When people feel they have been morally virtuous by saving the planet through their purchases of organic baby food, for example, it leads to the licensing of selfish and morally questionable behavior, otherwise known as moral balancing or compensatory ethics.

Those in their study who bought green products appeared less willing to share with others a set amount of money than those who bought conventional products. When the green consumers were given the chance to boost their money by cheating on a computer game and then given the opportunity to lie about it — in other words, steal — they did, while the conventional consumers did not. Later, in an honor system in which participants were asked to take money from an envelope to pay themselves their spoils, the greens were six times more likely to steal than the conventionals.

It’s entirely possible this is because they must do so or starve, but the phenomenon is definitely noticeable.

One of Moldbug’s claims is that communism is basically an anglo phenomenon that was exported abroad; he uses the analogy of a disease that is more severe in populations without some inherent resistance, but populations with inherent resistance have it because the disease is constantly present at some level, while those without have some hope of getting rid of it. I don’t know that I’m convinced of that — the relationship between Slavic villages and the village commons is rather different from the Anglo one, and deriving a partly communist inherent outlook from that isn’t impossible — but Moldbug is always worth at least thinking about.