Virtue signalling

The docket from the Coles Supermarket checkout looked just a little different.  Okay, they often use their dockets to inform customers of various promotional schemes.  I’d already noted earlier that the promotional had changed from cookware to kitchen knives.  No, this was something else.  There was a logo of sorts at the bottom of the docket that included some dot-art that one usually associates with Australian indigenous paintings.  And then, in very tiny print, there were the words, “Coles Group acknowledges the traditional custodians of Country throughout Australia.”  The rest of the message humbly expressed respect for Elders (past, present and emerging) and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and their culture.  Forty nine words in all – amazing how much you can print on a shopper docket...!

Well, I hope the folk who make up the Coles Group are sincere in their recognition of Australia’s original inhabitants, their descendants and their culture.  I hope their respect is more than just words on billions of checkout dockets all over the country.  But there are some things about this that bother me.

We live in a culture where virtue signalling is proliferating.  Virtue signalling – to put it crudely – is telling people how good we are.  Okay, my apologies – virtue signalling is a rather derogatory term.  It’s defined as “the public expression of opinions or sentiments intended to demonstrate one’s good character or social conscience.”  It could be jumping in on a trend in order to look better to your peers – regardless of what your real opinion is on that particular trend.  Since it is essentially showing off how moral we are, virtue signalling is a form of hypocrisy.  The primary motive is to improve your standing with your in-group.

Okay... let’s forget about the Coles Group.  The risk is certainly there that this is being done just to increase their share of supermarket revenue by showing customers how concerned they are for indigenous issues.  But it’s not my job to work out if the Coles Group is sincere or being hypocritical.  I have a different concern – and that’s our preoccupation with Social Media where virtue signalling is rampant.  Someone has said that Social Media provides virtue signalling with a megaphone.

I periodically get asked by my Facebook contacts to share items of social concern.  Sometimes they are on topics that are not a personal priority for me but I could easily agree to their request, share their post with my contacts and be seen as a wonderfully supportive sort of fellow.  There are dozens of causes on Social Media that friends expect us to ‘like’ or share.  And the problem is that so often these are posts that just deal with one aspect of complex social issues that really need lengthy discussion rather than just another ‘like’.

It’s worth keeping in mind that in the Bible Jesus had to deal with virtue signalling too.  The Pharisees of Jesus’ day were experts at it.  They prayed long prayers on street corners so they would be thought of as especially pious.  Their giving to charity was well publicised so that everyone would praise them for their generosity.  Even their fasting was a very public affair so that they would be seen as ever so religious.  But Jesus called them out.  Hypocrites – is what he named them.  Some of his most severe words were directed at this kind of hypocrisy.  Jesus compared the Pharisees to whitewashed tombs – nice on the outside – but inside, full of dead men’s bones.

We should add that it’s all too easy to condemn virtue signalling and the attitude of the Pharisee when we see it alive and well in our community today.  However, what about the sinful tendency of our own hearts?  In this fallen world our default option is always to try to make ourselves look a little better than we really are.  A little more generous...!  A little more compassionate...!  A little more spiritual...!  We need Jesus to change us so that we do our good deeds and develop good attitudes without having to tell the rest of the world about it on Social Media.  As Jesus said, “Your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

And a disclaimer to end with?!?  Yes, I agree – my regular Blogs could easily be seen in terms of virtue signalling – me trying to make a good impression on my readers...!  Well, I guess I’ll just have to let the Lord be the judge of that.

John Westendorp
2MaxFM – Sunday October 20th 2024

 

 

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