Doing a self-assessment

I know some people who speak a kind of righteousness that assumes most or all people are deliberately assholes, cheaters, thieves, liars, and con artists. When they complain about people, there seems to be an undercurrent of "not fair." Something like "I follow the rules, so it's not fair that your don't." It might be "I work hard to support myself and I'm just getting by while you don't do anything but live of of others." It just sounds to me like "I'd do that too if I could get away with it."

I wonder if this is a case of the pot calling the kettle scorched?

I have a different kind of righteousness, I think. I don't believe that people are fundamentally sinful (which I think is often the basis for that kind of righteousness), but I think people are fundamentally unconscious and unconcerned with anything that doesn't look like an immediate threat. It's biology. And average people don't really have much facility to move beyond their biology.

That means that most people have the potential to be deliberate assholes, cheaters, thieves, liars, and con artists. This includes those are righteous about not being those things.

I'm an intellectual elitist. The difference between me and those I've cited in the first paragraph might be that I don't have a moral agenda. And it always seems to be that the righteous believe they are good and godly while everyone else (not closely associated with them) are evil.

I know that I'm having ever increasing difficulty interacting with folk who think the minutemen have a point or that 2 blocks is "too close" to "ground zero" or that bankers are evil.