Reading about in-group atrocities suppresses concern for harm and fairness

Evidence

The results from this second study suggest that reading about atrocities committed by the in-group causes a shift in the accessibility of morality principles, with loyalty and authority coming to the foreground, and harm and fairness receding to the background. … It is noteworthy that not only the accessibility of loyalty and authority are enhanced, but also that harm and fairness become less accessible when individuals read about in-group atrocities, as compared with outgroup atrocities. This may be due to the functional antagonism between these two classes of morality principles. But it is remarkable if we ponder the fact that most of the text of the article, in either condition, is about harm inflicted on other human beings, and the unfairness of the events described is blatant. — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 2135

Categorization

• XREF: Directly parallels and complicates the Allport reassessment thread: harm/fairness suppression under group-threat is the cognitive engine behind the psychological features Allport described. — connects to: Those who read unfavorable group history become less willing to apologize — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt: International…, 1358; Group glorification suppresses demands for justice for ingroup violence — Bernhard Leidner et al., Ingroup Glorification, Moral…, 49
• SEED: Article angle: how moral ‘blindness’ toward an out-group’s suffering is not a failure to register facts but an active re-weighting of which moral principles even stay cognitively accessible.
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 2135