Additionally every change costs energy and (as you well mentioned) colours itself with a perception of potential/real/invented risk. This risk is the straw we all grab to excuse ourselves why we are not acting the way we know we should.
If you look at the real world these risks get even invented on the fly (e.g. if we were to accept that immidiately $badthing would happen), so using the terms of the author: We can invent new crony believes with the purpose of protecting other (bigger) crony believes.
If you think about conspiracy nuts, their drama lies exactly in the flexibility. Their core crony believe isn't e.g. that the earth is flat or that reptilians control politics, but a deeper underlying believe that something is wrong. Which is why they often switch out their myths like other people change their clothes.
If you look at the real world these risks get even invented on the fly (e.g. if we were to accept that immidiately $badthing would happen), so using the terms of the author: We can invent new crony believes with the purpose of protecting other (bigger) crony believes.
If you think about conspiracy nuts, their drama lies exactly in the flexibility. Their core crony believe isn't e.g. that the earth is flat or that reptilians control politics, but a deeper underlying believe that something is wrong. Which is why they often switch out their myths like other people change their clothes.