Are You Suffering from Situational Bias? Be HONEST. by Daisy Luther for The Organic Prepper
We’ve all heard of normalcy bias, a mindset in which people don’t believe that the bad things they see on the news could actually happen to them. But have you heard of situational bias? What’s more, are you perhaps guilty of it yourself?
What is situational bias?
In the context of prepping and survival, situational bias is a systemic cognitive bias that causes people to believe that their unique situation protects them from the events or disasters that may befall others. It’s similar to normalcy bias, but a little different because it’s more thought out – the person has what they feel is a valid reason for their belief, instead of simply, “It could never happen to me.”
It’s something that we in the survival world see frequently. Perhaps it’s someone on one of Selco’s articles saying, “I’m sure it was bad in the Balkans, but what he’s describing could never happen here because Americans are different” or someone reading about a riot who breathes a sigh of relief and says, “I’m glad I don’t live in the city.”
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Both of these examples of cognitive biases have some strong basis in reality. The United States is different from Bosnia and Venezuela and Greece and all those other places where we’ve watched the SHTF. Our governmental systems are different, our lifestyles are different, and yes, we have guns. A riot or an episode of mob violence is more likely to take place in a metropolitan area than down a long country road.
But societal collapse doesn’t follow a list of rules
We have to remember that there are no absolutes in societal collapse.
Our government in the United States is pretty darned corrupt or at the very least, perceived as such (flashback to the most recent presidential election for a reminder), our standards of living are falling, and the current administration is doing everything possible to get guns out of our hands.
Hatred has come further and further out of city limits. During the previous election and the hullabaloo surrounding it, supporters of President Trump in rural areas had threatening letters sent to their homes, homeowners in suburbia had their American flags set on fire, and many publications have posted gleeful essays about the election outcome, deeply insulting almost half the voters in the United States. We’ve even seen people thoughtfully pondering on social media about how to “re-educate” Trump voters and libertarians.
As poverty increases (and it is) so does desperation. I wrote a while back that people are now stealing food to get by. Hatred of “others” is blatant and public. The flames of racial divides are being deliberately fanned – and some would even say, being doused in gasoline. Leading up to the Balkan War, Selco wrote that the media bombarded people with fear and hate.
Violence is becoming easier to justify.
All of these things combine to make violence easier for people to justify. We have “othered” and “been othered.” We are divide, purposely, as a means of control. After all, if we’re busy fighting among ourselves, we’re not paying as much attention to what the government is doing. And if we feel pushed into a corner, we’re going to double down on our opinions and embed ourselves even more firmly in “our side” even if what “our side” is proposing in fact goes against our ideals.
The easier it is to justify violence and vandalism, the more likely it is to happen outside of its usual settings.
