The Madness of Conviction: How Emotional Reactivity Threatens Society

Our societies are literally tearing themselves apart, irreconcilable positions are taken by individuals, uninterested in discussion and convinced in their moral outrage. How do we fix this?

Pic: PA

Last week, the activist organisaiton, Palestine Action was proscribed as a Terrorist Organisation by the British Parliament following an attack on the military infrastructure of the United Kingdom. This act caused the government to act against an organisation that has put what it calls ‘direct action’ and what everyone else calls intimidation, violence and vandalism, to introduce an Bill proscribing it and the vast majority of MPs agreed. Palestine Action therefore joins the list of other banned organisaitons from the far right to Jihadists. Promoting them in any way could land you 14 years in prison.

The reaction was revealing. This weekend, protests in the centre of London were carried out under the spurious action that you could still carry out the activities of Palestine Action (Direct Action) as long as you didn’t use the Palestine Action name. They also attempted an ‘I Claudius’ style protest citing that they supported the group. The Metropolitan Police were in no mood to indulge this and acted swiftly arresting the protestors including an 83 year old former Vicar.

Online the usual keyboard warriors were at work, but interestingly the Government’s actions seem to have pushed some of them over the edge.

This Tweet from the controversial Barrister Franck Magennis of The Garden Chambers is extraordinary for someone in his position and will no doubt be raising some eyebrows at Bar Standards, when they are not wrangling over the definition of ‘woman’.

The number of highly educated people who are risking years behind bars all in the name of a moral cause they believe is just is quite extraordinary. Their actions exemplify a disturbing phenomenon I call “The Madness of Conviction”, a psychological trap where emotionally charged beliefs become so entrenched that their holders can’t see reason, only their own moral position. It’s a form of collective fanaticism fuelled by our oldest neurological wiring - our System 1 brain, designed to react instantly to threats. This stone age evolution is being amplified to dangerous levels by social media and may reach catastrophic levels as AI becomes increasingly weaponised to influence opinion.

The issues over Israel and Palestine are, because so many have nailed their moral core to a side, perhaps the best place to see this phenomenon manifest. In a series of extraordinary interviews, the Barrister Natasha Hausdorff drove interviewers from Ian Dale to Lady Nugee (Emily Thornberry) into frothing rage for merely pointing out facts around international law to them concerning this issue. On being asked about why she caused this reaction by Brendan O’Neill in an interview last week, Hausdorff replied that it appears that some people are so convinced of their moral position that to challenge it causes them a perceived existential threat and this results in an aggressive and unhinged reaction, or words to that effect.

The problem isn’t just protests or protests alone. It’s how our society has become a battleground for emotional, uncompromising moral posturing, often with serious consequences for democracy and civil order.

The Dual Minds We Use; and Why It Matters

To understand how we got here, we need to cross into psychology and how our brain responds to inputs, and to do this we must understand the two basic responses to outside influences. Psychologists like the late Daniel Kahneman identified how we react.

Whenever we see, hear, read or experience something there is an automatic reaction we cannot stop. We call this System 1.

• System 1: The impulsive, emotional brain, the quick reflex that protected our ancestors from lions and sabre-toothed tigers. It reacts before we consciously think; it’s automatic, primal.

When we consider and rationalise an input it costs us three times the calories and some considerable effort. This is called System 2.

• System 2: The slower, effortful brain; the thinking mind capable of critical analysis and nuanced judgment. It’s expensive in energy, demanding deliberate focus and patience.

So System 1 is the emotional response, System 2 the rational.

System 1 was designed to protect us from immediate threats: it is literally the stone age brain and was evolved to keep us safe from lions and predators. However, in the age of social media, our System 1 is pressed to the limit. Outrage, fear, moral outrage, these are the buttons pressed daily. And once pressed, these reactions are often never thoroughly examined. When someone finally does engage their System 2, say, reflecting on whether their tweet was wise, they might realise their impulsive action was wrong. But often, it’s too late. The emotional response has already taken hold.

