Things we are conditioned to simply accept

I have written previously in this blog about the interesting psychological phenomenon that can be seen in many YouTube videos, especially those recorded in the United States (but in no way restricted to that country), where people will come to the YouTuber, who is recording with a camera in his hand in some public place, and question him about it, sometimes quite aggressively so, telling him that he has no permission to record them, and sometimes even alleging that it's outright illegal to do so. Some people may get so utterly upset about it that they become outright aggressive and even physical, and may outright attack the person, who is doing nothing more than standing in a public place with a camera in his hand. Sometimes the police is called (and especially in America it varies a lot what the police does, but quite often if the guy is just standing on a traditional public forum, like a sidewalk or a public park, they don't do anything, because that's clearly not illegal.)

What makes this particularly interesting is that these exact same people, who are so concerned about some guy holding a camera in his hand, have literally no concerns whatsoever about cameras that are attached to walls, poles or ceilings, or even cameras that may be inside the windshields and rear windows of cars parked nearby. This even in situations where they have absolutely no idea who those cameras belong to, or where that footage is going.

Indeed, it makes all the difference in the world whether the camera is being held by a person, or whether it's attached to the scenery, like a wall or a pole. The former is considered highly concerning, the latter is not considered concerning at all, even though the situation is pretty much exactly the same, the only difference being where the camera is attached to.

The modern society, at large, has been psychologically conditioned into just accepting "security" cameras. And we have been conditioned to think that all cameras attached to structures are "security" cameras. We don't question it, we don't scrutinize it, we don't become wary of it, most of us don't even pay attention to it. Even if we happen to notice the camera, we just accept it and dismiss it. Even the very same people who become extremely agitated and angry when someone is recording with camera in hand do not question nor are apprehensive about these "security" cameras, even though they have absolutely no idea who they belong to.

I find this an interesting psychological phenomenon. It's not really intentional conscious conditioning by someone (like eg. the government). It just happens automatically on its own, by us merely being surrounded by cameras everywhere. We stop questioning their existence. We learn to just accept them.

I have noticed another example of something that we have been conditioned to just accept and not question: People with high visibility vests being in suspicious places.

If we see someone somewhere unusual, where they shouldn't really normally be without permission, like inside an building under construction, or some warehouse, or train tracks, trying to open a locked door to somewhere where normally people don't have access to, and so on and so forth, if that person is wearing normal everyday clothes, or some kind of hoodie, or anything suspicious, we may notice and become suspicious about it, and start wondering if that person is actually permitted to be there or whether it might be some perp who is trespassing and eg. trying to steal or sabotage something.

However, if the person is wearing a high visibility vest, we just don't question it. We immediately and automatically assume that it's worker who has permission to be there and is there for legit business.

As far as I know, burglars and other criminals sometimes actually use this psychological phenomenon to their advantage by carrying such a vest with them and putting it on when going somewhere where they shouldn't be, in order to draw suspicion away from themselves. They rely on this conditioning that the vast majority of people have to just assume that it's a legit worker, based only and solely on him wearing the high visibility vest.