Want to drive a right winger insane? Adams, Jefferson, Madison and Paine on religion

[lib_wit_it]

29. We've known this for a while via the RW Authoritarian Follower theory. Those who aren't familiar

with the concept can google it and find some pretty decent explanations. What they won't find, at least I haven't found, is how to deal with these people.

If you can't reach someone with facts, then what? Actually, Fox has shown that you deal with them through fear and anger mongering. But how does that help us in the cause of getting the RWAFs to come to their senses and accept reality?

My fear is that they are lost to the world of reason and more and more people seem to be getting sucked into the void.

Authoritarian followers (Right Wing Authoritarians/RWAs) Excerpt

Once someone becomes a leader of the high RWAs' in-group, he can lie with impunity about the out-groups, himself, whatever, because he knows the followers will seldom check on what he says, nor will they expose themselves to people who set the record straight. Furthermore they will not believe the truth if they somehow get exposed to it, and if the distortions become absolutely undeniable, they will rationalize it away and put it in a box. If the scoundrel's duplicity and hypocrisy lands him on the front page of every daily in the country, the followers will still forgive him if he just says the right things. [Book 2006] The Authoritarians” by Bob Altemeyer p.100

And while most Americans came to realize what a mistake the war in Iraq has turned out to be, high RWAs lagged far behind. They listen to the news they want to hear. They surround themselves with people who think like they do. They believe the leaders who tell them what they want to be told. They make about as much effort to get both sides of an issue as the Bush administration does to foster different points of view within the White House. And if six high RWAs are sitting in a room talking about the war, and all six now have misgivings, it will still be hard for any of them to say so because the ethic of group solidarity is so strong in the authoritarian mind.

Is there any conceivable evidence or revelation that will lead them to admit the war was a mistake? I suspect some of them will eventually, begrudgingly reach that point, and others will rewrite their personal histories and say they had their doubts from the start. But others, petrified by their dogmatism, will never admit the undeniable. [Book 2006] The Authoritarians” by Bob Altemeyer p.99

It's easy to see why authoritarian followers would be dogmatic, isn't it? When you haven't figured out your beliefs, but instead absorbed them from other people, you're really in no position to defend them from attack. Simply put. you don 't know why the things you believe are true. Somebody else decided they were, and you're taking their word for it. So what do you do when challenged?

Well first of all you avoid challenges by sticking with your own kind as much as possible, because they're hardly likely to ask pointed questions about your beliefs. But if you meet someone who does, you'll probably defend your ideas as best you can, parrying thrusts with whatever answers your authorities have pre-loaded into your head. If these defenses crumble, you may go back to the trusted sources. They probably don't have to give you a convincing refutation of the anxiety-producing argument that breached your defenses, just the assurance that you nonetheless are right. But if the arguments against you become overwhelming and persistent, you either concede the point—which may put the whole lot at risk—or you simply insist you are right and walk away, clutching your beliefs more tightly than ever.

That's what authoritarian followers tend to do. And let's face it, it's an awfully easy stand to take. You have to know a lot nowadays to stake out an intelligent, defendable position on many issues. But you don't have to know anything to insist you're right, no matter what. Dogmatism is by far the best fall-back defense, the most impregnable castle, that ignorance can find. It's also a dead give-away that the person doesn't know why he believes what he believes. [Book 2006] The Authoritarians” by Bob Altemeyer p.93

The full article: http://www.whale.to/b/authoritarian_followers.html

Two other good articles describing the concept:
An Analysis of the Right-Wing Authoritarian Follower (RWA): Insight into the Tea Party and Congressional Gridlock[100*7]
http://myesoteric.hubpages.com/hub/An-Analysis-of-the-Right-Wing-Authoritarian-Follower-RWA

and

The Right-Wing Id Unzipped: Excerpt

Here again we see the paradoxical nature of the authoritarian personality: rebelling against authority while hungering for it - exactly as the contemporary right wing fancies it is rebelling against big government while calling for intrusive social legislation and militarism. In the midst of dire economic circumstances, why do they expend inordinate energy brooding over contraception, abortion, abstinence education, gay marriage and so forth and attempt to transform their obsessions into law? Reich said:

The formation of the authoritarian structure takes place through the anchoring of sexual inhibition and sexual anxiety.... The result of this process is fear of freedom and a conservative, reactionary mentality. Sexual repression aids political reaction not only through this process which makes the mass individual passive and unpolitical but also by creating in his structure an interest in actively supporting the authoritarian order. The suppression of natural sexual gratification leads to various kinds of substitute gratifications. Natural aggression, for example, becomes brutal sadism which then is an essential mass-psychological factor in imperialistic wars.

http://www.truth-out.org/right-wing-id-unzipped/1329147417