We live in dogmatic times. Judy Johnson defines dogmatism as "a trait that drives people to adopt polarized, hardened belief systems, dogmatism manifests in conspiracies theories, gross inequalities of wealth and opportunity, and widespread racism. It has a role to play in climate change and even pandemics."
She writes that dogmatism has several characteristics:
Five features are cognitive characteristics. The first is intolerance of ambiguity — a key feature Stanley Budnar defined as, “the tendency to perceive ambiguous situations as sources of threat.” Second is a defensive cognitive closure, in which conflicting ideas are immediately judged as ridiculous. Third is a rigid certainty that protects dogmatists from having to open their minds to the possibility they’re wrong, and the fourth, compartmentalization, partitions contradictory beliefs in isolated cognitive chambers with no connecting corridors. The final cognitive characteristic is a lack of personal insight that reflects dogmatic people’s inability to distance themselves far enough from their core beliefs to recognize their own dogmatism.
Besides its cognitive characteristics, dogmatism is marked by five behavioral features:
One is a preoccupation with power and status, which often creates stereotypes that remove ambiguity. The next is glorification of the in-group and vilification of the out-group, as seen in ethnocentric hero worship, prejudice and discrimination. Third is arrogant, dismissive communication that dismisses the person, not the idea.
Such ad hominem attacks are typical of the fourth behavioural feature, namely dogmatic authoritarian aggression. This is characteristic of leaders who divide people into warring camps around the world. Bob Altemeyer notes that such leaders demand absolute respect, unwavering loyalty and obedience to arbitrary rules, which they enforce without mercy. Commenting on the increasing prevalence of authoritarianism, Anne Applebaum states that charismatic, authoritarian political leaders create national chaos by stoking fear in the vulnerable, lambasting mainstream media for spewing fake news, appointing sycophants to powerful positions in the justice system and repeating vicious lies to brainwash the vulnerable.
Obviously, there are lots of examples of this behaviour. And the dangers of this behavior are equally obvious. Something to think about as we enter the new year.
Image: Dogmamoncton.com
4 comments:
Who cares what some liberal elite college professor says. She's probably one of those fake "Doctors" like Jill Biden. This is just more leftist cancel culture trying to undermine traditional thinking. In short, fake news.
Cap
Dogmatic thinking is the leaky tire of climate change.
It's a belief-based structure that's positively medieval, even Dark Age. It was exploited in centuries past by both church and state to keep the peasants in line. Dogma was defended by walls labeled 'heresy' or 'treason' and those who ran afoul usually paid with their lives in unpleasant ways.
When you think of it, fact or evidence-based knowledge has had a tough time competing with belief or faith-based dogma across the five or six millenial span of human civilization. Today we may live in a knowledge-based world that has given us all the blessings (and curses) of science, medicine, technology and industrialization and abundant cheap, cheap, cheap energy - wondrous things that could not have emerged from our belief-based past. Yet people still flock to TV evangelists and Voodoo doctors.
Yuval Noah Harari suggests primitivism, in which dogma is rooted, has been our constant companion for tens of thousands of years that it is ingrained in many of us. The "need to believe" runs deep in the full pews of evangelism, fundamentalism, while Old School Christianity flags. Fundamentalism thrives in most religions and it leads people to fly airliners into skyscrapers.
Look at Trump's Gullibillies. He's spent four years filling them with increasingly ludicrous lies and they're still by his side. Whenever something doesn't go his way it's "the other" to blame. The Deep State, the faithless Department of Justice, the plotters of the FBI, congressional Republicans colluding with the Democrats, even an incompetent and weak Supreme Court - they're to blame for depriving the Gullibillies of their duly-elected president. Trump stands reason on its head and they'll still turn out, maskless, to flood his rallies. Theirs is a contagion more scary than any virus.
When dogma drives its adherents to dismiss fact as hoax, we're all delivered into the hands of alchemists, sorcerers and wizards even as existential threats loom.
The problem with dogma of any kind, Cap, is that it becomes axiomatic -- beyond question. Anything which is immune to questioning is dangerous.
And, when alchemists become the new priests, Mound, we march back into the Dark Ages.
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