17: Inauthenticity
Inauthenticity involves pretending to be something other than one's "true self," which is often adopted when there are pressures to conform to the demands of others.
Consider the number of individuals who attend a church and claim to be members of a given denomination, but whose daily behavior routinely violates the moral imperatives of that religion - yet when confronted with their hypocrisy staunchly will staunchly deny it and find a crafty argument to resolve the conflict between professed beliefs and actual behavior. This demonstrates how widespread is the problem of inauthenticity.
Parental expectations, peer pressure, and media modeling may directly or indirectly convey an indication of what is demanded of a person and they seek to conform to a pattern of behavior that communicates acceptance of the role that others wish them to play, regardless of their natural inclinations.
- In some instances, the expectations of others are communicated explicitly. For example, a boy's parents tell him that he will go to medical school and become a doctor
- In most instances, other people communicate their demands covertly. For example, the parents hint about medical school while never stating so outright
- Another common tactic is to communicate demands by negating or criticizing other choices. When the lad says he wants to be an artist, or anything but a doctor, he is lectured on the negative consequences of that choice
- In some instances, the person imagines what others expect. The boy thinks that he ought to become a doctor, without any prompting.
(EN: This is a particularly difficult aspect of social interaction, particularly in an individualistic society: people will communicate by hints and intimations - and then, oddly, deny having done so and insisting that the person they were attempting to manipulate must have mistaken their intentions.)
Examples of inauthenticity abound: the teenager who behaves a certain way in order to be accepted among a group of people to which he wishes to belong, a junior executive who feigns an interest in golf because his peers and seniors are interested in the game, a woman who marries a man she doesn't love because she has the sense society expects her to marry by a certain age, etc.
The author references Jean-Paul Sartre, who addressed inauthenticity in his notion of "bad faith," and illustrates this with the example of a waiter who attempts to "act like" a waiter by certain behaviors, such as draping a towel over his arm. The fact that he waits tables makes him a waiter, and the towel over his arm has nothing to do with the satisfactory fulfillment of his duties - but because he has the sense that it is what waiters do, he conforms to unnecessary behaviors to fit his role.
He reaches back further in the history of philosophy, to Socrates and the well-worn guidance to "know yourself" with the implication of "be yourself." Or as Shakespeare wrote, "This above all things, to thine own self be true." However, this is often in conflict with societal pressures, real or perceived, and it has long been the case that a person seeks to conform to gain the acceptance and approval of others.
The author then turns to early psychoanalyst Erich Fromm, who considered the behavior of the conformist. By his reckoning, there is no psychological issue of a person consciously does so - if he is aware that he has altered his behavior to gain the acceptance of others and makes a deliberate choice to enter into this bargain, it is not self-deception but merely a choice to play a role.
As in many instances, the distinction is subtle and has to do with the beliefs of the individual: when he realizes he is pretending, it is a choice; but if he believes his motivation is internal, it becomes an act of self-deception.
The final example the author provides is "groupthink," a sociological concept in which people in a group will agree to a given decision even though none of them genuinely support it. As such the decisions of a committee are far less effective and far more irrational than those that might have been made by any of its members.
The "group" can be as small as two people. Consider the example of a married couple who decides to take a vacation in a place where neither of them wanted to go, but each though that the other would like to go there.
(EN: In group situations, I don't believe this to be the case that all are agreeing to the decision. One person who has power in the group makes a suggestion - whether he genuinely supports it or believes it will be appealing to the others - and the rest consent out of a desire to ingratiate themselves to that individual. So it's not the "group" that thinks, but one person's flawed or inauthentic thinking and the others' separate decision to go along with it.)