Accept that is exactly the opposite of what is happening. How is taxing people for SS, medicare and now for not buying health insurance giving them more power. Money is power the more of it the government takes from you the less power you have. The more government dictates what you must do the less power you have.
And liberals are accused of living in a dream world...WOW, talk about believing in an ignorant Utopia. So we live in a fairy tale benign world where the only wolves are government?
Extreme idologues at both ends of the authoritarian spectrum are idiots.
When you try talking sense to them, they automatically assume you're an supporting the extmemist view on the other side.
Apparently, as our society falls apart, the most truly extreme view one can take is one of
moderation.
That way, eventually, as most people side with one ideological extremism or the other, those partisan idiots assume that YOU are their enemy.
You keep pushing the fallacy that authoritarianism is a shared trait. It is an overwhelmingly conservative personality trait.
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The Authoritarianism personality based on a 50 year studyÂ…
Right-wing Authoritarianism (RWA) is a psychological personality variable or "ideological attitude".
It is defined as the convergence of three attitudinal clusters in an individual:
1) Authoritarian submission - a high degree of submission to the authorities who are perceived to be established and legitimate in the society in which one lives. "It is good to have a strong authoritarian leader."
2) Authoritarian aggression - a general aggressiveness, directed against various persons, that is perceived to be sanctioned by established authorities. "It is acceptable to be cruel to those who do not follow the rules."
Conventionalism - a high degree of adherence to the social conventions that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities. "Traditional ways are best."
3) High scorers on the RWA scale (High RWAs) tend to have a rigid, often fundamentally religious, view of morality tending toward homophobic, racist and patriarchal beliefs. High RWA scorers tend to support authority figures, such as the government, taking action to censor certain social groups — often those they view as physically or morally threatening.
Right and left
The "right wing" in right-wing authoritarianism does not necessarily refer to someone's politics, but to psychological preferences and personality. It means that the person tends to follow the established conventions and authorities in society. In theory, the authorities could have either right-wing or left-wing political views.
Milton Rokeach's dogmatism scale was an early attempt to measure pure authoritarianism, whether left or right. The scale was carefully designed to measure "closed mindedness" without regard to ideology. Nevertheless, researchers found that it correlated with political conservatism. In a similar line of research, Philip Tetlock found that right wing beliefs are associated with less integrative complexity than left wing beliefs. People with moderate liberal attitudes had the highest integrative complexity in their cognitions.
There have been a number of other attempts to identify "left-wing authoritarians" in the United States and Canada. These would be people who submit to leftist authorities, are highly conventional to liberal viewpoints, and are aggressive to people who oppose left-wing ideology. These attempts have failed because measures of authoritarianism always correlate at least slightly with the right. There are certainly extremists across the political spectrum, but most psychologists now believe that authoritarianism is a predominantly right-wing phenomenon.
Although authoritarians in North America generally support conservative political parties, this finding must be considered in a historical and cultural context. For example, during the Cold War, authoritarians in the United States were usually anti-communist, whereas in the Soviet Union, authoritarians generally supported the Communist Party and were opposed to capitalism. Thus, authoritarians generally favor the established ways and oppose social and political change. Hence, even politics usually labeled as right or left-wing is not descriptive. While Communism in the Soviet Union is seen as leftist, it still inspired the same responses. This leads to questions over what makes various ideologies left or right, but that is another discussion.
Significant Correlations
1: Faulty reasoning - RWAs are more likely to:
Make many incorrect inferences from evidence.
Hold contradictory ideas that result from a cognitive attribute known as compartmentalized thinking.
Uncritically accept that many problems are ‘our most serious problem.’
Uncritically accept insufficient evidence that supports their beliefs.
Uncritically trust people who tell them what they want to hear.
Use many double standards in their thinking and judgments.
2: Hostility Toward Outgroups - RWAs are more likely to:
Weaken constitutional guarantees of liberty such as the Bill of Rights.
Severely punish ‘common’ criminals in a role-playing situation.
Admit they obtain personal pleasure from punishing such people.
Be prejudiced against racial, ethnic, nationalistic, and linguistic minorities.
Be hostile toward homosexuals.
Volunteer to help the government persecute almost anyone.
Be mean-spirited toward those who have made mistakes and suffered.
3: Profound Character Attributes - RWAs are more likely to:
Be dogmatic.
Be zealots.
Be hypocrites.
Be absolutists
Be bullies when they have power over others.
Help cause and inflame intergroup conflict.
Seek dominance over others by being competitive and destructive in situations requiring cooperation.
4: Blindness To OneÂ’s Own Failings And To The Failings Of Authority Figures Whom They Respect - RWAs are more likely to:
Believe they have no personal failings.
Avoid learning about their personal failings.
Be highly self-righteous.
Use religion to erase guilt over their acts and to maintain their self-righteousness.
The RWA construct was developed by Robert Altemeyer, drawing on Adorno's post-WWII research on the concept of an authoritarian personality - based on Freudian theory - which contained conservative, pro-fascist, prejudiced and ethnocentric beliefs. Taking an empirical approach based on statistical analysis and disregarding the theoretical construct, Altemeyer found that just three facets of this authoritarian personality were statistically significant and cross-correlated: conventionalism, authoritarian aggression and authoritarian submission. Conventionalism is the tendency to accept and obey social conventions and the rules of authority figures. Authoritarian aggression is characterised by an aggressive attitude towards individuals or groups disliked by authorities, and authoritarian submission is submission to authorities and authority figures. (The Authoritarian Specter)
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