Ideology, ignorance and absolutism

Ideology is one of the often misused words in political conversations. This isn’t surprising considering most political conversations are riddled with words that have more attachment to emotion than meaning. However, if you want to improve your political word power, sound smarter than your adversary and win the admiration of neighbors and friends, knowing what the words mean helps.

While the popular meaning of ideology has drifted to describing any set of ideas that guide one’s actions, it is, in its most original meaning a political word. Like the terms right and left wing, ideology is a product of the French Revolution. It describes knowing the conclusions of a political philosophy without knowing the truths, observations and justifications used to arrive at those conclusions. Ideology is a political philosophy that is, to a significant degree, stripped of epistemology, yet is still used to guide one's actions.

Because ideology is a reduction of a philosophical conclusion, it is, naturally, more accessible to people whose political minds have less capacity for, or interest in, the complexities of philosophy. When a situation arises that doesn't neatly fit into their understanding, their ignorance of idea construction can lead to bizarre interpretations and prescriptions. The problem with ideology isn’t in having one as a belief, though; it’s when that belief is expressed as an absolute.

Within the realm of reason absolutes are dead end roads. Those who hold to absolutes are denying reason its proper function, as no mind can conceive every possible scenario that might arise from the application of an idea. However, absolutism is comforting to the least intelligent among us, as it requires only a single thought.

So ideology invites, but does not insist that ignorant people participate. But they do, and often in great numbers, as excited ignorance tends to feed on its own set of delusions. Once established as a political movement it never ends due to voluntary agreement among the adherents. Even if it accomplishes the original objective, the goal is never as motivating as the mass self-induced excitement that becomes the new, self-justifying end. Radical ideological movements either destroy themselves or everything around them. The only question is which comes first.

How political philosophy devolves into radicalism

I will use a microwave oven analogy to describe how an ideology can devolve into radicalism for two reasons. First, it’s far easier to understand the concept when it’s based on something everyone knows well enough. Secondly , because anyone who knows me realizes I would never disparage somebody’s political beliefs or wish the powers-that-be declare a universal sarcasm font (just a suggestion...).

The philosophy of this analogy is Electrism. While few, I included, have a deep understanding of why electricity performs as it does, I’ll declare the a priori, foundational truths of this philosophy to be hot, neutral and ground (a version of our life, liberty and pursuit of happiness), represented in most house wiring as the black, white and green wires. Most people have an ideological understanding of Electrism, knowing only that when you put the plug into the socket, it makes your microwave work.

After further pondering, his ideological understanding leads him to believe that if a microwave can heat a cup of water in 2 minutes, by turning the plug over it will make ice in the same amount of time. He is sure it can be done and is the only way to make the oven serve its proper, safe purpose. He feels as if he is on the verge of a great discovery that will revolutionize microwave oven technology. He’s convinced his logic is clear, and he is grateful that others haven’t discovered this simple concept. He imagines the glory of being held in the same esteem as Edison, or receiving a Nobel Prize.

But a 3-pronged plug can’t simply be turned over and stuck into a common household socket. He cuts the oven’s wires, strips the insulation and reverses the hot and neutral, wraps it with black tape and plugs it in. He puts a cup of water on the turntable, punches the button and...makes hot water in 2 minutes. He wonders how this can be. After all, his logic is firm. It should work as his calculations described. It must be that some nefarious influence is working against him.

His ideology has made him an absolutist, therefore an ideologue.

He decides to pursue a deeper understanding. He Googles “electricity” and begins looking for this dark influence. He reads a how-to article on jumpstarting a car. He notices that in that explanation, the hot wire is called “positive” and the neutral is "negative." Of course! Negative! That explains why his theory didn’t produce the positive results his calculation promised. Why was the media hiding this truth? He tells a few of his friends about his theory, but they dismiss his ideas as absurd. “What can one expect,” he thinks, “from the Negatarians!”

The ideologue always justifies his beliefs by imagining his "adversary" is his mirror image.

He continues to devolve...

The newly minted Positarian again strips the wires, but this time he caps the neutral, “Negatarian” wire, substituting the ground wire in its place. He plugs it back in, puts the cup of water on the turntable and punches the button. The oven hums and buzzes, but the water doesn’t turn into ice, nor does it get hot! The turntable doesn’t even spin! How could this be? His theory is well “grounded,” he surmises, so it must be yet another dark influence at work.

He performs additional research, this time focused on the microwave oven. What he reads about the magnetron is a bit beyond his ability to understand, but he notices that the turntable is operated by a small electric motor, so he decides to study that. He reads that an electric motor has a stator and a commutator. Ah-ha! Of course! Now he’s not only smarter, he’s getting downright angry! It’s not just the dark influence of the Negatarians, it’s also Statorism and Commutism!

Thus he becomes a fanatic (and a libertarian).

But what can be done? How does one get around the nefarious influences of the Negatarian Statorist Commutists? He can’t do this alone, so he starts a website. To his great relief he discovers he’s not the only one who has been unfairly injured by a bag of popcorn. Others are also seeking an answer to the “handling temperature” dilemma, and now they look to him as a leader.

His followers praise him for his knowledge, and for exposing the conspiracy of the Statorist Commutist Negatarians. Just as he blames nefarious external forces for the conspiracy to turn America into a nation of singed-knuckle slaves, he decides that certainly God is on the side of the Positarian cause. After all, burn=fire=hell=Satan=Negatarianism.

His following grows as the word spreads about the very real (but imaginary) enemies of the safe, sane microwavism of God and the Founders (these knuckle-singed faithful are, after all, not the brightest bulbs in the oven). He is given an AM radio show to advance his theories and explain to the Positarians what they, as a group of like-minded individualists, should do.

Soon they all speak with one voice, reciting the slogan of the revolution:

“We must put to an end, once and for all, to the dangerous Burnialism of the Statorist Commutist Negatraians! Our very lives and the future of America as a great nation depend on it!”

The Negatarians must be converted, marginalized or eliminated!

Now he and his followers have become radicals.

And he gets a show on Fox.

Popcorn photo -- grantlairdjr

Beck -Fox News

All others - Wikipedia