .... could not deny or minimize responsibility, was to admit they had done something wrong and hurtful, and then try to get rid of the episode as fast as possible." ... and to get "a reassuring sense of closure." [page 194]
This whole exercise of self-justification and denial extends, as one would expect, to torture also.
"The universal justification for torture is the ticking-time-bomb excuse." [page 202]
The trouble is that those circumstances are very rare, so the 'saving lives' excuse starts being used even when there is no ticking and there is no bomb." .... "Once torture is justified in rare cases, it is easier to justify it in others;" [page 203].
 Cognitive Dissonance and Life December 20, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Cognitive dissonance is such a simple idea. As originally formulated by Festinger, it consists of the unpleasant sensation humans feel when holding two contradictory cognitions. For example, I think I am a good person but I did something that hurt another human whom I cared a great deal about. In order to resolve this state of emotional tension, Festinger believed that humans engaged in dissonance reduction, which usually consisted of changing their underlying attitude to make the cognitions concordant. For example, take my above example, I solve this state of tension by changing my attitude toward the person I hurt. Perhaps I begin to despise them and feel they deserve the hurt I caused them because they are bad. This dissonance reduction and self justification is completely unconscious and allows us to make it through life.
From such a simple idea, Aronson and Tavris explain how politicians can do such rotten things and actually believe they are acting in a righteous manner. They also explain the difficulty of marriage, the problems with clinical psychology,and many mundane every day phenomena as well.
The key, according to Aronson and Tavris, is not just cognitive dissonance per se, but cognitive dissonance done over and over and over. So, a politician may be faced with the choice to accept a small bribe. He takes it, suffers dissonance, unconsciously changes his attitude by saying, "it is only a few thousand dollars, and, besides, I am still objective." This sets the politician up for accepting bigger bribes and engaging in still more dissonance reduction. Soon, you have a corrupt politician who truly believes his own B.S.
Sound familiar? Read this book and think about how many times you have engaged in similar self justification. Whenever you wish to point out the splinter in another's eye, remember that mote in your own!
A great book.
Help Yourself, Help us all . December 18, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I got what I was after when I ordered this book. Enhanced with stellar examples ranging in severity and repercussion, from thousands dead to marriages failed, this is a psychology book that Shows more than Telling, letting you do the math.. but also showing how it adds up. Or with the dissonance theory, which it does adequately explain, it shows how sometimes, our cognitive dissonance makes it so that our decisions Don't add up, and why its so hard for us to be fair when faced with dissonance. This book helps us realize how humans, although hard wired to Skew the facts in our perceived favor.. Are able to get around the tragedies of dissonant thinking.
It's a psychology book, with a touch of self help because.. as it so fairly points out, We are all guilty of mistakes, Yet, its those of us who can admit to them that are the one who tend to recover from them, learn from them, and even be more valued and trusted by society-- more often.
Less likely to make the same mistake again.
One of the most interesting ideas it posed through numerous example, was that people Acclimate themselves step by step to immoral behavior, escalating in severity. Thankfully, no ones bad, no ones good, We are all capable of Vast misgivings. Our first mistake being inherent human fallibility, this book examines how we can help understand our cognitive flaws, and own up before things escalate. It also gives us some courage to admit, even if things Have gone too far.
Excellent book on Rationalization and beyond December 3, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I guess it was me that made them, well that's the impression I got from this book. No one ever said I couldn't rationalize anything. (: Excellent and informative read.
Jane Stevens
Tao Cycle Therapy: Natural Happiness via Self Directed Cure for Chronic Anxiety & Depression [Updated 2008 3nd Edition]
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