Why People Justify

When confronted with proof of an unprecedented crash at all levels of training, staff and public often respond with justifications and reasons why.

LRH wrote extensively about the mental mechanism behind this phenomenon:

L. Ron Hubbard

“One often wonders why people are so ‘reasonable’ about intolerable and illogical situations.

“The answer is very simple: they cannot recognize outpoints when they see them and so try to make everything seem logical.

“The ability to actually see an outpoint for what it is, in itself is an ability to attain some peace of mind.

“… The human reaction is to REACT! to an outpoint. And then get ‘reasonable’ and adopt some explanation for it, usually untrue.

“You can safely say that ‘being reasonable’ is a symptom of being unable to recognize outpoints for what they are and use them to discover actual situations.”

HCO P/L 30 September 1973 Issue II
Data Series 30, Situation Finding
(Management Series Vol. 1, p. 128)

“A lot of people are on a stuck flow of being sensible and sane — and that winds up in stupidity. So they get reasonable. Their confront of evil isn't up to it — basically, their confront of outpoints.”

HCO P/L 18 March 1977RA
Data Series 43RA, Evaluation and Programs
(Management Series Vol. 1, p. 167)

“It is horrifying to behold how easily people buy dub-in. This is because an illogical sequence is uncomfortable. To relieve the discomfort they distort their own observation by not-ising the outpoint and concluding something else.”

HCO P/L 18 May 1970
Data Series 7, Familiarity
(Management Series Vol. 1, p. 29)

L. Ron Hubbard

“People who explain how wrong it is all going and who have reasons why and WHO AREN’T PUTTING IT RIGHT are the real crazy people in the universe.”

19 August 1967
The Supreme Test
(OEC Vol. 0, p. 236)

Friends of L. Ron Hubbard