I had a long career in market research, I was used to deciphering and describing human behavior. But politics baffled me. Then I read The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt and I finally understood. It was so helpful that I wrote a book about how to apply his ideas to understanding the political world. Actually, I wrote two books!

But in the past few years everything has become scrambled.

The two books I wrote used the psychology theory called Moral Foundations Theory to help people understand political and social trends. That theory says that our underlying psychology, one that we don’t even recognize is there, has five basic flavors or taste buds (as Jonathan Haidt, one of the theory’s originators has called them). And these differ by whether we are conservative or liberal. If you aren’t familiar with Moral Foundation Theory, here’s a link to a quick primer.

My first book (Marketing Landmines) applied those theories to marketing. Drawing from my background in marketing, I explained that marketers need to pay attention to the moral foundations of their customer base. The second book (Persuade, Don’t Preach) broadened the use of theory to everyday culture and politics.

I wrote both these books before the pandemic. But the events of the past few years, with DJT, EM, and the pandemic all happening, have scrambled what I thought I knew. I thought that using these theories would help the world make sense, but it doesn’t seem to help anymore. Or does it? (Skip to conclusions for that.)

An example: Tesla

What I thought I knew: The customers for Tesla have been buying electric vehicles because they are concerned about climate change. Customers generally skewed politically liberal and relatively wealthy. That tracked with the people I knew who owned Teslas. A few years ago, one of my friends told me he was buying a Tesla even though the electricity in our area is powered by a coal plant because it sent a message that he was concerned about climate change. If I was Elon Musk and I cared what my customer base thought, I wouldn’t have gone to work for DJT who appeals to conservatives who aren’t concerned about climate change. Obviously, EM never read either of my books.

EM jumped into working for the President enthusiastically. Now he’s facing backlash from Tesla owners, who are putting stickers on their cars saying that they bought their car before EM went crazy. Tesla dealerships are being picketed, charging stations are being vandalized and Tesla sales are down both inside and outside the US. Sales and the stock price have gone down substantially. On the other hand, DJT did a Tesla commercial from the White House and rightwing influencers are buying Teslas. The world is upside down. And maybe, maybe EM is rethinking his support of DJT. Despite the fact that he has “left” the White House, I think he will have a hard time recovering.

Another example: Vaccines

What I thought I knew: Conservatives tend to be more fearful and more concerned about safety. Surveys done before the pandemic showed they were more likely to trust their doctor. Vaccine skepticism before COVID was found almost exclusively among the left (I know, I was one of the authors of a study on vaccine skepticism conducted over 20 years ago).

Not anymore, things have changed. DJT’s actions and the backlash to the pandemic lockdowns have wiped that away.

A final example: The military

What I thought I knew: The military draws its staff more often from the conservative end of society. It appeals to the sense of orderliness, their patriotism and their high desire for authority.

But DJT has done and said some things that undercut respect for the military. Among many things, he has suggested John McCain was a loser for being captured and avoided visiting a military cemetery. And of course, he avoided the draft.

The result? Recently, recruitment for the military has declined. Some years it has been down as much as 25%. Note: It has recovered, it is now up, so maybe this example isn’t as strong as the others.

Conclusions

The books I wrote are dated because the examples are old. Just a few years old, but still they are dated. But that doesn’t mean the books aren’t useful at all. The techniques I recommend for using moral foundation theory to overcome biases are still useful, you really need to work to apply it to these times.

But how does this help us with this topsy turvy world?

One of my conclusions from study of how to apply these principles is that when an issue collides with multiple moral foundations, you find out which one has the most power by seeing which one wins. What seems clear to me is that the most important factor is “desire for authority”, which won out over the other ones for conservatives. The difficulties presented by the pandemic probably reinforced and exaggerated the natural tendency of conservatives to want an authority to tell them what to do. This isn’t just a US phenomenon, most countries have been moving more conservatively, probably because of the challenges of both the pandemic and inflation. Haidt calls this moral foundation “respect for authority” so I used that in my books also. But I after watching the last few years, I would like to amend that to call it “desire for authority”. In each of these examples, what the authority has suggested has overridden the conservatives’ natural tendency and won, because desire for authority has greater weight than their other tendencies.

But what makes this so powerful is that it is combined with another moral foundation, that of Belonging (or what Jonathan Haidt calls Loyalty to the Group). This group is bound together by what they hate, which is a typical out group behavior. Name calling is a key indicator of this hatred. Adding the power of two moral foundations make this attachment even stronger.

And then, the evangelical right adds into the mix the belief that DJT was chosen by God, which brings into the mix the third moral foundation, Sacredness/Purity. This makes it impossible to dislodge.

I hope this helps some people understand what is going on in this world. Do you think I am right? I