Like the Christofascists who increasingly live in a fantasy world detached from objective reality and in open opposition to modernity and knowledge, the Tea Party's adherents cling to image of America that (i) never existed and (ii) in reality runs afoul of many basic American beliefs - I attribute the phenomenon to the fact that the Tea Party has an 85% or more overlap with the Christofascists. Among the thing one hears constantly is the Tea Party meme of returning to the rule of the U.S. Constitution and democracy, yet what they really want is akin to a fascist state where they inflict their beliefs on the majority of Americans. Sadly, too many in today's GOP are only too ready to jump on board the anti-democracy train. Here are excerpts from a piece in Salon that looks at the hypocrisy of the Tea Party loons:
[I]f a recent Slate analysis of the Tea Party worldview from conservative pundit Reihan Salam is correct, it’s the Tea Party — more than what remains of Occupy Wall Street, or the Davos crowd — that most stridently represents those citizens who reject actual, real-world American democracy. Salam jokingly refers to the U.S. of the Tea Party’s dreams as “Teatopia,” . . .
What I’d argue, rather, is that the Tea Party’s philosophy of government (again, as understood by Salam) has embedded within it an aversion to basic democratic principles that goes far beyond a typical contempt for Washington, politicians and pundits. When Salam writes that Teatopia is founded on a commitment to a “robust federalism” intended to let “different states … offer different visions of the good life” and allow citizens to “vote with their feet” by moving to whichever state best reflects their values, he’s not describing a common aversion to corruption or a distaste for political theater. He’s describing a childish and essentially anti-political belief that a return to an Articles of Confederation-style U.S. order — in which each state is more of a sovereign unto itself than a member of a larger American whole — will produce 50 mini-nations where everyone basically agrees.
If we take into account the recent Pew report on polarization, which found a full 50 percent of “consistently conservative” respondents saying it was important to them to live in “a place where most people share my political views” vs. only 35 percent of “consistently liberal” and 22 percent of “mixed” respondents saying the same, Salam’s “Teatopia” makes perfect sense. If you’re made uncomfortable by the very idea of sharing sidewalk with someone on the other side, why wouldn’t you pine for a future in which you’re so tucked away among your kind that you come to forget people who think differently even exist?
[T]he animating spirit of Teatopia is also, at its core, childish. It reflects a psychological makeup that privileges certainty, loathes ambiguity, celebrates purity and is awash with a mild but persistent sense of vulnerability and fear. Teatopia is a place where one never has to wonder about the veracity of her basic assumptions about what Salam calls “the good life.” It’s a place where no one ever has to grapple with the uncomfortable reality of other human beings living full, rewarding lives while concurrently making major decisions one thinks are self-evidently incorrect. It’s a place where one need never acknowledge that there are people who dream vastly different dreams and, what’s more, believe they have just as much right as anyone to make those dreams come true.
Like the author, I believe that their is a psychological defect - a sickness, if you will - that causes both the Christofascists and their Tea Party first cousins to desperately fear those deemed "other" and anything that differs from their fantasy world beliefs.
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