Ethically exhausted?
Can the cognitive load of trying to be good all the time make one behave badly?
Many of us subscribe to a set of moral or ethical systems: ways of thinking which help us decide how to behave in various decisions, and which lay out for us the kind of people we want to be.
I think of myself as a relatively ethical person — I screw it up regularly, of course, but I like to think I get better at being an ethical hooman over time, and that my views and behaviour become more nuanced, too.
One of the things I take most seriously is trying to be an ethical consumer — something which is pretty difficult in a first world Western urban society (not that I’m complaining about living in such a society, note!).Why do I bother? Part of it’s because I want to try live as lightly on our environment and societies as I can. Part of it’s because I firmly believe that, while I get to vote on my government only every 3 years, I get to vote on my future society every time I spend my money.
And the more I know and learn, the more I find myself having to cut things out. For heavens’ sake, I’m considering becoming pragmatically vegan. Talk about cognitive load!
The increasingly-high cognitive load of trying to be an ethical consumer’s started to have an interesting effect on me, though. Recently, I’ve occasionally found myself buying or eating things I would never have a year ago. Or sometimes eating/drinking things that I know I shouldn’t buy (based on recent new knowledge I’ve gained), but I do anyway. Like the ice cream. Or milk in my flat white.
Last week, it culminated in the ultimate shame. I ate a piece of KFC chicken. I didn’t buy it, mind, but still. It’s been years since last I did that. And I was (and still am) covered in disgust and self-hatred. Worse, I know I may do something similar again in the near future. KNOWING THAT IT’S WRONG (and not in a fun way).
And it has me wondering — is it possible to get what I’m going to call “ethical exhaustion”? Where one gets so tired of trying to be “good” all the time that one‘s brain revolts and goes in completely the opposite direction? Is it some sort of subconscious protective behaviour meant to free up cognitive resources for other things — an anti-stress measure, if you will?
I know that recent science suggests to us that our decisions are actually made preconsciously, and we then justify to ourselves a decision that’s already been made without our conscious knowledge. How does that relate to this change in my behaviour?
Or have I just been lying to myself all these years, and I really don’t care? It’s also been a particularly long and difficult year — could I just be tired? Or is it, simply, decision fatigue? And what on earth am I supposed to do about it?
What do y’all think? Have you experienced something similar?
— — —
Related readings
— —
