Moral hypocrites are bullies

Perhaps we should have an even dimmer view of hypocrites

Written by Robert Kurzban

I’m old enough to remember when adults didn’t care about bullies on the playground.

Now, true, part of the reason is that there wasn’t much bullying where I went to school. I was lucky to attend public schools that were, in retrospect, excellent. The teachers excelled at their jobs and there was almost no violence during my time there. The biggest scandal at my school was the time that one of the students came in with a mohawk.

Still, there was some. The big kids, the older kids, the cool kids, they occasionally tormented the small, young, and nerdy with an unkind word here, a gentle shove out of the way there.

But the bullying was so tame that teachers paid little attention. Their attitude was “Eh, settle it by yourselves. We care—but not enough to intervene.”

Bullying = Attack + Impunity

Bullying has changed over the years—moving into cyberspace, like everything else—but its core has not. To my way of thinking, there are two key elements of bullying: 1) the bully attacks the victim AND 2) the bully is protected from retaliation.

Attacks come in many forms. The sort of bully depicted in shows like The Simpsons—the infamous Nelson Muntz—attacks with physical violence: A poke, a prod, a noogie, or a threat to do some or all of those things if lunch money isn’t handed over. Not all attacks are physical. A recent insightful piece by Kat Rosenfeld about gossip attacks, such as those depicted in Mean Girls, discusses “how savage and Machiavellian the socially ambitious teenage girl can be.” A mean girl gives your reputation a wedgie.

Research by the superlative Jaimie Krems, Tracy Vaillancourt and colleagues (citations below) provides robust support for the Simpsons/Mean Girls sex difference and the idea that women use “indirect relational aggression”—gossip—more than men. Informational attacks can be far more harmful than physical attacks, making them a powerful weapon, and often focus on intimate matters. As Vailancourt and Krems (2018) put it, “derogation of rivals characteristically includes tactics such as criticizing a same-sex rival’s appearance, or spreading rumors (i.e., using indirect aggression) that suggest that the rival is promiscuous.” This derogation has a purpose. These scholars go on to suggest that “girls and women use indirect aggression to (1) reduce a rival’s ability to compete, and (2) maintain their own high social status, which increases their own mate-value.”

Gossip can be about anything related to one’s reputation, but one particularly vicious type of attack is a moral one. Yes, it can be damaging to Heather if it becomes widely known—or merely believed—that she shared an intimate moment with a less-favored student from her chemistry lab. But if Heather were accused of violating whatever taboo is in fashion—which today would probably be some sort of -ism or -phobia—here reputation would be in tatters.

The second key element of bullying is that bullies are protected. In Nelson’s case, he’s protected because he’s physically big. Scenes with Nelson tend to occur in moments when the kids are out of sight of adults and without the threat of third-party punishment. Nelson can attack knowing that he’s big enough to defend against any attempt at physical retaliation.

In the modern moment, another especially important source of protection is anonymity. On the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog, and all that. If one can launch an anonymous attack using technology or through third parties who keep your identity secret, you can, just like Nelson, attack at will, free from consequences. Of course, there is always the possibility of leaks or discovery, so this form of invulnerability isn’t perfect. But it’s often pretty darn good. Anonymous trolls are a species of bully. 

Another source of protection connects to my particular view of power. Bullying is a kind of conflict: It’s an attack by the bully on the target. For this reason, one kind of protection an attacker can have is power in the sense that most or all third parties to the conflict will take the bully’s side. Having everyone on one’s side is, as we have seen, a tremendous source of power and can make one all but invulnerable.

Since we’re on the topic of power, let’s return to my favorite source for examples, Game of Thrones. In one key scene, the good citizens of King’s Landing throw rotten vegetables at Cersei Lannister as she is humiliatingly marched naked through the streets while Septa Unella rings her bell and chants “Shame!” The mob attacks Cersei, safe from retribution, because they have the power in that particular context, protected by one another.