Take Lucy Connolly for example. She impulsively tweeted out of anger, only to regret her haste later. She deleted the Tweet, a sign of System 2 kicking in, but the damage was done. Had the court not chosen to neglect her deletion, when her System 2 brain had kicked in, the legal outcome might have been different. That’s the danger: our systems are wired for quick reaction, not reflection.

Rationalisers, Not Rational Thinkers

Most of us are rationalisers, not rational thinkers. What’s more, the more educated we are, the more susceptible to this we become . Once we’ve adopted a position, be it on politics, law, or morality, we fit every piece of evidence into this pre-existing framework. It’s easier than admitting we might be wrong. The analytical thinking norms that have been the staple of our education system for the last 100 years, place the onus on rationalising our position when questioned rather than examining why we hold it. It’s a subtle but important difference.

This becomes especially lethal when beliefs are morally loaded, wrapped tightly with identity. The more we rationalise, the less open we become to nuance or compromise. It’s why some MPs dug their heels in over laws governing end-of-life care, or why certain NHS trusts refuse to recognise court rulings that challenge their worldview around gender and women’s rights. They don’t see law-breaking as an issue, they see it as a moral high ground and dangerously, they don’t consider the impact on our society if everyone picked and chose the laws they follow and the laws they don’t.

It’s remarkable how many we see comparing themselves to the Suffragettes or the resistance movements to the 3rd Reich. From University Campuses to Barristers. In order to rationalise the law breaking morally, it is essential that they compare the liberal democracies they live in with the very worst of authoritarian states in history. To them this means invoking the bogeyman of the modern era: Adolf Hitler. For example: if Trump is actually Hitler then you can justify any form of resistance from a moral position. They are LARPING as Stauffenburg.

The Societal Toll: Fragmentation and Breakdown

But what happens when this process repeats on a societal scale? What happens when we all start feeling morally righteous and start to justify defying laws, refusing consensus, or turning violent? Society fractures.

Shared moral frameworks, like Christianity or communal norms, used to knit us together. Their decline has left a vacuum filled with dogma, where emotional reactions dominate reason. This feeds into tribalism, ensuring we see those “on the other side” not just as mistaken but as morally inferior.

The result? Increasingly irreconcilable views, refusal to accept legal or democratic authority, and a growing sense that the social contract is no longer binding.

Professor David Betz of University College London, who advises the US and UK governments on civil conflicts and their causes, has concluded that civil conflict is now inevitable in the UK because these divisions are so deep it will be impossible to reconcile them politically. His warning has triggered headlines and given his status and reputation, it will be causing great concern in Whitehall even if it isn’t discussing it openly.

The problem is that when you rationalise a System 1 response and nail it to your moral framework and identity, it becomes almost impossible to change your mind.

Why It's So Hard to Change Our Minds; and Why Education Must Step Up

Attempting to ‘deprogram’ this kind of conviction is tough. History shows that radicalisation, whether political or religious, is rarely reversed by sheer argument. The London Bridge attacker, for example, had previously been ‘de-radicalised’ in prison, only for him to revert the moment his deprogrammers announced he was safe.

But the key isn’t just trying to reverse extreme beliefs; it is almost impossible to do this as the Prevent strategy and the above example shows. it’s preventing their formation in the first place. And the way to do that? By teaching critical thinking early and often.

Critical thinking isn’t just about facts; it’s about recognizing your emotional reactions, questioning your immediate impulses, and understanding that your first instinct isn’t always right.

It’s a mental ‘pause button’, much needed in our era of relentless social media toxicity.

Education must focus on intervening before System 1 results in irreversible beliefs. We need curricula that cultivate self-awareness, emotional regulation, and scepticism, not just rote memorization.

Because when people are unaware of their own emotional triggers, they become easy targets, manipulated by narratives that tap into their deepest fears and moral certainties.

