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In reply to the discussion: In an online context, "conspiracy lust" is a lot like blood lust. [View all]MicaelS
(8,747 posts)41. The Paranoid Style in American Politics by Richard Hofstadter
I think that classic essay explains American thought better than any other. It may have been written 50 years ago, but it is still relevant today. And today it applies equally to the Left as well as the Right.
http://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/
The paranoid spokesman sees the fate of conspiracy in apocalyptic termshe traffics in the birth and death of whole worlds, whole political orders, whole systems of human values. He is always manning the barricades of civilization. He constantly lives at a turning point.
One of the impressive things about paranoid literature is the contrast between its fantasied conclusions and the almost touching concern with factuality it invariably shows. It produces heroic strivings for evidence to prove that the unbelievable is the only thing that can be believed. Of course, there are highbrow, lowbrow, and middlebrow paranoids, as there are likely to be in any political tendency. But respectable paranoid literature not only starts from certain moral commitments that can indeed be justified but also carefully and all but obsessively accumulates evidence. The difference between this evidence and that commonly employed by others is that it seems less a means of entering into normal political controversy than a means of warding off the profane intrusion of the secular political world. The paranoid seems to have little expectation of actually convincing a hostile world, but he can accumulate evidence in order to protect his cherished convictions from it.
In American experience ethnic and religious conflict have plainly been a major focus for militant and suspicious minds of this sort, but class conflicts also can mobilize such energies.
The situation becomes worse when the representatives of a particular social interestperhaps because of the very unrealistic and unrealizable nature of its demandsare shut out of the political process. Having no access to political bargaining or the making of decisions, they find their original conception that the world of power is sinister and malicious fully confirmed. They see only the consequences of powerand this through distorting lensesand have no chance to observe its actual machinery. A distinguished historian has said that one of the most valuable things about history is that it teaches us how things do not happen. It is precisely this kind of awareness that the paranoid fails to develop. He has a special resistance of his own, of course, to developing such awareness, but circumstances often deprive him of exposure to events that might enlighten himand in any case he resists enlightenment.
One of the impressive things about paranoid literature is the contrast between its fantasied conclusions and the almost touching concern with factuality it invariably shows. It produces heroic strivings for evidence to prove that the unbelievable is the only thing that can be believed. Of course, there are highbrow, lowbrow, and middlebrow paranoids, as there are likely to be in any political tendency. But respectable paranoid literature not only starts from certain moral commitments that can indeed be justified but also carefully and all but obsessively accumulates evidence. The difference between this evidence and that commonly employed by others is that it seems less a means of entering into normal political controversy than a means of warding off the profane intrusion of the secular political world. The paranoid seems to have little expectation of actually convincing a hostile world, but he can accumulate evidence in order to protect his cherished convictions from it.
In American experience ethnic and religious conflict have plainly been a major focus for militant and suspicious minds of this sort, but class conflicts also can mobilize such energies.
The situation becomes worse when the representatives of a particular social interestperhaps because of the very unrealistic and unrealizable nature of its demandsare shut out of the political process. Having no access to political bargaining or the making of decisions, they find their original conception that the world of power is sinister and malicious fully confirmed. They see only the consequences of powerand this through distorting lensesand have no chance to observe its actual machinery. A distinguished historian has said that one of the most valuable things about history is that it teaches us how things do not happen. It is precisely this kind of awareness that the paranoid fails to develop. He has a special resistance of his own, of course, to developing such awareness, but circumstances often deprive him of exposure to events that might enlighten himand in any case he resists enlightenment.
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In an online context, "conspiracy lust" is a lot like blood lust. [View all]
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
OP
When you want to push a good conspiracy theory, you will cite just about anything...
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
#4
Really? So you don't think or read about ANY event until you are CERTAIN all the facts are in?
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#16
Pseudo-intellectuals seem to believe in every conspiracy theory put in front of them.
PhilSays
Mar 2014
#3
And Iran-Contra never happened, nor "Watergate," nor Tonkin Gulf, nor Caesar's stabbing.
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#18
I use the term because I think it is a pathological condition for many. nt
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
#11
Where are battles won? Not the playing fields of Eton; rather, the suites of Wall Street.
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#58
I'm not getting into a discussion about which nations are better than others.
bemildred
Mar 2014
#55
Here's your problem: If ANY "conspiracy theory" uncovered truth that the govt doesn't want you to
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#24
If you don't tell people the truth, they will speculate and invent conspiracies.
bemildred
Mar 2014
#32
But where the espoused theory flies flat in the face of actual perception....
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
#22
WTC-7 wasn't hit by a plane, and no-one saw any do so. The S.H. claim is accepted nuttiness*. As for
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#26
Somehow, I feel as if they are in a far, far better position to comment than you are. nt
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
#23
Eyewitnesses can be wrong, can be fooled, can see what they want to perceive, and can lie. NOT
WinkyDink
Mar 2014
#33
You're providing interesting facts, but not supporting an overall theory.
Tommy_Carcetti
Mar 2014
#40