How We Have Ended Up With 2 Totally Divided Camps, Both Convinced They're Absolutely Right

Amusing Ourselves To Death: Donald Trump's Assault On Reason

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2017/07/amusing-ourselves-to-death-donald.html

"The Politics Of Horror" And "The Paranoid Style In American Politics"

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-politics-of-horror-and-paranoid.html

"My Gripe With Christianity"

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2017/01/my-gripe-with-christianity.html

To shed additional light on what I've already written -- but from an entirely different angle -- I will conclude with a story from my own life and how I came to realize that people are urgent to ensure their ability to misunderstand other people. 

For only misunderstanding allows them to validate their pre-existing views without need to adjust or enlarge their field of vision.

My story...

I started studying Spanish at 16 years of age.

Back in 1963, foreign language instruction was very bookish, with almost no attention paid to speaking the language. 

Three years later I ended up deep in the Mexican mountains -- beyond the reach of electricity and running water -- and a couple years after that I embarked my studies at La Universidad del Valle in Cali, Colombia. 

Truth be told, I was an unusually slow learner of spoken Spanish.

Consequently, there was a very long time in which my inability to speak - coupled with my inability to comprehend - provided ample opportunity for "playful ways" of getting my meaning across, and equally "playful ways" for others to communicate their meaning to me.

This prolonged period of "playing charades" was (mostly) great fun for all of us.

But there came a day when I started to "get it."

And the more I "got it," the more I realized a curious thing.

What used to be "playful fun" became an actual process of thoughtful, reflective communication.

And the more precise my communication became, the more I -- and my fellow conversationalists -- became aware of exactly what we were saying to each other. And under aegis of the precision afforded by my newly developed ability to communicate, we were increasingly aware of our differences.

Not infrequently, those differences were often disappointing and sometimes disturbing. 

I came to realize -- as did my interlocutors -- that we were often on different sides of the political aisle, or had wildly divergent views on religion.

And so, the warm playfulness of once-upon-a-time misunderstanding gave way to understandings that frequently chilly - and not infrequently chilling. 

Neither my fellows nor I could continue to bask in the playful good cheer of trying to "get" the elemental gist of what the other was saying.

Now communication was real.

And often, that reality was disappointing, offputting or downright alienating.

And now, in this politically supercharged election year of 2020, when -- thanks to social media -- everyone's skeletons are out of the closet and we no longer smile benignly on those same neighbors whose political and religious beliefs, not to mention social-racial-ethnic beliefs. 

Previously, all those beliefs, views and opinions were essentially unknown to me. But now their full-spectrum articles of faith are as well-chiseled as Mount Rushmore. And there they stand -- as plain as potatoes -- implacably PRESENT, and often abhorrent, so abhorrent that compromise -- or pretending "we" don't know -- are impossible.

Welcome to The Ipecac Express!

How can I conduct a meaningful conversation with someone who thinks Donald Trump is either The Second Coming or a new expression of John the Baptist, The Necessary Precursor?

And how can they conduct meaningful conversation with me, a "baby killer?"

But even more fundamental than the "how" is the "why."

Why would they (or I) want to conduct conversation?

To answer this question, I am forced to be inconsistent.

For I can answer the question. 

But they cannot.

They will continue conversation only as long as they can voice the same stock opinions that have made them who they are. 

But as soon as I talk enough sense to make them question their kneejerk beliefs, they put an end to the conversation depriving me of the ability to make enough sense to put them at risk of "losing their religion" (or as I see it, obliging them to renounce their false gods).

Faster than you can say "Confirmation Bias," they re-submerge themselves in their community of like-minded believers. 

But now -- like Adam and Eve after eating the forbidden fruit -- they know I am not just "that eccentric neighbor" five doors down from my 1950s home on Glenmont Drive. 

Now they know that I am someone whose ideas are inimical to the survival of their religion. 

Why are my ideas inimical to the survival of their religion? 

It is not because I hate their religion but because I have an a priori commitment to the pursuit of truth and use my brainpiece to undertake rigorous research that allows me to formulate reasonable, well-informed arguments that are inconsistent with their false gods and athwart their commitment to bearing false witness.

But they are not interested in Truth except insofar as they've been told that certain divinely-revealed truths are all they need to know, and that "free thinkers" are dangerous people to be shunned in favor of like-minded people who "check their brains" at the church door.

"God said it. I believe it. That settles it."

And, as coup de grâce, they now feel morally obligated to "damn the infidel" and keep him at arm's length. 

They deliberately surround themselves with the only light their religion (or politics) allows them and it is illuminating enough to see their way around the small, clipped-wind world they've made for themselves.

But it never occurs to them -- and given their credo it must not occur to them -- that the purpose of light is to illuminate what they cannot yet see, and they don't see it because they refuse to shine a light on it - a perfect tautology for perfectly tautological people!?!