I was reading about Mel Gibson’s anti-semitic rants, and his apology about being drunk* when I remembered this meme. I agree with the meme, that our brains tend to feed us what we’ve heard from our environment, but our conscious mind overrides that with our processed thoughts.
People use “he didn’t mean it, he was drunk/high” as an excuse for racist/misogynist/whateverist comments. The response is typically “you don’t become racist when drunk, you just drop your inhibitions and reveal who you are.”
But if you agree with the First Thought meme, what if being impaired isn’t revealing what you really think, but is preventing you from thinking at all, and just getting stuck on your conditioned response?
*Gibson is just an example. This post is not about litigating whether he personally is racist, but about this sort of behavior in general.
No one is a bad person for their thoughts, thought crimes do not exist. Your behavior is what matters. Idc if you have “horrible” thoughts all day if you don’t act on them or let them influence how you treat others who cares? Humans don’t have control of our thoughts we need to stop worrying about them being “wrong” what you do is what matters
As an autist with probably PTSD I can’t reinforce your point enough, between the call of the void and my borderline sociopathic tendencies I’d be killed five times over if folks judged me for my thoughts. If you look at my comments history you will see my sanitized thoughts, my unfiltered ones admittedly aren’t that much worse on a cause and effect level just more impulsive and descriptive.
The ancient Roman/Latin phrase for what OP describes is:
EnIn vino veritas.In wine, there is truth.
(thanks to antonim for the correction)
The phrase goes back even further to the Ancient Greeks, the exact same meaning in Greek ( en oino, aletheia ), but the Roman/Latin phrase is more well known.
People have known for literal multiple thousands of years that… people do not say stupid shit because they are drunk, the alcohol made them do it… people say stupid shit when they are drunk because they have these stupid thoughts and beliefs all the time, but are normally smart enough to not say them out loud.
En vino, veritas.
In, not en, and it is written without the comma.
(Finally the two years of suffering through Latin classes have paid off!)
Fuck!
I knew I couldn’t count on a classics major to appear out of nowhere and correct me!
=P
jk jk, its appreciated, I’ll fix it, lol.
The book I’m reading (Incognito by David Eagleman) mentioned exactly that.
Robinson and Yarvitz, like many others, suspected that the alcohol had loosened Gibson’s inhibitions and revealed his true self. And the nature of their suspicion has a long history: the Greek poet Alcaeus of Mytilene coined a popular phrase En oino álétheia (In wine there is the truth), which was repeated by the Roman Pliny the Elder as In vino veritas. The Babylonian Talmud contains a passage in the same spirit: “In came wine, out went a secret.” It later advises, “In three things is a man revealed: in his wine goblet, in his purse, and in his wrath.” The Roman historian Tacitus claimed that the Germanic peoples always drank alcohol while holding councils to prevent anyone from lying.
But there are many things that people have “known” for years that turned out to be untrue as our ability to understand the physical world increased. Now we’re finding that our unconscious mind accounts for more of what we think than our conscious mind can control.
It is absolutely true that many ancient or even fairly modern bits of ‘common wisdom’ have been innacurate, or wildly utterly wrong.
… but, at the same time… some of it actually does hold.
I grew up with an alcoholic dad, basically all his brothers and sisters and mom and dad were as well.
They’ll all tell you how they really feel when inebriated…
Yay for Italian heritage, rofl, I am a keeper of this ancient wisdom, it courses through my very veins.
… and by that I mean oh lord, I also get drunk very easily, fortunately I’ve had enough self control to not ever develop an alcohol addiction…
To steal another Greek phrase and render it in Latin:
modus omnibus in rebus
I don’t see the contradiction between the meme and drunk behavior. What it’s saying is that you’re not responsible for what you think, only how you behave. Mel Gibson is not guilty for having antisemitic thoughts, but he is responsible for expressing them.
There is the issue that only sober people decide to get drunk, the same sober person who reflects on previous drunken behavior. I guess what I’m saying is that getting drunk and impregnating one of your daughters is awful, but no where near as bad as getting drunk and impregnating the other one the next evening.
Mel Gibson is not guilty for having antisemitic thoughts, but he is responsible for expressing them.
Yes, this is where I’m at. I . . . don’t know what to make of your second paragraph.
No, altered states of mind don’t stop our own thoughts. In fact, I would argue that a conditioned response is more like an inhibition. As in, I believe getting drunk reduces the likelihood you’ll use a conditioned response, not increase it.
As an old, professional drunk, I can anecdotally confirm this.
An interesting counterpoint, thank you.
I’ll disagree. An altered state of mind is altered, by definition, so it’s not like people are in their perfect mind. I’m not saying that they should in any way be excused of consequences for their actions, just that an altered state doesn’t fully represent who they normally are.
As for conditioned responses, they are learned, yes, but they become an automatic neural response to a stimulus.
We can become aware of these responses, and actively work to inhibit it, but it’s an active effort to suppress the ingrained behaviour and when impaired, this suppression would fail.
