Reply #91: That's more or less my take on it, too

[Lydia Leftcoast]

I've inferred things about the backgrounds of the regulars in R/T, especially the cases in which they obviously grew up with toxic forms of religion, but if you say that they're reflecting their backgrounds, they'll jump down your throat.

My (atheist) clinical social worker friend refers to such people as "black and white thinkers." If they find weaknesses in some position that they once held, suddenly it's all bad.

The first generation of neocons, most of whom were Communists in their youth, would be prime examples. Khrushchev denounced Stalin, and oops, they had to become hard-right conservatives, as if there was nothing in between Stalinism and McCarthyism.