From here.
I will quote from a few snippets below:
Research on hypocrisy shows that people are mostly motivated to appear moral rather than to actually abide by their moral judgments.
Once you understand this hard truth about humans, so many other deliciously cynical hard as nails truths shine through the light, and you can finally find your somewhat disgusted way in life.
Research on ‘motivated reasoning’ shows that people deviously craft moral justifications to push their own agendas.
Yep. Sad but true once again. Plug this truth into your brain and watch the whole world light up before your very eyes. In other words, when people are good, they are good. When people are bad, they are also good. People are always good, no matter how good or bad their behavior is. No one wants to be bad. Except me. The bad boy.
In fact, humans are more eager to judge other people than to follow their own moral advice.
You know, you really can’t understand life at all until you plug into ugly little truths like this. Plug this in and watch everything converge together, an endless epiphany.
We proclaim our moral values, and then we don’t even follow our own rules. But that’s ok, because we all just lie and say we do anyway. Evidence to the contrary? Not an issue. Deny it. Things hitting a little too close to home? Not a problem. Project away the blame onto someone else so you go scot free. Defenses are a handy little bag of tricks.
