When I was teaching, I had a standard “introduction” lecture that I’ve referred to several times on this platform: I would tell my Law and Public Policy students that, yes, they would find me opinionated, but no, a difference of opinion would not affect their grades–that my goal was not to change their opinions or policy preferences, but to ensure that they left my class using two phrases more frequently than they had before: “it depends” and “it’s more complicated than that.”
In other words, I saw it as my job as a college professor to encourage increased recognition of complexity and ambiguity–to discourage knee-jerk ideology in favor of thoughtful exploration. In my opinion–then and now–education is the process of inquiry. The educated individual is aware of what s/he doesn’t know. Education–again, in my view–is vastly different from rote learning. Teaching is not a process of transmitting “givens” to receptive vessels–it consists of introducing students to the process of critical thinking and dispassionate analysis of what constitutes probative evidence and what doesn’t.
There isn’t a lot of critical thinking–at least, as I describe it– going on in America’s political life these days. I recently came across an essay in the New York Times that helped me understand the roots of the rigidity that permeates our national conversations. It was titled “The 77-Year-Old Book That Helps Explain the MAGA New Right.”
The essay focused on a 1948 book by one Richard Weaver, whose argument–according to the essay–laid the foundation, or basic contours, of the New Right’s closed approach. The book was titled, “Ideas Have Consequences,” an observation that has become a popular catchphrase on the Right.
Dr. Weaver didn’t have just any old ideas in mind: The ideas he was concerned with were distinctively modern ideas, and the consequences of these ideas were devastating. They had caused nothing less than “the dissolution of the West.”
Weaver’s target was a philosophical concept called nominalism. Nominalism, which Weaver attributed to philosophers like Hobbes, Locke and other Enlightenment thinkers, rejects the existence of absolute truths — including transcendental moral truths. Nominalists rejected Plato’s notion of a universal objective moral reality.
Dr. Weaver insisted that nominalism was the source of all our woes. He wrote that, by challenging the idea of universal objective moral reality, “modern man had succumbed to individualism, relativism, materialism, historicism and politics as will to power.” Weaver–and today’s intellectuals of the Right–insist that, as a consequence, modern thought is inherently corrosive, and that we must restore a “transcendental moral orthodoxy” to our politics.
They seem quite sure that any “moral orthodoxy” will mirror their own “objective” conclusions…
As the essay points out, adopting Weaver’s approach would rather “obviously legitimate the repression of anyone who thinks about truth differently.” We can draw a straight line from Weaver to MAGA’s belief that “heritage Americans”–i.e. White Christians– who evidently are seen as having some sort of genetic access to those immutable “truths,” are the only people who can be “real Americans.”
As the author of the essay notes, there’s nothing wrong or anti-American about holding strong convictions grounded in tradition or religion. But–as she also reminds us– the American system was based upon the Enlightenment belief that “citizens are entitled to shape their own conceptions of the world.”
Genuine conservatives understand and respect the First Amendment’s commitment to the freedom of the individual conscience. They accept that religious freedom means living in a country where different people hold different beliefs, and that a commitment to free speech allows people to voice opinions contrary to their own.
MAGA folks are not conservative.
There’s general understanding that Trump and MAGA are authoritarian, but less recognition of how profoundly unAmerican that authoritarianism is. MAGA folks approve of Trump’s approach to governing because it is consistent with what the essay calls a “closed philosophical mode” of “radical anti-modernism and moral and political absolutism.” MAGA’s contempt for liberal democracy is rooted in its belief that they–and only they– are arbiters of Truth, and they see America’s constitutional commitment to pluralism and tolerance as threats to that Truth.
They are incapable of recognizing that discerning a truth (lower case) requires understanding that the world is complicated, and that what constitutes any given truth often depends upon recognizing and accounting for the multiple facts in which that “truth” is embedded.
MAGA folks firmly believe that they are in possession of immutable Truths; the only open question is how they are going to make the rest of us bend to their Truths.
