Conservatives believe in GOD.
Liberals believe in Santa Claus.
Great article. I think he’s right.
Why Unhappy People Become Liberals.Some people just flat out love pity.
Great article, thanks for posting it.
Sometimes I can take the shorthand the liberalism is a mental disorder, but that groups a lot of people in who probably shouldn’t be. A lot of liberals haven’t thought very deeply about their positions, but is seems to be nearly a passive outlook of “Who would be against the government helping poor people? That sounds like a good thing to me...” or “I don’t know...why can’t healthcare be free? Shouldn’t everyone get free healthcare?”
It is the committed liberals, the ones who have labored hard and long to build their own “logical underpinnings” to their viewpoints. They never stop to check their intial premises, and build a huge castle on the foundation of a flawed premise.
Cognitive dissonance is a common malady amongst committed liberals, and I have always thought it is because many of them ARE indeed intelligent, and there is still a part of their primitive hindbrain that operates below their subconscious, constantly and continually sending subtle signals to their conscious brain that they are wrong. Their filters to their conscious brains are set up to ward those warning messages off, but I think it is like a continuous, erosive Chinese water torture that gives them ulcers, bilious personalities and a constant state of unhappiness.
I notice a lot of people who have worked in industries that are noted for low-pay and rough working conditions (retail, local radio, etc.) tend to become Liberals. They develop a deep-seated hatred for “greedy” bosses, and an overwhelming consumption with seeing them “punished”.
Liberals are lured into their cult by guilt or some claim to esoteric knowledge and then kept there by fear, and usually it involves the “Hitler card.” Doubt that go to any lefty site where there might be debate about internal cult politics, the “Hitler card” is never far from use.
Liberals seek to avoid their difficulties or mitigate their effects without facing them head-on, hence using pity as a tool for protection.
Love to a liberal is often means someone who can take away the pain and protect them like Daddy and Mommy.
Alas, this is why so many liberals don't want kids. They don't want to face the pain and be the protectors, the earners and producers for others.
Miserable people are only happy when they are surrounded by other miserable people.
Two principles: Give and Get
The conservative is more likely to give; the liberal is more likely concerned with getting.
It is more blessed to give than to receive - scriptural, I believe.
Prager makes many good points. I’d like to say that TV is the number one culprit for making people into liberals. TV is where the majority of people get their liberalism — the more educated will get it from the university. The less educated will get it from watching liberal shows on TV or almost anything from Hollywood. TV is a one way stream of information that wants you to react emotionally. Therefore, Hollywood, the news, commercials, TV shows, etc., are experts at manipulating your emotions, manipulating how you feel. Liberalism is about feeling “good.” To be fair, religious programs also manipulate feeling. And liberalism does have similarities with religion: both can be very idealistic. But with liberalism there is very little encouragement to think about the issues — most of the issues are presented prepackaged and the public is suppose to accept and react. It activism is its missionary work.
This has been going on for some time but I think the 60s were pivotal in pushing liberal values and the importance of feeling: pop & rock music were the first big public educators. We’ve been trained to feel. The 60s liberal values were in the “air” and spread everywhere, even to future generations of people.
Today the Tea Party want fiscal conservatism but are they socially conservative? Many aren’t, but the national debt factor mitigates their liberalism. In other words, they too have been watching TV all their lives but something is working against it’s influence: common sense.
Liberalism is also a big escape if you have nothing to loss — the person working in a sh*t job thinks he is equal to and should have the same as Brad Pitt. Life is unjust and the government handout is a paltry recompense for the great injustice of not being Brad Pitt. Where did he get that idea that we should all be equal? Television. Most desperate people buy lottery tickets and vote democrat. But the liberal “feels” he is being moral if he gives government permission to give handouts to the desperate guy who “feels” the injustice of not being Brad Pitt. One is a fool and the other is a desperate fool — but the ultimate root of the foolishness is liberalism.
I’ve noticed that a common characteristic among liberals I know is jealousy. My neighbor was so upset that another neighbor, a retired cop, was going to be a teacher. She felt it was unfair that he would get 2 pensions when he retired from teaching.
Recently, a researcher announced the discovery of a “liberal” gene: people who have it and were very social adolescents tend to be liberal. The researcher (a probable liberal) called it an “open-minded” gene, because liberals are so accepting of alternate life-styles and so forth. I would call it something else—a gullibility gene, maybe, since liberals seem to fall for any hair-brained scheme.
While I don’t think that genetics holds the entire answer, I do think that it plays a part. Also, since liberalism is a multi-faceted belief and behavior system, I think that other genes will be identified that also influence people to become liberals.
Identifying the genes is the first step towards finding a treatment.
[C]onservatives on the same socioeconomic level as liberals give more charity and volunteer more time than do liberals. And as regards the suffering of non-Americans, for at least half a century conservatives have been far more willing to sacrifice American treasure and American blood (often their own) for other nations’ liberty.
Happier people are more generous...hmm. Too common-sensical for the academy?
Utopians will always be less happy than those who know that suffering is inherent to human existence. The utopian compares America to utopia and finds it terribly wanting. The conservative compares America to every other civilization that has ever existed and walks around wondering how he got so lucky as to be born or naturalized an American.
bump
I remember some older liberals in college telling me that if you were truly intelligent, then OF COURSE you would have to be depressed, with all your knowledge of the suffering in the world. I disagreed with this, saying that to depress and stymie yourself with the sad parts of the world would keep you from being one of the positive influences in the world, and they all thought I was an idiot.
Another interesting thing is to ask a liberal atheist why he does not believe in G-d. He will tell you that it’s because there is evil, or suffering, or bad in the world, so HOW COULD THERE BE A G-D??? There could not be a G-d because children die. Etc.
Think of how stupid that is. There cannot be an omnipresent omnipowerful Creator because obviously He is not Santa Claus??? Or a magical fairy who does everything you wish??
What kind of argument is that? A human father is benevolent; no one loves his child more than he. And yet even a Dad cannot save his son from that car accident, or cancer. A Divine Creator has obviously created a very complex universe. Just because we are not sappily happy all the time is no reason to say that WE are the most powerful forces in this universe, that there could be no loving creator at all.
misery loves company.