I was taught growing up that everyone is a good guy in their own mind, and there’s almost always some common ground you can use to appeal to their basic human nature- some core, absolute basic values that everyone shares to some degree.
Considering yourself “the good guy” doesn’t mean everyone has basic values that they all share and can be appealed to. Some people consider themselves “good guys” regardless of what they do. It’s a sense of being good rather than doing good. It is also extended to their in-group. So if a pastor is caught in an affair, “he’s a good man of god and that jezebel must have seduced him!” but if a black man with a gun stopped an active shooter, the same person might possibly say, “he was probably there to rob the place.” If a “good guy” does something objectively wrong, he and his in-group can call it a bad day or a poor decision or a blm/antifa crisis actor false flag conspiracy to defame a good person.
