Ace had a great post the other day that I meant to talk about, but I didn't get to it. Well, I'm getting to it now.
Here's the money chunk.
...And at universities, in the pseudo-sciences, they are constantly attempting to "explain" conservative thinking as a type of cognitive dysfunction. Not willing to give into the faddish and ephemeral? Ah, well, a part of your brain is too small and won't let you sample "new experiences."
Note the normative assumption always packed into these claims: That the conservative brain is "too small" as compared to the liberal brain, defined as normative; the conservative measure represents a deviation away from the assumed norm while the liberal trait is privileged as the norm, or if not the norm, then the ideal.
No pseudo-scientist every finds that liberals have a bigger amygdala (or whatever) and are therefore "too open to new experiences" (a.k.a. too trendy, too faddish, too ephemeral in one's sense of self). None of these guys ever says the liberal trait represents a deviation from the norm or ideal -- no, they're always the norm or idea. It's always the conservative's traits that need to be "explained" as a psychological defect or an actual defect with their physical brain structure.
Yeah, you should definitely read the whole thing.
The thing is, that denormalizing process of conservatives and conservatism Ace talked about has been going on for a long time. To pick just one example, think about guns. For most of America's history, gun ownership wasn't really debated all that much. It was only relatively recently that the Left got the bright idea to limit gun ownership amongst law-abiding citizens.
A key part of the anti-gun strategy was to denormalize the idea of firearms. Guns weren't just supposed to be severely curtailed in the general population. They were weirdo objects for strange people. Whether it was geographic arguments ("Southerners are all gun nuts, of course") or class justifications ("The uneducated are the only ones people who still have guns") the goal was the same. In fact, lefties were so hell bent on making guns abnormal they faked at least one scholar-researched book to make it look like America didn't have widespread gun ownership in it's history.
In general, the Left has had some success in making conservatism seem strange. At the very least, they've reinforced amongst themselves the 'Right=Alien' arguments they always make. For committed progressives, conservatives are not just political rivals anymore. They're the Other.
Truth be told, the hard Left doesn't make up a majority of American citizens. Break it down on a state-by-state basis. Even where they make up the largest percentage of voters, they don't make up a majority. From those perspectives, it's pretty easy to see just how marginal the liberal ideology is in America.
Conservatives should take this vulnerability on the Left--specifically, their lack of numbers-- and use it against them. More importantly, how about we examine and highlight their own behavior. For your viewing pleasure, courtesy of No One Of Any Import, are some lefty protestors barking at a recent Tea Party rally.
Blinkered, moronic and as charming as athlete's foot ? Where's the sign-up sheet for that?
Lefties insist that they are the sane, logical and normal ones.
Yeah, that dude is totally playing with a full deck.
Before we get too cocky, liberals have a few advantages. They still control the MSM and they can still get some progged-up professors to create 'science' to prove their ideological biases. These are no small things. They can dupe a lot of the politically uncommitted folks out there.
However, conservatives have distinct advantages of our own. As stated before, the voter identification numbers are on our side. Best of all, any time the Left goes out in public, they behave like the complete oddballs that they really are. It shouldn't be too hard to make liberals seem strange--because they are strange.
Seriously, you have a group of people that are cool with one of their own shouting that he wipes his ass with the American flag every night. Now that's definitely a little bit of hyperbole on his part, but the fact remains that homeboy's peers were copacetic with his sentiment that the American flag should be disrespected early and often. Just a reminder: THIS IS NOT NORMAL.
The Right can score legislative victories. They can win elections. But in order to really make inroads they have to start beating back progressive culture. That means pointing out just how alien their ideology is when compared with the mainstream of American political thought.
ALSO: Here's the great RS McCain with a story about another Lefty weirdo. How weird are we talking about here? How's about possible jail time sound?
Seriously, click the link.
