I think, for the people who criticize, it is a way for them to subconsciously recognize the behaviors they are guilty of themselves and hoping others do not adopt these same weaknesses. Personally the hardest thing to do is to introspectively deal with my own weaknesses and change them consciously; I think people know me better than I know myself! So in this way while these people don't recognize that these are weaknesses they suffer from themselves, it is a way of demonstrating how much they care about others than they do about themselves.
Some people, parents for instance, put improvement of others ahead of themselves because they care about the welfare of others and how they turn out instead of improving themselves. More.
I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.