Stupidity Is Hard Work

And self-willed credulity is the hallmark of postmodern progressivism

Taking a break from vacation to comment on The Scandal of the Century

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That ideology is the systemization of stupidity is no novel concept: Mr. Orwell’s famous literary invention, doublethink, well defines it. Far back in the 1940s, he described that intellectual cancer, and embedded it in the heart of his magus opus, Nineteen Eighty-four.

Ideology is goals oriented; in one way or another it looks forward to the realization of a Radiant Future. Necessarily, therefore, it takes no account of past history, nor of present reality. The past is a dark age, best disregarded; the present is a dystopian hellscape. All that matters is the achievement of the Radiant Future—and that end justifies any and all means.

But since that past is not a dark age nor the present a dystopian hellscape, the ideology of postmodern progressivism demands of its devotees a flexible treatment of reality. Thus the 1619 Project. Thus the Alito flag flap.

In the annals of American politics, there have been few more glaring examples of utter stupidity than the progressive meltdown over Justice Samuel Alito’s flag etiquette. It was not, indeed, a manifestation of congenital idiocy. We can safely assume that most of the comrades who tossed blood clots over this bogus scandal have IQs higher than their height in inches. It was, rather, an example of the ideologically driven systemization of stupidity.

National Socialism and Marxism-Leninism are each in their way profoundly irrational, demanding of their devotees a willing suspension of rational analysis. Yet both ideologies attracted undoubtedly intelligent people, such as Josef Goebbels and Leon Trotsky. They worked hard to be stupid; it didn’t come naturally to them. Thus it is with contemporary progressivism. On the non-ideological side of life, most progressives are sensible and decent people. For instance, in practice the children of progressive elites are much more likely to have enjoyed the benefits of the nuclear family, an institution that progressivism reviles in principle.

But on matters touching politics, progressives behave as ignorant and malicious fanatics, promoting fantastic conspiracy theories and persecuting heretics with all the zeal of the Inquisition. The phrase family values sends them into a frenzy of panic over the threat of fascism and “Christian nationalism.” Nor can it be doubted that they believe what they say.

Where the so-called Alito scandal is concerned, the facts of the matter are simple enough. The present Supreme Court embodies a conservative majority whose rulings sometimes infuriate progressives. The Court is thus deemed to be “rouge” and “illegitimate.” No justification is offered for the underlying assumption that if a Supreme Court ruling contradicts some progressivism dogma, it must be lawless if not evil. This is held to be a genius of the manifest. The huffing and puffing of journalists, pundits and “constitutional scholars,” the appeals to precedent and institutional norms and “our democracy”—all that comes later and it’s just window dressing. Since the Supreme Court as currently constituted stands in the path of progress, so called, it must therefore be destroyed.

The long-range goal of the comrades is to pack the court with a permanent progressive majority and transform it into a third legislative branch that can be relied upon to rubber-stamp progressive policies. As a first step in this project, the Court’s conservative majority must be purged.

But a series of bogus ethics charges against the conservative justices has so far failed to get that job done. The Supreme Court is, after all, a coequal branch of the federal government; the legislative and executive branches have no power to interfere in its internal management. Congress does have the power of impeachment, but save in the most extraordinary circumstances there is no possibility that Democrats could use it to get rid of conservative justices.

So all that is left to the Left is slander and name calling, with the objective of intimidating the conservative justices into recusing themselves from ruling on hot-button cases, or to bully them into giving their opinions a progressive twist. The Alito flag flap is the latest effort along that line.

The narrative goes this way. The American flag was seen to be flying upside down at Justice Samuel Alito’s residence in January 2021: clear evidence, the comrades allege, that the Justice is a MAGA sympathizer and January 6 apologist if not an outright fascist. He must therefore recuse himself from any and all cases touching on Donald J. Trump.

Traditionally, flying the national flag upside down has been recognized as a signal of danger or distress. But it’s never been a particularly prominent practice among the MAGA cadre. In the Alito case it was so flown by the Justice’s wife in connection with a neighborhood dispute. Perusing the facts of the case, one gathers the impression that Martha-Ann Alito is an opinionated woman and bit of a termagant. But so what? Where’s the crime? Where’s the ethical lapse? How does Justice Alito’s married life bear on the performance of his official duties?

No answers to these questions are proffered. Nor is there a speck of evidence that the upside-down American flag—or the AN APPEAL TO HEAVEN flag seen flown at the Alito’s’ New Jersey vacation home—had a thing to do with Trump, MAGA, or January 6. Yet there can be no doubt that progressives firmly and truly believe that they do. Ideology makes them stupid enough to swallow anything that appears to further the sacred cause: Diversity! Equity! Inclusion! Student Loan Debt Cancellation!

As an example of this self-willed credulity, there may be cited Lauren Windsor, a “progressive activist and documentarian” who posed as a religious conservative to elicit supposedly incriminating remarks from Justice Alito, his wife, and Chief Justice John Roberts. Among other things, she got Alito to say, regarding the polarization of American politics, that “There are differences on fundamental things that can’t really be compromised.” Oh, the humanity! In Windsor’s telling, this observation was somehow scandalous and horrid. But honestly, who doesn’t believe it? Surely Windsor believes it herself!

This redoubtable hunter-out of heresy and crimethink was also appalled to discover that Justice Alito is a faithful Roman Catholic, i.e. a religious fanatic who poses an existential threat to “secular democracy.” One shudders to imagine what Windsor means by “secular democracy”—no doubt a people’s republic in the style of Venezuela.

The Politico article in which Windsor discusses her undercover journalism is notably short on real news, though prodigal in its coverage of her own progressive views, which are unrelievedly standard issue. As for the ethical issues raised by her masquerade, Windsor dismisses them by striking the pose of a fearless truth teller, doing wrong in the service of the greater good: a most convenient rationalization for a prize specimen of shameless self-promotion.

All this provides, once again, a demonstration of ideologically generated stupidity.

Now of course, the Right is not immune from the scourge of ideologically generated stupidity. It has to be hard work for anybody of average intelligence to see Donald J. Trump, the Prince of the Golden Escalator, as a great American. Nor is it a recently emergent phenomenon. Denunciations of the current upsurge of antisemitism in America tend to concentrate on its malice and potential for violence. But antisemitism is also surpassingly stupid—“the socialism of fools,” as it’s been called.

The more ideology, the less civilization: that, it seems to me, is the lesson of modern times. It’s a lesson that postmodern progressivism, supposedly the party of facts & evidence & reason & logic & Science, seems to have skipped in favor of seminars on Queer Theory and Flag Fascism.