Into the Woods

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While doing some reading on “Moral Foundations Theory,” I came across this on-line test for “moral foundations.” I answered 36 sly and somewhat troubling questions, and the test identified me quite correctly as “left liberal.”

The test attempts to measure the relative strength of your “moral foundations” in six categories:

Care
Fairness
Loyalty
Authority
Purity
Liberty

As a liberal, I tested high on Care and Fairness, and lower on Authority, Liberty, and Purity.

Authority? As a liberal and as a heretic, it blows my mind that anyone would see deference to authority as a moral virtue. And though I value liberty, as a liberal I would be greatly offended if liberty trumps, say, fairness. I believe I would prefer the word justice to fairness, however. Still, because I like John Rawls’ approach to justice — justice as fairness — either word will do.

I have to suppose that conservative minds are willing to knowingly tolerate injustice — or at least a certain level of injustice — to preserve authority. I further suppose that a libertarian is willing to tolerate injustice or un-caring (think unfed children, or old people without medical care) to preserve their individual liberty. As for purity, who cares? Purity might be nice if it’s costless, but as a liberal I can’t think of any good thing that I’d sacrifice to purity.

Though according to the Myers-Briggs test I am a perceiving type, not a judging type, I nevertheless judge the living daylights out of both conservatives and libertarians. In particular, I abhor arbitrary authority. And though loyalty and liberty are positive values to me, I would be contemptuous of anyone who would put loyalty and liberty ahead of justice and caring. Unfortunately, this comes up in politics all the time.

In my world, conservatives and libertarians aren’t just inclined to ugly politics. They are morally confused.

This showed up in my Facebook feed with the words, “Powerful photo. We are fortunate to have a man of God back in the Oval Office.”

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I regularly check the logs for this blog. It’s gratifying that many of the blog’s regular readers are outside the U.S., particularly in Europe. In addition to regular readers, there are lots of one-time visits from people who are Googling for some subject or another. For example, my post on the expiration of copyrights for Peter Rabbit is very popular internationally, as are my posts on the Nikon Model S microscope and the repair of classic Peerless speakers.

Though the blog’s firewall log shows that the majority of hacker attacks come from Russia (surprise, surprise), I don’t get many actual readers from Russia. When, a few days ago, the logs showed a reader in Moscow, I naturally checked to see which post the Moscow reader came here for. Interestingly, the post was one of my more prescient political posts, “The ability (and inability) to judge character.”

It happens that I’m about halfway through the 2015 book How Propaganda Works, by Jason Stanley. I’ll have a post on that book later. But one point that stands out from How Propaganda Works is that a key factor that makes people susceptible to propaganda is flawed ideology. I’ll save Stanley’s arguments on flawed ideology for another day. For now, I’d only like to point out what an incredibly dangerous combination this is:

Flawed ideology
The inability to judge character

If we put racism, primitive religion and Republican politics into the category of flawed ideology, and if we combine that with the right-wing propaganda of the last few years and the candidate the propagandists were pushing, then we’ve got a strong framework for understanding this country’s downward spiral into fascism. One of the things I hear constantly from those who don’t subscribe to flawed right-wing ideology and who do have the ability to judge character is (talking about Trump and those who voted for him), “How can they not see through him?” It’s no mystery that they can’t see through him if you keep in mind the deadly combination of flawed ideology and the inability to judge character.

There is an interesting piece by Eliot A. Cohen in this month’s Atlantic, “A Clarifying Moment in American History.” One of the things that Cohen says is, “[Trump] will fail most of all because at the end of the day most Americans, including most of those who voted for him, are decent people who have no desire to live in an American version of Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey, or Viktor Orban’s Hungary, or Vladimir Putin’s Russia.”

I beg to differ. I am increasingly irked at being told that we should reach out to Trump voters and try to understand them. What is it that we need to understand about their flawed ideology? We already understand their flawed ideology quite well. What is it that we need to understand about their incomprehensible inability to judge character? Even their most famous preachers tell them that Trump is a man of God whom God has sent to save America. I’m afraid my ideology doesn’t provide a way to square that godliness with all that hatred and the finger photos.

Anyone who has sunk that low, I am increasingly convinced, has forfeited the right to be called decent. Not only did they vote for Trump, but many of them did it with a kind of spiteful glee and vindictiveness (as is communicated by the finger photos). I will never forget that. Unless someone with a more tolerant ideology than mine can convince me that my view is flawed, then my view is that anyone who voted for Trump is not a decent person. In aggregate, they are dangerous. They will get nothing from me in the future other than as much distance as I can muster, a bare minimum of civility, and only the most basic support for their human rights and justice. That is far more than they themselves accord to the people they don’t like. Also, justice cuts both ways. Trump voters have to be held responsible for what they’ve done, once we’ve emerged from the ashes of the coming calamity. Certainly, I would cut some slack for those who ultimately do see through Trump and who ask for some forgiveness for what they’ve done. I doubt that many will be in that category, though.

Of course I have no idea why someone in Moscow would want to read my post on the inability to judge character. However, I can think of two basic reasons: 1. Someone in Moscow is wondering what the hell is wrong with Americans. Or, 2. Someone in Moscow is working on a better understanding of how to deceive Americans with propaganda.

Which do you suppose is more likely?

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Below, the log showing the reader from Moscow

Zack Galifianakis in a scene from the documentary, with one of our locals who lives near a coal-ash impoundment

Readers of this blog know that I love to shoot photos at grassroots political events here in the rural South. It’s a chance to do some casual portraiture — which I love. I also see the photos as essays on progressive and First Amendment activism here in Trump country.

The event was the showing of a new documentary narrated by Zack Galifianakis, “Democracy for Sale.” The documentary is about the right-wing takeover of North Carolina after a flood of outside money bought our state legislature. The 2010 redistricting then gerrymandered these right-wing radicals into their seats. They will be hard to dislodge. But drawing attention to what right-wingers are doing and have done in North Carolina is part of the process. The infamous “bathroom bill,” which almost certainly is what caused the odious Republican governor Pat McCrory to lose his seat, is only a small part of the damage being done to North Carolina by right-wing radicals.

In this documentary, narrator Zack Galifianakis visits our county, which has gotten itself on the map for its fight for environmental justice. “Democracy for Sale” is available for streaming at Hulu, Amazon, and other streaming services.

One thing I always notice among progressives is the kindness and concern in their faces — very different from the pinched, angry, spiteful looks of authoritarian types.