"Speak Out Now or Forever, Perhaps, Be Silenced" from "The Authoritarians"

[Emit]

Bob Altemeyer, the psychologist whose studies John Dean used in his book, Conservatives Without Conscience, has a message for all. In his book that he wrote at Dean's encouragement and that he has placed online for free, he pleads with us to act for change. For those of you who may have missed my first post about this insightful book, I'm telling you that the results of this man's studies of Right-wing Authoritarians (RWAs) are absolutely chilling, to say the least. It is incredible that we have found ourselves in this position as a nation and as a people.

Having worked in counseling for many years, dealing with extremely difficult personality types, I have to say that understanding the basics of these personality types is essential to learning how to confront and or even begin to deal with the problem. I also know from experience that these types as described in Altemeyer's and Dean's books are of the most difficult persons to converse with; they are challenging beyond belief. As Altemeyer himself writes, "...authoritarians can stupify you with the inconsistency of their ideas." In fact, Altemeyer holds little hope of their ability to change, or of our ability to change their thinking, through direct confrontation.

Seven deadly shortfalls of authoritarian thinking


From Chapter Three

How Authoritarian Followers Think

... research reveals that authoritarian followers drive through life under the influence
of impaired thinking a lot more than most people do, exhibiting sloppy reasoning,
highly compartmentalized beliefs, double standards, hypocrisy, self-blindness, a
profound ethnocentrism, and--to top it all off--a ferocious dogmatism that makes it
unlikely anyone could ever change their minds with evidence or logic. These seven
deadly shortfalls of authoritarian thinking eminently qualify them to follow a wouldbe
dictator. As Hitler is reported to have said,“What good fortune for those in power
that people do not think.”

1. Illogical Thinking

~snip~

... High RWAs indeed had more
trouble remembering details of the material they’d encountered, and they made more
incorrect inferences on a reasoning test than others usually did. Overall, the
authoritarians had lots of trouble simply thinking straight.

~snip~

... authoritarians also have trouble deciding whether
empirical evidence proves, or does not prove, something. They will often think some
thoroughly ambiguous fact verifies something they already believe in.

2. Highly Compartmentalized Minds


... authoritarians’ ideas are poorly integrated with one another.
It’s as if each idea is stored in a file that can be called up and used when the
authoritarian wishes, even though another of his ideas--stored in a different file--
basically contradicts it. We all have some inconsistencies in our thinking, but
authoritarians can stupify you with the inconsistency of their ideas. Thus they may say
they are proud to live in a country that guarantees freedom of speech, but another file
holds, “My country, love it or leave it.” The ideas were copied from trusted sources,
often as sayings, but the authoritarian has never “merged files” to see how well they
all fit together.

~snip~

3. Double Standards
When your ideas live independent lives from one another it is pretty easy to use
double standards in your judgments. You simply call up the idea that will justify
(afterwards) what you’ve decided to do. High RWAs seem to get up in the morning
and gulp down a whole jar of “Rationalization Pills.”

~snip~

4. Hypocrisy
You can also, unfortunately, find a considerable amount of hypocrisy in high
RWAs’ behavior.

~snip~

Continued: http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/chapter3.pdf



Here is some of the advice he gives in how to confront this situation:


From Chapter 7

What’s To Be Done?

The Short Run Imperative: Speak Out Now or Forever, Perhaps, Be Silenced

... We’ve got to act immediately ... Here’s how I put it in 1996 at the end of what
I intended to be my last book on the subject:

“I am now writing the last page in my last book about authoritarianism. So, for
the last time, I do not think a fascist dictatorship lies just over our horizon. But I do
not think we are well protected against one. And I think our recent history shows the
threat is growing...We cannot secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves, and our
posterity, if we sit with our oars out of the water. If we drift mindlessly, circumstances
can sweep us to disaster. Our societies presently produce millions of highly
authoritarian personalities as a matter of course, enough to stage the Nuremberg
Rallies over and over and over again. Turning a blind eye to this could someday point
guns at all our heads, and the fingers on the triggers will belong to right-wing
authoritarians. We ignore this at our peril.”

Eleven years later ... I believe circumstances such as “9/11" have nearly swept us to disaster,
the authoritarian threat has grown unabated, and almost all the protections I saw in
1996, such as a “free and vigilant press,” are being eroded or have already been
destroyed. The biggest problem we have now, in my view, is authoritarianism. ...

So what’s to be done right now? The social dominators and high RWAs
presently marshaling their forces for the next election in your county, state and
country, are perfectly entitled to do what they’re doing. They have the right to
organize, they have the right to proselytize, they have the right to select and work for
candidates they like, they have the right to vote, they have the right to make sure folks
who agree with them also vote. ...

If the people who are not social dominators and right-wing authoritarians want
to have those same rights in the future, they, you, had better do those same things too,
now. You do have the right to remain silent, but you’ll do so at everyone’s peril. You
can’t sit these elections out and say “Politics is dirty; I’ll not be part of it,” or
“Nothing can change the way things are done now.”The social dominators want you
to be disgusted with politics, they want you to feel hopeless, they want you out of their
way. They want democracy to fail, they want your freedoms stricken, they want
equality destroyed as a value, they want to control everything and everybody, they
want it all. And they have an army of authoritarian followers marching with the
militancy of “that old-time religion” on a crusade that will make it happen, if you let
them.

... Americans have, for the most part, been standing on the sidewalk quietly
staring at this authoritarian parade as it marches on, becoming more and more dismayed.
... You can watch the authoritarians tear democracy apart,
bit by bit, bite by bite. Or you can exercise your rights too, while you still have
them, and get just as concerned, active, and giving to protect yourself and your country.
... But time is running out, fast, and nearly everything is at stake.

http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/chapter7.pdf


His free online book and comments and a link to his online discussions can be found here:
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey /

(Crossposted from GD)