Dialogue with such people is unlikely to be productive.
Sounds like Weaver offered the first modern “twist” to the pretzel today’s MAGA crowd are in to justify everything they say and do. He’s validating concrete thinking, not critical thinking. But in tribal environments there certainly must have been strong leaders requiring blind loyalty and followings in order to retain control and power over the tribal behaviors and “philosophies”. I keep citing Rebecca Costa’s great book, “The Watchman’s Rattle” where she synthesizes all the research done on early human social evolution.
Your education philosophy described today made my old heart sing. YES! Critical thinking! In science there are whole and immutable truths, but the variables associated with the scientific method of proving/establishing those truths can be just as creative as poetry.
Too bad today’s Republicans suppress – with great energy – critical thinking. They must think they’re still the leaders in the caves they occupy.
Thinking about complex things takes time and a desire to learn. Critical thinking is even more demanding. The skills and attitudes conducive to critical thinking can be introduced to very young children, but if parents lack the ability to do so, schools are not very good at making up for that. If someone doesn’t get the message that “it depends” and “it’s more complicated than that” when they are young, they are pretty likely to engage in “knee jerk ideology.” And here we are.
Teaching people think beyond the obvious, to “color outside the lines” and to research beyond the class limitations must be a burden for those, like Sheila, who want to send students out of class with more knowledge than they entered with. I was a poor student, not sure why I didn’t want to learn till late in life as I had no aims and didn’t know I was supposed to have them. In my 70s I finally knew “what I wanted to be when I grew up”; the political structure became more and more controlling over my daily life and I decided I wanted to be a paralegal to learn the hows and whys of my part in upholding civic and human rights and my responsibilities to uphold them.
“There’s general understanding that Trump and MAGA are authoritarian, but less recognition of how profoundly unAmerican that authoritarianism is.”
Dialogue with Republicans, even before I began to understand the political foundation of America, appeared to be useless talking to my parents about the racism, bigotry and antisemitism they lived by because I was a child. Maybe if I had “woke” up sooner I could have made a better case in my arguments against what is now known as conservative anti-DEI and I wouldn’t have wasted my time talking to the wrong side trying to convince them and would have supported the opposition to strengthen democracy, Rule of Law and uphold the Constitution.
Mea culpa!
Sheila’s last sentence, “Dialogue with such people is unlikely to be productive.”
This is why the Stoics warned against entering discussions with closed-minded people. Once they move beyond their level of understanding, they will begin to attack you (ad hominem). Everyone in Trump’s inner circle uses this tactic, especially Trump and Bondi.
Bondi only released a small fraction of the heavily redacted Epstein documents by yesterday’s due date. I expected the redaction, but I didn’t think she would completely disobey the new law Congress just unanimously passed. As Thomas Massie predicted, “She’s in contempt.” Negative consequences????
Usually, pain from poor choices helps wake up a closed mind. I’ve watched Hoosier farmers go through how many Trump bailouts because of his poor decisions, and still defend him?” #ignorance
Has Trump learned anything from his past poor choices? I sure don’t see any evidence. I occasionally read his posts, and there are never any signs of self-reflection. #none
He and Miller actually think that Venezuela “stole their own oil and assets from Big Oil” when their leftist government nationalized their own sovereign resources. And, they say it with such contempt and anger because they firmly believe they are right. #ignorance #closedminded
We are and have always been both victims and beneficiaries of our times. That’s the story of life. These times in our personal, local, national, and global situations brought us Trump, who brought us his inept Cabinet, toady Congress, Supreme Court, and States.
One factor that profoundly worsens our situation is our refusal to accept the well-established fact that these times are not sustainable and haven’t been for quite a while. As is true so often in life, our past success determines our current reality, and we have overrun our environment. Now, our environment will do what it has to in return. There is no additional wealth to redistribute; no more atmosphere to benignly hold our waste; no more respect to offset our hates.
Politically, Republicans will be blamed in history for this decline. Life will go on.