Without Change, Society Will Break Down

The ’Madness of Conviction’ is more than just a psychological quirk, it's a profound threat to the fabric of our society. As already mentioned: Daniel Kahneman explores in Thinking, Fast and Slow, our minds are wired with two systems: System 1, quick and intuitive, and System 2, slow and deliberate. Unfortunately, our default tendency to rely on fast, emotional reactions, System 2 costs three times the calories and requires huge effort. In today’s social media age this means that many of us often act, justify, and double down without sufficient reflection.

When these emotional reactions become deeply entrenched, resistant to reason or compromise, social cohesion erodes. Laws are ignored, courts are defied, and civil order begins to falter. If we ignore this dynamic, the society we cherish founded on shared norms and mutual respect risks falling apart into chaos, tribalism, and lawlessness.

The solution isn’t simply shouting louder or passing more laws. It’s about teaching people to recognise and pause before our System 1 impulses take over, about fostering critical thinking, awareness, and emotional regulation. As Kahneman suggests, transforming rapid, instinctive reactions into thoughtful responses requires deliberate effort, an ongoing societal challenge.

Without this shift, the consequences are clear: societal fragmentation, a breakdown of the social contract, and the collapse of the civil order that sustains free, open societies. The choice is ours. We can confront the ‘Madness of Conviction’ now, by understanding and managing our cognitive biases or watch the fabric of society tear apart as Professor Betz warns. Recognising this dynamic is crucial if we wish to break free from the 'Madness of Conviction'; and rebuild a society rooted in thoughtful, deliberate judgment.

The real threat of AI

The threat of the impact of AI on our society is often seen one dimensionally: the very real threat to jobs and livelihoods. However, there are signs all over the world that AI is now being inevitably used to manipulate System 1 responses and then to rationalise those responses. It’s the ultimate radicalisation machine. Pope Leo XIV has identified this threat and is so concerned about it addressing it is a priority for the Vatican. He pointed out that until fairly recently, countries and companies were nodding sagely about the ethics of AI but since the development of Large Language Models about 12 months ago, there has been a headlong dash to grab as much market as possible and ethics have been trampled in the rush.

These increasingly sophisticated machines are designed explicitly to manipulate us. Governments, corporations, and hostile foreign powers are already deploying AI tools to analyse targets and identify their emotional buttons, those triggers that activate System 1 responses, and exploit them at scale.

A recent edition of The China Show (from 1:14 in this video) revealed alarming research: China, through extensive bot farming, is responsible for up to 80% of all contentious issues online. One striking example involved a TikTok video by a Black cultural commentator discussing his concerns about how Black communities are portrayed online in America: as perpetual victims. The initial response was a thoughtful discussion, but within three days, there was a sharp spike in hostile and racist comments. Researchers tracked 90% of these comments back to Chinese-created bots, with 60% of all social media engagement on the topic originating from these automated accounts. The goal? To sow division within the United States by exploiting our innate susceptibility, your System 1 reactions.

As AI becomes more sophisticated, so too will these manipulative campaigns. The enemies of democratic societies: China, Russia, Iran, and their proxies, are already committing over 60% of the deliberate disinformation and social unrest tactics. They are deploying automated digital armies designed to manipulate emotions at scale, aiming to deepen polarisation, erode trust, and destabilise western democracies.

This isn’t just a problem for governments or tech companies, it's a societal emergency. We are all vulnerable to this contagion. Without deliberate effort, our populations will become increasingly passive participants in these manipulative schemes, unable to distinguish genuine concern from engineered outrage.

If we fail to recognise and address this manipulation, our societies risk becoming puppets of unseen puppeteers; divided, distrustful, and weakened from within. The survival of our democratic values depends on a collective effort to understand how our minds work, to reinforce our defences, and to master the art of pausing before reacting. Because in the battle for our minds, awareness is the frontline, without it, the chaos we see today will only grow worse.