conuly

At any rate, this isn't actually the topic I meant to be on, and I didn't mean to offend you (or anybody) or even judge anybody. I just meant to ask why many people don't know about their choices, not why anybody deliberately makes a choice they do.

People have built up activities like washing cloth pads, or soaking beans, or baking cake, or (I'm trying to think of things I've done recently, you understand, so I can compare them properly to my pre-existing conceptions) making play-dough into tasks of Sisyphean proportions! So they aren't making a fair decision because they don't really understand how hard this or that is - they just think they do, without even trying it. Or they don't know how to do it at all, so they assume it must be difficult - if it wasn't, everybody would know how!

And you can't make a choice if you don't know you have a choice, right?

You choose to use canned beans because you know planning meals in advance enough to soak beans isn't going to work for you. People without that problem, however, might choose to use canned beans because "Wow, soaking beans is hard" (which I've actually seen written, though usually in more words), and it's really a minimum of effort. Their choice is based on a misconception, instead of something they know about themselves.

And I like people to have choices. Choices are good things, even if you ultimately choose something just the opposite of what I would choose.