Is our world all that different? Again, I can’t put it better than Kat Rosenfeld, who writes: “The message now, and it’s not exactly subtle, is that it’s fine, even heroic, to manipulate the people around you and destroy someone’s life if you feel she’s mistreated you… just as long as you’re a gold medallist¹ victim in the oppression Olympics.” To Rosenfeld, protection comes from the idea that certain identities are, in some communities, immune from criticism or punishment, for vicious attacks.

Where does such immunity come from? From the social world—the ways in which we take sides and cement agreements. Groups of humans and other primates are hierarchical, with agreement about who is on top and who is on the bottom. At the top of the hierarchy, one is relatively safe from attacks—and retaliation—because what it means to be at the top of the hierarchy is for others to take your side. To make a moral attack is to invite third parties to join your side. If you know in advance that others will side with you, then you are free to launch your physical, reputational, and moral attacks without fear of subsequent costs.

This fact also explains why moral attacks can be so devastating, potentially more than physical attacks, which one might think would be more serious. Moral attacks leave one with no defenders. This is just what it means to make a successful moral attack with invulnerability: everyone is going to side with you. One is immune from retaliation within the group, protected by status and alliances.

If you get punched or kicked or noogied, you’ll eventually heal. But in today’s world, with an internet that lasts forever, you might never recover from an attack on your reputation. Indeed, moral attacks can be fatal.

Finally, when it comes to physical attacks, the legal system has a vote and can retaliate against unprovoked attacks because of laws against assault. But because of very strong protections on speech in the United States and elsewhere, those launching moral attacks—even if they are lies—can do so fearing little risk of punishment by the law.

In the movie Heathers, one of the characters, Veronica (played by Winona Ryder), asks one of the Heathers (Duke, played by Shannen Doherty), “why can’t you just be a friend? Why do you have to be such a mega-bitch.” To which Heather replies: “Because I can be.”

Invulnerability means you can be.

Attack Motives

Now, Heather’s reply is satisfying, but it doesn’t really explain why she is a bully. It explains why she isn’t afraid of retaliation. But remember, bullying is about more than evading retaliation; it’s about attacking people in the first place. 

What motivates the bully’s attack?

For Nelson Muntz, the answer is a tale as old as time: lunch money. Some bullies use force or the threat of force to get stuff from their victims. This can be money, Atari cartridges, help with homework, that sort of thing.

But there are other benefits to be had beyond goods and services, mostly to do with what other people think of you. We currently denigrate bullies—at least, we say we do—but bullying clearly carries reputational benefits with some observers, particularly bullies of the moral variety. Even physical bullying can shape how people think of you. Pushing people around can demonstrate to others that you are strong, which can deter attacks.

Non-human animals provide interesting illustrations of this. Consider findings of “displaced aggression,” observed in species ranging from primates to rodents to birds. Following an attack by a dominant individual, a subordinate will sometimes attack another individual subordinate to them, even though that individual was uninvolved. This might on first glance seem a bit unusual, but consider that the original victim might benefit from showing that it’s still quite capable of defending itself. Displaced aggression, on this view, is a way to deter more attacks that would potentially threaten its place in the hierarchy.

The same argument, of course, applies to reputational attacks. Making such an attack successfully shows others that you have the protection of others, deterring reputational attacks on yourself.

Probably more importantly, attacking people of the “right” kind improves your reputation as a good member of the coalition. We currently think about attacks on blacks in the U.S. South, correctly, as reprehensible. But amid the anti-black racism in Southern white communities, such attacks could cement your status in your own group as a person with the correct kind of bigotry. Attacks on the disfavored groups in many contexts, including the current one, are a source of reputation and pride.

Ok, now let’s turn to moral attacks, an accusation that someone has violated some rule or norm. They can be used for the same purposes as other sort of attacks—to gain professional advantage, establish one’s formidability, cement oneself as a good group member and, in addition, illustrate one’s endorsement of the norm that one is using to make the attack.

That last one warrants elaboration. For example, to accuse someone of witchcraft is to say, I believe in witchcraft and I think it is wrong. In this way, I burnish my credentials as an anti-witch, witch-believing moralist who is definitely not a witch. This ensures that I’ll always be the burner, never the burned. Over the last five years, you might just possibly have read news stories about someone accusing another person of racism, harassment, transphobia, sexism…

Now, at this point, things get a little confusing. There are multiple reasons to launch, say, a witchcraft accusation. One set of reasons is the ones we just reviewed: you’re a bully, you’re well protected by your size, status, or what have you, and you want to make an attack to gain some benefit at someone else’s expense. We’ll call all of these together Bully Motives.

