Believing What Is Obviously Untrue
By the time he felt forced to quit in 2015, Thomas
Sargent had spent 24 years as environmental safety and health specialist at
Sonoma (California) State University.
Except for a performance improvement plan issue in 2002, he had been a
solid, technically skilled employee. A 2013
report commissioned by the university found asbestos dust in some
buildings, and later in the year a report
from the State’s Office of University Auditor identified a few materials handling
weaknesses at the university, including the need for hazardous materials
inspections. Sargent took that finding and
ran with it.
For two years, Sargent pressed for management action on the
issue and, he felt, they resisted. He
said the asbestos concentrations were really high, and the university said they
were not. The university paid for another
inspection, which did not find a big problem, but Sargent said the inspection
was faulty. Money was not available to
eliminate asbestos from the buildings, but the university took other actions,
such as sealing surfaces, to contain the problem.
Relations between Sargent and his boss deteriorated. Sargent reported violations externally. He accumulated six
reprimands and two suspensions. Then
he quit and sued the university.
In “Why
We Believe Obvious Untruths,” Philip Fernbach and Steven Sloman suggest
that all of us are ready to believe things that are patently untrue – for
example, in the case of Donald Trump, the prevalence of voter fraud, extraordinary
attendance at his presidential inauguration, the birth place of Barrack Obama –
because we satisfy ourselves with what we think individually. We refuse to accept the analyses of others
who disagree with us.
Whistleblowers are among those who go off on their own to
come up with their complaints. That
individual initiative in support of what they believe makes them so attractive
to many. But it is sometimes hard to
know if they aren’t just crazy or motivated by some hidden agenda.
The university believed its evidence made its position
patently true, and Sargent rejected that position, not unlike the way Donald
Trump rejected evidence that no significant voter fraud existed in the 2016
presidential election. It is difficult
for nearly all of us to independently evaluate Sargent’s contention that
potentially dangerous asbestos risk was present or the university’s contention
that no significant risk existed. We have
trouble distinguishing the deluded from the honest reporters.
Something similar goes on with other whistleblowers. Few readers of Edward
Snowden’s documents could personally assess his claim that the government
acted illegally. When Sharon
Watkins described reporting irregularities at Enron, they seemed suspicious
but few could know for sure how improper they were. No readers of my complaints can easily
determine if I had a reasonable basis for presenting them or if HomeFirst was
right in ignoring them.
Fernbach and Solman contend that what makes humans
exceptional is not our individual mental capability, but our ability to think
in concert with others. You know that
the earth revolves around the sun, but only by virtue of others’ astronomical
observations and calculations. You know
that smoking causes cancer, but without knowing precisely the effects of
smoking on our cells, how cancer develops, and why some smoke is more dangerous
than others.
The problem, of course, is that groups also go cockeyed, believing
things that are quite, even patently, untrue.
Anecdotes – the sun rising in the east each morning or a relative who
lived to old age despite being a heavy smoker – may confuse us. Religious doctrine leads some to make
statements – for example, concerning the age
of humanity – that are obviously inconsistent with reality. Then, members of close-knit groups can fall
prey to groupthink and ostracize
those who challenge the group’s norms and beliefs.
Defending themselves, organizations commonly accuse their
whistleblowers of not being able to get along with others in the group[1]. Sonoma State University said Sargent showed resentment
and malice toward his manager and mounted a campaign to get him fired. HomeFirst board members decided to fire me
because I was insubordinate
and a “loose
cannon” who could not
get along with others on the team.
In the Fernbach and Sloman framework, Sargent is the
individual – operating alone as most whistleblowers do – who strongly believes
what is, to the university, obviously untrue.
The university represents a community of shared knowledge that enables
its members to feel that they understand things that, in Sargent’s view, they
don’t. The fact that group members –
those in Sonoma State University, HomeFirst, or even the whistleblower
community – affirm each other’s beliefs makes them feel smarter when they may really
be quite dim.
Our natural state is ignorance, Fernbach and Sloman write,
and we should be cautious and evaluate what we think. If we care to find the truth.
Stepping away, even momentarily, from our irrationality to
bathe in rational evaluation is problematic.
The whistleblower’s frustrations may bias his investigations. The organization’s retaliation against its whistleblower
takes place in an arena not of truth-seeking but of power plays. Both sides are driven more by emotion than by
reasoned analysis; they seek to win, not to be right.
Organizations often retaliate quickly against those who
break ranks to complain[2]
rather than investigate the alleged problem.
A few hours after I revealed to HomeFirst that I had reported possible
violations externally, the CEO and Board members decided I should be terminated
and, on advice of their attorney, they lost
interest in discussing whether the company’s actions needed correction.
Communication between the whistleblower and the organization
ceases. Any collaborative search knowledge
is abandoned. The whistleblower is fired
for insubordination and poor performance, an end that should have been seen
early on.
But on occasion, a court or a jury steps in to judge the
matter and describe the truth when the parties are unwilling to do so themselves. That was the happy
ending for Thomas Sargent.
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