😇 Good guys make the rules

Thu, 16 Jul 2026 01:00:00 +1100

We can cheat, because we are the good guys.

Look fair. Then cheat.

In Monin and Miller’s studies, people first rejected a blatantly sexist statement, then chose a man over a woman for a job labeled male. Looking fair on the first screen made the biased hire on the next one easier to live with.

Brown’s team ran a simpler version. People rated how generous they would be on soft charity dilemmas, such as donating an inheritance. Then they faced a math screen that showed the answer unless they hit a key in time. People who had just rated their own virtue “forgot” that key more often than people who rated an acquaintance. Researchers call that pattern moral credentialing.

GoodGuysDontPlayFair on behaviorengineering.ai

😇 Good guys make the rules

Look fair. Then cheat.