Ideology Was Once a Fine Idea

The word “ideology” had a fine beginning, revealing bright prospects for the future:

The word first made its appearance in French as idéologie at the time of the French Revolution, when it was introduced by a philosopher, A.-L.-C. Destutt de Tracy, as a short name for what he called his “science of ideas,” which he claimed to have adapted from the epistemology of the philosophers John Locke and Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, for whom all human knowledge was knowledge of ideas.

… Destutt de Tracy and his fellow idéologues devised a system of national education that they believed would transform France into a rational and scientific society. Their teaching combined a fervent belief in individual liberty with an elaborate program of state planning, and for a short time under the Directory (1795–99) it became the official doctrine of the French Republic. __ Britannica

But sadly, the word fell in with some bad company — socialists and communists — and was terribly sullied by the association:

[The] Meaning “systematic set of ideas, doctrines through which the world is interpreted” was in use in English by 1907, earliest in socialist and communist writing, with reference to class; from 1918 it came to be used of socialism and communism themselves (along with fascism) and later more broadly still.

Ideology … is usually taken to mean, a prescriptive doctrine that is not supported by rational argument. [D.D. Raphael, “Problems of Political Philosophy,” 1970] __ etymonline

The word ideology has by now strayed so far from its 1796 origins that it may as well be a different word altogether.

Modern ideology is very trendy, and very violent.

“A new consensus has emerged in the press… that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.”

Orwell described how totalitarian movements dictate what ideas and language will be deemed socially acceptable. He referred to this as groupthink. Ideological movements feel deeply threatened by mavericks who violate their groupthink, and so persecute them.

In Maoist China and Stalinist Russia, the purging impulse eventually led to party members attacking other party members for being marginally less sanctified. We are now seeing similar phenomena within the identity politics movement. At left-wing Evergreen State College, Bernie Sanders enthusiast Bret Weinstein was hounded off the faculty for resisting a demand by black activists that all whites vacate the campus for a day. One of the nation’s largest public radio stations, WNYC, recently faced a revolt after it chose a progressive white woman instead of a person of color to head its newsroom. The purity standard rises higher and higher.

Another indicator of the totalitarian temptations within today’s identity politics is the surging reality of violence. There is the psychic violence of vendettas pursued by Twitter hunting packs. There are the shout-downs, table-turnovers, and physical trashings that the non-woke now regularly face on campuses. Smashed buildings and statues, looting, and arson became commonplace in American cities this summer. And the paramilitary enforcers of identity politics increasingly carry out assaults like the recent beating of a Wisconsin state senator (a gay Democrat) for filming riots, and the killing of a Portland businessman for counter-protesting. __ Ideology Has Grown Totalitarian

This violent, media-driven movement is not only taught in schools, it also has the full backing of the Chinese CCP — the same CCP that brought you the Chinese coronavirus, and which has thrown its full support behind the candidacy of Zhou Biden.

Ideology vs. Religion

Consider the following well-intended attempt to distinguish religion from ideology. Nice try, fellas. But no cigar.

A religion may present a vision of a just society, but it cannot easily have a practical political program. The emphasis of religion is on faith and worship; its appeal is to inwardness and its aim the redemption or purification of the human spirit. An ideology speaks to the group, the nation, or the class. Some religions acknowledge their debt to revelation, whereas ideology always believes, however mistakenly, that it lives by reason alone. Both, it may be said, demand commitment, but it may be doubted whether commitment has ever been a marked feature of those religions into which a believer is inducted in infancy. __ Britanica

Sadly, many modern religions are indistinguishable from ideologies, and immerse themselves in politics rather than matters of spirit. Other religions such as Islam attempt to incorporate politics within religion — as one sees in Iran and in many of the policies of Saudi Arabia. Such totalitarian religion cannot be said to be any improvement on the violent ideology one sees in Antifa and BLM.

Ideological Indoctrination Has Taken Over Popular Culture

One may turn to music, sports, movies & TV, or anywhere else in “popular culture,” but one cannot escape the dictated ideology of the day. The same harsh rhetoric that is force-fed to students in schools and universities, is the dominant brainwashing du jour being crammed down the throats of Netflix viewers and YouTube watchers. Everything to the contrary is being censored out of the picture by Google, Facebook, Apple, Twitter, Hollywood, and the giant news media conglomerates.

And guess what? The human resources departments of many large employers are on the alert for any signs of deviance from the dictate, among those they interview for future positions with their companies.

You still have a small amount of freedom, a small amount of time. Use it wisely, as you would use the microseconds you still have to breathe, after being caught in an avalanche. Your choice now could determine your future.

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So, what exactly are they teaching students at American universities? If Harvard and SFSU are any indication, the answer is bigotry, historical amnesia, a pathological aversion to facts, and an embrace of violence…

The radicals have taken root on our campuses, but it’s not too late for us to tear those roots from the ground. Let’s start by demanding that Harvard and SFSU rescind their shameful invitations.

___ US College Professors Teach “Death to America”

Another thing South Dakota and Sweden have in common.