Monday, September 15

Psychology of the Republican right

This is from a fascinating post attributed to Deepak Chopra:
[Gov. Palin] is the reverse of Barack Obama, in essence his shadow, deriding his idealism and exhorting people to obey their worst impulses. In psychological terms the shadow is that part of the psyche that hides out of sight, countering our aspirations, virtue, and vision with qualities we are ashamed to face: anger, fear, revenge, violence, selfishness, and suspicion of “the other.” For millions of Americans, Obama triggers those feelings, but they don’t want to express them. He is calling for us to reach for our higher selves, and frankly, that stirs up hidden reactions of an unsavory kind.
He goes on to outline the psychology of the Republican platform in a way I'd never considered before:
–Small town values — a denial of America’s global role, a return to petty, small-minded parochialism.
–Ignorance of world affairs — a repudiation of the need to repair America’s image abroad.
–Family values — a code for walling out anybody who makes a claim for social justice. Such strangers, being outside the family, don’t need to be heeded.
–Rigid stands on guns and abortion — a scornful repudiation that these issues can be negotiated with those who disagree.
–Patriotism — the usual fallback in a failed war.
–”Reform” — an italicized term, since in addition to cleaning out corruption and excessive spending, one also throws out anyone who doesn’t fit your ideology.
I hadn't thought of it quite in these terms before, but his words do ring very strongly true. Is this my admittedly-liberal own bias tinging it with what I want to hear? Or is Dr. Chopra's thesis accurate?

Thanks to Aunt L in Reno for the link!

1 comment:

  1. You are welcome...knowledge is power and the more we can disperse anti-lunacy the better off we'll be. Deepak's think piece was excellent! And I was happy to see Gloria voice her concerns. You're right, Greg, Sarah is just an attractive diversion. Back to the basics, Obama vs McCain....forget the bits and bites.

    VOTE DEMOCRATIC! And rid the world of bigots, nimbys and short sided, selfish, parochial conservatives!

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