But another reason you might accuse someone of witchcraft is that you genuinely and sincerely believe 1) witchcraft is wrong and 2) your target engaged in witchcraft. We’ll call this a Principled Motive. You have a principle about what is wrong (1) and you think people who do it should be punished, which first requires an accusation.

The balance of this piece will make the following simple claim. If an accusation is not motivated by principle, what’s left is that it was driven by one of the Bully Motives.

Hypocrisy

How can you determine someone’s motive for an attack?

First, let’s pause to investigate terms. I’m on the record at some length regarding my views on hypocrisy, and for the present purpose, I’ll say that hypocrisy comes in two basic forms.

Both start with a view about something that is morally wrong. So, for instance, to take a moral issue at the center of public discussions, let’s take plagiarism. To be a hypocrite, in my view, you first have to endorse the basic principle that plagiarism is wrong.

In the first type of hypocrisy, you claim that plagiarism is wrong… and then you commit plagiarism. The second type of hypocrisy is to claim that plagiarism is wrong… and then claim that it isn’t wrong when your friend, ally, kin, or group member does it. In those cases, you simply ignore it. This form of hypocrisy is inconsistency, bias, or partiality. To endorse the view that something is wrong is to claim that it’s wrong no matter who commits the offense. That’s what it means to be principled, to apply the rule impartially, as symbolized by Lady Liberty’s blindfold.

So, I wouldn’t call it bullying when one launches a moral attack based on principle. Let’s go back to my ski trip with my friend. In the incident I describe in the post, one skier accuses another of plowing into him, violating the safety rules of the slope. This isn’t bullying. This is a normal, everyday moral accusation based on the fact that someone acted in a way that violated a rule, in this case a safety rule on the slope.

But.

Let’s suppose someone, we’ll call her Susan, stood at the front of the mob with a pitchfork when Luis Rubiales kissed Jenni Hermoso after the women’s soccer team’s victory. Bad Luis! Fire Luis! Then suppose Susan learns that Margot Robbie kissed Brad Pitt, saying, “That wasn’t in the script but I thought, ‘When else am I going to get the chance to kiss Brad Pitt? I’m just gonna go for it.’” If Susan doesn’t launch (or support) the same attack on Margo that she did on Luis, then we know that she’s not really opposed to unsolicited kisses. She just uses the moral attack when the victim is a Luis, someone she wants to destroy, rather than a Margo, who she doesn’t. It’s a pretext in the Luis case that she can use, safe from retaliation with the mob behind her.

To take another issue that is at center stage currently, take the accusation that certain kind of speech is wrong, does harm, and should be punished. Recent years have seen any number of attacks on people for a gamut of offenses having to do with parts of speech, pedestrian claims about biology, and words that sound like slurs in a foreign language.

The strong reaction to recent testimony by the (ex-)presidents of Harvard, MIT, and Penn wasn’t necessarily due to the fact that they seemed to be taking a strong stance in favor of free speech. The reason is that the remarks came from the heads of institutions that were well known for having among the very worst records on free speech (FIRE ranked Penn 247 of 248, just above Harvard, which was dead last), attacking people for things they said and threatening to punish students for sexual misconduct and harassment if they used the wrong pronoun.

The presidents’ remarks—before the United States Congress—illustrate that they didn’t really—not really—think that speech—even advocating genocide—was the sort of thing that is harmful. They didn’t really believe that people should be punished for saying words that hurt other people’s feelings. If they did, they would have said, well, yes, calling for genocide is bad and should be punished.

When they suddenly found themselves saying that people shouldn’t be punished for expressing even genocidal views, to observers, this made it clear that their prior attacks on students and faculty weren’t grounded in principle. The motive for attacking people who said the “wrong” things wasn’t because these presidents thought people should be punished for saying the wrong things; the reason was something else, one of the motives described above having to do with gains, whether material, professional, reputational, or all of the above. You can just cross out the principle as a candidate motive.

