Rationalization

Rationalization is perhaps the most widely and frequently used of the unconscious ego defenses. It reflects a built-in bias, of which we are unaware, in favor of ourselves, our feelings, our own opinions, ideas, and prejudices

Rationalization   is the practice of finding and giving plausible and apparently "reason­able" explanations for thought and conduct that stems from quite different motivations than those we openly express. Rationalization is unconscious self-deception. It usually comes as a great shock to find that others do not see us or our points of view as we see them our­selves. We often rationalize our conduct to cover up our less worthy motives often our jealousies toward other people. Thus a teacher or mother chastises children "for their own good"unaware that she is enjoy­ing her own sense of power.

Rationalization is "emotional thinking" as opposed to valid reasoning. To a certain ex-tint, the unconscious mind being what it is rationalization is inevitable. There is no com­pletely rational man Since all our strongest personal beliefs and prejudices are rooted in emotions, it is not surprising that we de­fend them by rationalization rather than by critical, logical thought

Some of the most penetrating observations on rationalization were written more than a generation ago by the late Jame Harvey Rob inson in his brilliant book, The Mind in the Making, thus:

We are incredibly heedless in the formation of our beliefs, but find ourselves filled with an illicit passion for them when anyone proposes to rob us of their companionship. It is ob­viously not the ideas themselves that are dear to us. but our self-esteem, which is threatened.

We are by nature stubbornly pledged In defend our own from attack, whether it be our person, our family, our property, or our opin­ion. A United States Senator once remarked to a friend of mine that Clod Almighty could not make him change his mind on our Latin-America policy. We may surrender, but rarely confess ourselves vanquished. In the intellec­tual world at least peace is without victory.

Few of us take the pains to study he origin of our cherished convictions: indeed, we have a natural repugnance to so doing. We like to continue to believe what we have been accus­tomed to accept as true, and the resentment aroused when doubt is cast upon any of our assumptions leads us to seek every manner of excuse for clinging to them. The result is that most of our so-called reasoning consists in finding arguments for going on believing as we already do.

I remember years ago attending a public dinner to which the Governor of the state was bidden. The chairman explained that His Ex­cellency could not be present for certain "good" reasons; what the "real" reasons were the presiding officer said he would leave us to conjecture. This distinction between "good" and "real" reasons is one of the most clarify­ing and essential in the whole realm of thought.