[Moved from Singles] Can hypocrisy be proven?

[LOVEthroughINTELLECT]

From Wikipedia: "Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have beliefs, opinions, virtues, feelings, qualities, or standards that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie."

If a man tells his wife that he is going to his office to catch up on some work when he is really going to see another woman, it can be proven that he is lying. One of the wife's friends might see the husband with the other woman at the time that he claimed he would be at the office. That kind of thing happens all of the time in criminal cases, it seems.

But can anybody prove that another person is being hypocritical? If a university president says that he values academic integrity but then he hires an athletics director who oversaw an athletics program at another school that was found guilty of academic fraud then that president is being a hypocrite, right? Well, to prove that he is being a hypocrite one would have to prove that he does not value academic integrity. Unless somebody is omniscient and can read minds, nobody really knows what anybody else values, believes, etc. It would be fair to say that that president's actions do not seem to coincide with his words. But that is pointing out a perceived inconsistency, not proving hypocrisy. It could be--among countless other possibilities--that he believes in giving people second chances, believes that punishing a person for past wrongs undermines the goal of academic integrity, etc. Or it could be that he really could not care less about academic integrity and he is simply posturing by giving lip service to it. Nobody really knows. And nobody can prove anything one way or the other.

Yet, people--especially Christians--seem to never miss an opportunity to accuse others of hypocrisy.

 

[HazelWings]

nobody really knows what anybody else values, believes, etc. It would be fair to say that that president's actions do not seem to coincide with his words. But that is pointing out a perceived inconsistency, not proving hypocrisy.

Like you said, you can't prove what someone else believes and values. I also think we're limited with our language because we could say the part I just quoted here, or we could just say "hypocrisy" as an umbrella term. I notice this in a lot of threads on this forum, where people are constantly wanting clarification of something that someone said that they thought made sense. I, personally, don't have the patience to pick apart definitions.

 

[FaithPrevails]

MOD HAT ON

Thread moved from Life Stages - Singles to Society - Ethics & Morality at OP's request.

MOD HAT OFF​

 

[BobW188]

The flip side is the many non-Christians who never miss an opportunity to accuse Christians of hypocrisy.

This is why we're told "Judge not, lest ye be judged," which is followed by the admonition that it is as we judge others that we ourselves will be judged. Our hypothetical college president's actions belie his statements. He is not walking the talk. Yes, we can never fully know all of his underlying motives; but we can certainly bring our opinion that he's being self-contradictory to his attention. If in fact he's lying, he's as much a sinner as the philanderer. (Whose motives we can also not fully know.)

 

[Jade Margery]

I think it's pretty easy to prove blatant displays of hypocrisy. Let's take a hypothetical politician who attacks his opponent's character because of a drug charge from when that opponent was in college. If politician A uses that past indiscretion as an excuse to say that politician B is an irresponsible, terrible influence on today's youth and should never be voted into office, and then politician A is later discovered 'powdering his nose' in a bathroom, that would make him a very obvious hypocrite.

A hypocrite is, to me, best summed up in the phrase "Do as I say, not as I do." A person's personal beliefs and opinions are immaterial. If they publicly condemn a certain action but then participate in it themselves, they are a hypocrite. Slightly more difficult to prove would be someone who loudly encourages a certain behavior but doesn't take part in it. But if, say, a politician campaigned for a war that would send thousands of other people's sons to their deaths but then pulled strings to make sure their own child was in a safe and cushy position far from any fighting, I would call that hypocrisy as well.

 

[LOVEthroughINTELLECT]

A person's personal beliefs and opinions are immaterial. If they publicly condemn a certain action but then participate in it themselves, they are a hypocrite...

If that is the way that it is then hypocrisy is like breathing: we all do it all of the time. Therefore, to charge anyone with hypocrisy is meaningless.

I am sure that 99% of people who speak out against the burning of fossil fuels drive gasoline-burning cars and in many cases use computers, appliances, etc. that are powered by electricity generated from burning coal. Therefore, everybody who speaks out against burning fossil fuels is a hypocrite, apparently.

But it does not work that way. They may say that something is bad and then turn around and directly participate in it or indirectly be complicit to it, but, realistically, a lot of times people do not have any other choice. In the case of opponents of the use of fossil fuels, would they even be able to effectively get their message out without the burning of fossil fuels?

Sometimes people, realistically, do not have any other choice. Other times, it is effective to use your opponent against him/herself, if that makes any sense. The Civil Rights movement probably benefited from byproducts of the very system that they opposed. So was the Civil Rights movement a bunch of hypocrisy?

It's not like an environmentalist makes a speech against the burning of fossil fuels and then thinks to himself as he steps into the driver's seat of his gasoline-burning car, "You who just heard me speak: do as I said, not as I am about to do". On the contrary, out of habit--and out of neccesity--he, like everybody else, drives a car. He may be thinking as he hits the accelerator, "I need to turn my attention to pushing for more mass transit".

We don't know what a person is really thinking. Therefore, most of the time when I hear somebody accuse somebody else of hypocrisy it is fair to ask, how can they prove it?

 

[Fenny the Fox]

If that is the way that it is then hypocrisy is like breathing: we all do it all of the time. Therefore, to charge anyone with hypocrisy is meaningless.

Pretty much the way I actually look at it.
Everyone is a hypocrite in one way or another. So why try to point it out in an accusatory fashion.

Granted, if it is pointed it out merely as a reminder/warning -kinda like a "do you really wanna go there?"- then I see merit in it, at times. But I can see no point in accusing anyone, anywhere of hypocrisy if only for the accusations sake.

[Aside and slightly off topic:
Reminds me of the numerous people I have heard say something to the effect of "Church is full of hypocrites, why would I want to go there?"
The only response I have found that seems to disarm people and put anyone at ease is to say "yeah, it is full of hypocrites. One more can't hurt, can it?"]