Similarly, Bari Weiss, in the wake of the atrocities of October 7^th, raises an important question about the motives behind groups that supported and amplified accusations of sexual harassment amid the so-called metoo movement. In a powerful episode of Honestly, Weiss points out that the people and groups who, for example, opposed the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh based on allegations of misconduct, were silent in the face of the documented sexual violence in Hamas’ terrorist attack on civilians. This silence illustrates that these people and groups didn’t really—not really—launch their attacks based on a sincerely held moral principle, pointing instead to other motives.

This is the sense in which hypocrites are bullies. People who launch moral attacks, like our downed skier, are perfectly just in doing so when their accusation is made based on actions and on principle. A reasonable accusation of someone who violated a principle genuinely held by the accuser is neither bullying nor hypocrisy.

However, if an attack is clearly not based on principle, as illustrated by the attacker’s behavior in other contexts—when an enemy, rather than a friend, committed the putative offense—then the accusation can be seen for what it is, an unprincipled way to attack, often with unassailable protection. When made by someone who has little or nothing to fear—protected by anonymity, their position in the oppression Olympics, or more generally their power in their cultural context—then we should call these attacks what they are: bullying.

And respond to them appropriately.

Epilogue

Accusations of hypocrisy are often correct and, to my experience, relatively toothless these days. My experience is that accusations of hypocrisy are often followed by… so? Dog bites man. No news.

I think the reason for this is that people have lost sight of the fact that hypocrisy is often really bullying. People haven’t thought through the details of these inconsistencies. They sort of have this visceral sense, yeah, that’s not great, but it often seems to end there.

At root, I think the explanation comes down to two things.

First, people often don’t really think about morality as a weapon. We rarely use terms such as “moral attacks,” reducing the extent to which we link accusations of wrongdoing and intent to harm. We are evolved for the stone age—sticks and stones are the sorts of things that break bones—but live in the information age, in which information breaks bodies and souls.

The second element derives from the first. People know that reputational attacks can be made safely and to life-altering effect, so they choose to make them, destroying enemies knowing that they themselves won’t suffer any consequences. It’s hard to keep in mind that the information age allows nearly limitless attacks with impunity.

Anonymity is a tremendous defense, making the cost side of the cost/benefit calculations diminish to near zero. Consider people of ill character weighing the costs and benefits of destroying another person. With the cost side so close to zero, what should we expect of those who delight in others’ suffering, unfettered by conscience? I’m not saying I have a solution for this. Still, a dimmer view of hypocrisy—a social cost to it—might go some of the way to solving this problem.

Robert Kurzban is an American freelance writer and former psychology professor specializing in evolutionary psychology. You can find his Substack Living Fossils here.

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REFERENCES

De Backer, C. J., Nelissen, M., & Fisher, M. L. (2007). Let’s talk about sex: A study on the recall of gossip about potential mates and sexual rivals. Sex roles, 56, 781-791.

Fisher, M., & Cox, A. (2011). Four strategies used during intrasexual competition for mates. Personal Relationships, 18(1), 20–38.

Fisher, M., & Krems, J. A. (2023). An evolutionary review of female intrasexual competition. In D. Buss (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Human Mating. Oxford University Press.

Gallup, A. C., O’Brien, D. T., & Wilson, D. S. (2011). Intrasexual peer aggression and dating behavior during adolescence: An evolutionary perspective. Aggressive Behavior, 37(3), 258–267.

Hess, N. H., & Hagen, E. H. (2006a). Sex differences in indirect aggression: Psychological evidence from young adults. Evolution and Human Behavior, 27(3), 231–245.

Krems, J. A. (2017). Verbal derogation among women. In T. Shackelford & V. Weekes-Shackelford (Eds.), The encyclopedia of evolutionary psychological science (p. 198). New York: Springer.

Vaillancourt, T., & Krems, J. A. (2018). An evolutionary psychological perspective of indirect aggression in girls and women. The development of relational aggression, 111-126.

1. She spells this with two ls, so I render it that way here, since it’s her quote.