Reply #32: Hi Paint it~great rant.

[CampDem]

There is an online book called The Authoritarian written by Canadian researcher Dr Altemeyer. He has studied American right wing fundamentalism for many years.

He has conducted psychological/social experiments with instruments he has finely tuned over the years and in this book he presents his findings. He defines them as Authoritarian followers and leaders. He looks at ethnocentrism, racism, sexism, and the rigid compartmentalization that result from this worldview.

First he looks at how the authoritarian followers are highly compliant and submit to authority figures. Unless they get out of the fundie environment (attend a secular institution or meet new non-fundie friends) they develop measurable psychological traits to cope with the dissonance they feel from internalizing their fundie parents values. He contrast this with a moderate or liberal upbringing and presents data to show the differences. For me, reading this section left me feeling very sorry for them.

For the section about authoritarian leaders he splits them into 2 power hungry groups, one sharing many of the followers psychological traits while the other doesn't. It is a chilling read.

This book is available online and though it is long, I really enjoyed it.
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/

:hi: