The mind of the "anointed"

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The mind of the “anointed”

The following is from Thomas Sowell. Ever wonder why? pp. 9 -11.

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“Us” or “Them”

A reader recently sent me an e-mail about a woman he had met and fallen for. Apparently the attraction was mutual—until one fateful day the subject of the environment came up.

She was absolutely opposed to any drilling for oil in Alaska, on grounds of what harm she said it would do to the environment.

He argued that, since oil was going to be drilled for somewhere in the world anyway, was it not better to drill where there were environmental laws to provide at least some kinds of safeguards, rather than in countries where there were none?

That was the end of a beautiful relationship.

Environmentalist true believers don't think in terms of trade-offs and cost-benefit analysis. There are things that are sacred to them. Trying to get them to compromise on those things would be like trying to convince a Muslim to eat pork, if it was only twice a week.

Compromise and tolerance are not the hallmarks of true believers. What they believe in goes to the heart of what they are. As far as true believers are concerned, you are either one of Us or one of Them.

The man apparently thought that it was just a question of which policy would produce which results. But many issues that look on the surface like they are just about which alternative would best serve the general public are really about being one of Us or one of Them—and this woman was not about to become one of Them.

Many crusades of the political left have been misunderstood by people who do not realize that these crusades are about establishing the identity and the superiority of the crusaders.

T.S. Eliot understood this more than half a century ago when he wrote: "Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm—but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves."

In this case, the man thought he was asking the woman to accept a certain policy as the lesser of two evils, when in fact he was asking her to give up her sense of being one of the morally anointed.

This is not unique to our times or to environmentalists. Back during the 1930s, in the years leading up to World War II, one of the fashionable self-indulgences of the left in Britain was to argue that the British should disarm "as an example to others" in order to serve the interests of peace.

When economist Roy Harrod asked one of his friends whether she thought that disarming Britain would cause Hitler to disarm, her reply was: "Oh, Roy, have you lost all your idealism?"

In other words, it was not really about which policy would produce what results. It was about personal identification with lofty goals and kindred souls.

The ostensible goal of peace was window-dressing. Ultimately it was not a question whether arming or disarming Britain was more likely to deter Hitler. It was a question of which policy would best establish the moral superiority of the anointed and solidify their identification with one another.

"Peace" movements are not judged by the empirical test of how often they actually produce peace or how often their disarmament tempts an aggressor into war. It is not an empirical question. It is an article of faith and a badge of identity.

Yasser Arafat was awarded the Nobel Prize for peace—not for actually producing peace but for being part of what was called "the peace process" in the Middle East, based on fashionable notions that were common bonds among members of what are called "peace movements" around the world.

Meanwhile, nobody suggested awarding a Nobel Prize for peace to Ronald Reagan, just because he brought the nuclear dangers of a decades-long cold war to an end. He did it the opposite way from how members of "peace movements" thought it should be done.

Reagan beefed up the military and entered into an "arm race" that he knew would bankrupt the Soviet Union if they didn't back off, even though arms races are anathema to members of "peace movements."

The fact that events proved him right was no excuse, a far as members of "peace movements" were concerned. A far as they were concerned, he was not one of Us. He was one of Them.

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Leftist ideology is analogous to a religion with its assumptions, beliefs, values, virtues and sins and people of liberal outlook are slaves of these assumptions, values, and outlooks just as a religious people may be slaves of their moral views. Instead of looking at things in a rational way of simply considering the pros and cons of various possible options and choosing the best option they view many options as sins and outside consideration much as a Moslem considers eating pork as off-limits and a Christian considers murder as off-limits. Thus in the 1930s many intellectuals in Britain viewed war as wrong and off-limits while meanwhile Hitler was pushing Germany full speed ahead building up a great war machine with the intent of conquering Europe. These antiwar intellectuals viewed themselves as a morally superior elite operating from a higher moral plane than others. Their much reading and mental sophistries had annihilated their common sense.

16 May 2024