Extremes occur in almost any human grouping. Whenever they target the quashing of dissent they are wrong. My point is: they result from very different causes and the causes are important if one wishes to stop and correct them.
When one lumps all such extremes into the same bin, one runs the risk of creating yet another extreme which does nothing to help correct the original problem, it only exacerbates them making a solution that much more difficult.
I did not lump "all of them" into one bin, I said that those on the very extreme regressive left often have more in common with those on the very extreme oppressive right.
That's why the linear scale of Left-to-Right in politics is more aptly depicted as a kind of "horseshoe" because there seems to be evidence that once one ventures too far toward the extremes of both Left and Right, strange similarities begin to appear.
The difference again, is in kind. Thus, the solutions will necessarily be different.
So don't read this as a justification of any extreme that aims to silence dissent. Read it as a clarification of how to deal with and understand and attempt to correct it.
Such is the world we live in and such are the people that inhabit it. Filled with nuance and not at all "black and white", as Trump would have it.
It often attempts to correct itself with disastrous results.
You see, once again, I am focusing on the extremes in both groups and one behavior they have in common is devotion to a very fundamentalist code of conduct that lashes out at the moderate centers IN both Left and Right.
Both extremes are overly fond of tagging the moderate centers as
sellouts, imperialists, stooges, toadies for the elites and criminals who must be silenced at all costs, even at the cost of democracy itself. The other glaring similarity is that ALL of the above tags prove to be pure projection and blame shifting.
Psychological projection is a psychological theory which says such humans defend themselves against their own unconscious impulses or qualities by denying their existence in themselves while simultaneously attributing them to their targets.
Eventually a schism occurs in the minds of most extreme regressive leftists because their would-be liberal values find themselves in conflict with their inner fascist, and the inner fascist wins.
It can be a moment where the bubble fails and they are exposed to the harsh realities of life, it can be a personal trauma where key figures in their small circle hurt them, it can be almost any trauma which causes a shift in the magnetic poles of their psyche.
Or it can be as simple a reality as being forced to live by the very values they seek to impose on others.
In any case, at that point they often experience an identity crisis so unsettling that they seek the shelter of whatever will provide cover for that inner fascist, because their conduct is that of the average schoolyard bully. The bully needs protection, and it finds refuge in the codes and values of the extreme right.
That is when the jump across the ends of the horseshoe occurs.
It explains why almost all of the key figures in the Reagan era neoconservative movement are former ultra leftists.
The bullying tactics remain, the projection tendencies are nurtured, the fundamentalism legitimized and the intolerance is justified.
All that is required is that small sacrifice in personal values, a switch from Left to Right.
Since democracy and tolerance aren't important to them and never have been, and since intellectual laziness is a key component to preserving the bubble, it's almost unnoticeable for them, especially once they are nurtured enough to regain their confidence.