I don’t know. If you choose the altered state of mind, you ought to be able to accept responsibility for what that entails.
As far as i know, you can legally be excused of consequences for your actions if you are in an intoxicated state in Romania
Been reading the last sentence for four minutes straight.
10 GOTO 10WHY CANT I LOOK AWAY
My VIC-20 is overheating and hopping around on my desk. Now what?!
POKE it.
Why don’t you read it for four minutes gay and see if that changes anything?
Sir Patrick Stewart: But it’s too late. I’ve seen everything.
But science says the exact opposite is true. A drunk person has lower inhibitions so they express what they think easily. They don’t sugar coat it or try to hide their thoughts. This picture is a feel good thing which might be true in some situations but is generally wrong and is defending bad behaviour.
I think the point is that we are not what we think, we are not our first thoughts.
How we choose to act despite our initial impressions is what defines us, not the thoughts themselves.
I agree with this. Our actions are more important than our thoughts.
What I am saying is that drunk actions are equal to sober actions. Speaking your thoughts is an action.
Yes we’re in agreement about how alcohol affects inhibitions. The question is more about our thoughts. When impaired, we don’t hold back from speaking, but are we speaking our true thoughts or just the basic garbage that’s been littered on top of our thoughts?
Also to be clear, I’m not excusing the behavior. It’s not OK to express racist thoughts regardless of whether it’s how you feel when sober or not. And if drinking causes someone to do that, they ought not drink. The purpose of this discussion is more about how we judge the person afterward: do we judge them solely on their actions? Or, as people online usually do, also judge them for their thoughts?
I judge the actions of drunk people equally to actions of sober people. Being drunk and doing something stupid revealed the true person behind the facade they put up when sober. I will absolutely hold them accountable for everything they said and did.
Imagine your SO comes home drunk and confesses that they cheated on you. In the morning they are a loving SO once again. How would you judge them? Will you let it slide because they were drunk or will you confront them?
“First Thoughts are the everyday thoughts. Everyone has those. Second Thoughts are the thoughts you think about the way you think. People who enjoy thinking have those. Third Thoughts are thoughts that watch the world and think all by themselves. They’re rare, and often troublesome. Listening to them is part of witchcraft.”
“First Thoughts are the everyday thoughts. Everyone has those. Second Thoughts are the thoughts you think about the way you think. People who enjoy thinking have those. Third Thoughts are thoughts that watch the world and think all by themselves. They’re rare, and often troublesome. Listening to them is part of witchcraft.”
The inimitable Sir Terry Pratchett, GNU.
I miss that man. He was an absolute legend.
It’s probably more fair to say that it’s important to understand WHY you had that thought. Is it conditioning, a past bias against someone else, an unfair stereotype that you are perpetuating, or a lack of understanding?
I have to do this with my anger as sometimes I’m short tempered with someone only to reflect and realize that I’m angry with something else and taking out my frustrations on an undeserving bystander. I try to apologize if I catch myself doing this.
This is very healthy and emotionally mature of you. We would definitely be doing better as a society if everyone who is capable of doing this would.
I like this idea. I don’t know how modern cognitive science corroborates the idea or not.
But just to tuck this away in the thread, not to derail it: I think the point of the text in the image is much simpler, as the last response is meant to make us understand. The real “first thought” is “I’m a bad person.” After some reflection and careful analysis, the poster comes around to, “I’m just a teensy bit hypocritical.”
We can forgive ourselves for knee-jerk reactions if we put effort into not letting them poison our relationships with the world and other people. I have no idea if that should apply to Mel Gibson.
(Me, drunk)
1st thought: I have to pee
2nd thought: I really have to pee.
3rd thought: I love you guys. Also, I have to pee.
third thought, on the toilet: oh i have to shit too
as a person who’s wife is a very very mean drunk - like physically and emotionally - I just have been conditioned to think “those are the things she really thinks but hides. i am worthless and poor.”
This is how my mom was growing up. Didn’t matter what did or didn’t happen through the week, at least by Friday night you were going to get her real opinion about whatever she didn’t like about you, or whatever you may have done to upset her. One time after my brother passed away she jumped on top of me when I was in bed and started clawing at me with her fingernails yelling “The wrong son died”. She was as sweet as can be when she was sober, and would pretend like getting black out drunk and having a weekly melt down was totally normal. She finally stopped drinking by the time I was about 25, but I don’t remember a single holiday or family vacation where she didn’t get absolutely destroyed and act just as mean as she possibly could. It drove my brother to substance abuse which killed him when he was 20. “Mean” drunks are just people who hide their emotions the rest of the time, and they’re toxic to be trapped with.
Yikes. I’m so sorry you grew up with that. I’m sorry you lost your brother. I hope you’re doing alright now. You said it only happened when she drank; I’m glad she stopped, and I hope she’s okay now too ♥️
Sounds like a bad spot to be in. Do you have access to professional help?
