Activists came to believe they themselves were self-interested despite contrary evidence

Evidence

Members thought that not only did they have to appeal to others’ self-interest, but that they themselves must really be self-interested. They were resigned to the fact; it was considered common sense, and they sometimes even scrounged for self-interested sounding explanations of their own involvement. Neil even claimed that he was involved just because he was self-interestedly looking for amusement for Saturday mornings! — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1361

Categorization

• QUESTION: When does audience-directed framing soak into speakers’ own self-understanding? The author herself flags this as open.
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1361
• XREF: connects to: Skepticism about activists’ motives can invalidate truthful antiracist claims; False consciousness makes people hold beliefs contrary to their own interests; Activists sound less publicly minded in public than in private — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1205 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Skepticism about activists’ motives can invalidate truthful antiracist claims #corroborates (0.85)
• False consciousness makes people hold beliefs contrary to their own interests #qualifies (0.80)
• Activists sound less publicly minded in public than in private #qualifies (0.75) — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1205
• People on both sides of affirmative action blur self-interest with principled ideology #complicates (0.75) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 2013
• Both supporters and opponents of affirmative action may be rationalizing self-interest #complicates (0.75)