To further illuminate Sheila’s point, I strongly encourage watching this segment from PBS News Hour of Dec. 19, 2025. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/family-of-north-carolina-woman-detained-by-immigration-officers-shares-her-story
With advanced age has come the recognition of how much I don’t know. IMHO, curiosity goes hand in hand with critical thinking. Why and how, in that order, frame much of what I think about in terms of politics, religion, history, finance, etc., right down to household asset maintenance. Much of that last part I had always left to my partner, to my current regret. Ignorance of practical matters has direct consequences to my physical safety, comfort and well-being. The more ethereal issues are often harder to examine in terms of long-term consequences without a deeper understanding of the very complicated underpinnings.
Curiosity about how things work, who decides, how the questions are asked and answered, all of those things constitute critical thinking in my world.
Those whose minds are closed, who lack curiosity, who are too willing to allow others to declare the answers for them, reap the whirlwind in the long run, just like the rest of us.I wish it weren’t so, but see ample evidence of it every day.
He wants his cult to just do as he says without further thought. Many do it because it is easier than doing the harder work of curiosity and critical thinking.
RESIST.
Thanks for the summary of Richard Weaver’s viewpoint and impact.
The Weaver buy-in to religious dogma -we’re born sinners in need of redemption-
is detrimental to development of citizens who approach society as humanitarians. The fact that the majority in right wing religious sects elected Trump provides proof.
A long history of psychological abuse was changed only a few decades ago. The Church abandoned its self-serving lesson that babies who aren’t baptized can’t get into heaven because they are “born with sin.”
God watching for the “unrelenting sinners” down below (“sin” that men writing Biblical tomes often aligned with their own goals for power) is like Elf on the Shelf. Mitigation of an individual’s potential for cruel tendencies by turning the problem over to, religious sect manipulation has been ugly in intent and practice.
Off topic- worth pondering- how many men would belong to a religious sect that discriminated against them.
L.L. Interesting idea to ponder. My quick take on it is to doubt that there is much difference between men and women in that regard. Both can be taught to be subservient to power that is detrimental to their well being.
One of the most egregious examples that shows lack of critical thinking is – the complaint that public schools aren’t successful. The American worker, trained/educated in public schools grows the nation’s economy despite Wall Street’s 2% drag on GDP.
When Bill Gates, Walton heirs, Charles Koch, Jeffrey Yass and the DINO, Center for American Progress, etc., advocated and spent big bucks for school privatization, they showed that their goals had everything to do with gains for the .richest 0.1% and, nothing to do with advancement of the nation.
Reportedly, 80% of private school parents choose religious schools. Research shows that the religious are much more likely to succumb to irrational
thinking which has adverse consequence to rule of law, scientific advancements and contributions from a pluralistic population.
The legal scholar credited as most influential in advancing religious charter schools (tax funded) is a fellow of the Manhattan Institute, a friend of Amy Comey Barrett and a professor at a right wing religious sect’s university.
My favorite comment: “Dialogue with such people is unlikely to be productive.” Don’t even try; it’s not worth your time.
Sharon
Thank you for reading what I wrote.
I agree with your point, adding, magnitude of scale should be considered.
The two largest religious sects in the US discriminate against women with the acceptance of congregations that are made up of more than 50% of women.
IMO, mothers who take their daughters and sons to regressive and oppressive churches, mosques, temples, etc. should at least acknowledge that their institutions are using influence and resources to harm democracy, reproductive care for women (more than one in 6 US hospitals are affiliated with a religious sect) and, legal equal rights for women and those the religious groups choose to call sinners.
One of the two major sects has a somewhat centralized framework for voter mobilization and paid lobbying in states. They’ve been highly successful.
The global education plan of that sect is described at the Scielo site, “The new official contents of sex education in Mexico: laicism in the cross hairs.”
Todd, Trump and Miller present as psychopaths. They do not have the “gene” for introspection. In their own minds they are perfect.