My dad was an alcoholic. In rehab he/we where thought that at a certain point the person is no longer themselves but a monster who is stuck in a different kind of alcohol instinct.
Either way physical or emotional abuse is never ok. Don’t try to reason that it’s somehow not abuse and you deserve it. Making someone feel worthless about themselves is a red flag. The fact your wife poisons herself to a predictable negative result says she has not figured out life either.
I’m sorry you have to deal with that. I have been in a similar position in the past. We are in a better place now and sober - what came out of my partner at their worst is not reflective of their true feelings, it was reflective of the traumatic environment they were raised in.
I hope things get better for you.
Do you have a rule in your relationship that she isn’t allowed to drink around you to offer you protection from her?
I’ve lived this before. You’re not alone, even if we can only give digital support.
I hope you have you physical support around you but if ya need someone to talk to, hit me up. More than happy to talk.
This is not OK. Regardless of what provokes her, her feelings don’t define you and you deserve to be safe.
As someone who’s been (in the distant past) known to engage in questionable behaviour while black out drunk, you still need to be somewhat of an asshole to act like this. So he did mean it, even if he normally doesn’t want, and would be ashamed, to act this way.
In my case, being an asshole was influenced by my work environment, so I’m doing a lot better today, both on the asshole and the drinking front.
Glad to hear you’re doing better. Thanks for sharing your perspective.
The first thought is the conditioning done by life, the second thought is the conditioning done by oneself as we grow to become the person we want to be.
I needed this, thank you.
I’m not following you. What you think and what you say or do are entirely different, right? We think all kinds of things very quickly about all kinds of topics, and just as a practical measure we can only say or do do a small fraction of those.
So right now I’m not seeing the Mel Gibson connection, because that was a claim about his actions.
My point is about how we judge people: we should judge their actions. But many of us also judge their thoughts. Many people concluded from that incident that Gibson was inherently racist and that his apology and defense of his own thoughts were meaningless. I know there have been other incidents with him, which is why I just wanted to use that one incident as an example.
Being conditioned to think racist thoughts is essentially what racism is. Nobody chooses to be racist - you become one as a result of your genes and environment. That pretty much applies to your entire personality. I’m more in the camp that believes drunk people are just being honest. But I’m also in the no-free-will camp, so I don’t guilt people for being who they are. That doesn’t mean I like them or want to be around them, but I don’t act as if they could have been any different. Still, that’s not to say people can’t change - they can, if they want to. That’s the key difference between what you want and what you want to want.
I am also in the no-free-will camp. This whole discussion was sparked for me by reading Incognito by David Eagleman, where he makes a good case for lack of free will from a neuroscience perspective. He mentions the studies where people’s unconscious biases are shown by how fast or slow they respond to positive or negative words in conjunction with human characteristics like race. We may be outright anti-racist, choosing to engage in activities that help achieve racial equity, yet still have biases that our conscious mind has no control over.
Nobody chooses to be racist - you become one as a result of your genes
lol wut
…and environment.
I guess in a sense those two things could be said to encompass everything that could possibly define a person (discounting fetal development etc), but racism is at least as much of a belief system as it is a conditioned response, and the belief is about genetic determinism, so it still seems like a little bit of an ironic statement.
Even if choices all unavoidably trace back to nature+nurture, I would say there is still a distinction in how much of a ‘choice’ has been made between say someone who has an emotional response due to trauma associated with a certain ethnicity, and someone with beliefs that an ethnicity is genetically unfit to coexist in society with others, because the latter is conscious and considered, and you can say that such a person has a responsibility to consider more thoroughly whether it really makes sense.
Can you choose to have beliefs?
I cannot. If you were to hold me at gunpoint and forced me to genuinely believe, say, in the Flying Spaghetti Monster you would have to shoot me.
It’s almost certain that I have beliefs that are wrong and I’m they are wrong. Doesn’t mean I can just stop believing in them.
Ordering someone to change their beliefs at gunpoint is kind of the opposite of asking them to think. You can’t reasonably ask someone to not have been born to minority parents, because it’s impossible, but you can ask someone to think about why that might not be reasonable, or improve the quality of information that is the basis for their considerations, which are possible.
As for FSM, make pilgrimage to the pasta plains to witness the world’s spaghetti supply descending from the sky, and cast a critical eye on media peddling conspiracy theories like “wheat” and “rolling machines”.
Can people choose to have beliefs?
Yes, I’d say most beliefs are chosen. Just because you wouldn’t find a gun a convincing argument doesn’t mean you can’t choose to believe in the FSM (may you be blessed by his noodley appendages). You’d just have to work at it a bit, find evidence to support your views, and ignore any and all evidence counter to your views.
People raised in a cult can have beliefs they did not choose, but were forced upon them.
I’ve never been in a cult so I couldn’t say for sure, but that sounds reasonable. Post updated 🙌
