Let’s say you were a member of a political party that increased the national debt to astronomical levels. And you did this not by investing in the country’s development or funding programs that benefitted Americans. You did this by cutting taxes for rich people who already have more money than they will ever need.
I assume that you would then scream that the other political party has a spending problem. Furthermore, even though the other party has cut the debt more than you ever have — not just recently but over the course of decades — you would threaten to destroy the economy unless they cut it more.
Yes, you would be a Republican.
Now, this level of hypocrisy is not just galling. It’s pathological. It’s also dangerous and potentially catastrophic, but that’s merely a bonus for the GOP.
Conservatives are way into projection — that is, accusing others of behavior that they themselves indulge in.
For example, studies have shown that white people with a high degree of racial resentment are more likely to be Trump supporters. Despite the fact that racist attitudes permeate the GOP, a majority of Republicans still insist that white people are the ones being discriminated against. Yes, white conservatives who despise minorities say it’s actually the minorities who are racist.
Or consider that “all the threats and violence against Pride in stores is exactly what evangelicals think is happening with their wholly imagined ‘War on Christmas.’” No, crowds of atheists are not lighting Christmas trees on fire in stores.
But conservatives are too busy smashing up Pride displays to acknowledge that.
Even more disturbingly, we all know that conservatives are spending virtually all their time trying to outlaw drag queens, under the guise that men who dress like women will inevitably rape children. But to my knowledge, no drag queen story hour ever ended in child abuse. Plenty of church services have ended that way, however, and it seems like another youth pastor is arrested every week for molesting kids. And of course, the Catholic Church — which is perfectly happy to lecture everyone on morality and “normal” sexual behavior — covered up reports of “hundreds of clergy members who were accused of sexual abuse … of almost 2,000 children who were harmed over seven decades.”
And that’s just in the state of Illinois.
Meanwhile, the leader of the party of Law and Order is currently facing his second indictment and was recently found liable for sexual assault and defamation, which is interesting for a guy whose catchphrase was “lock her up.”
So why do conservatives project so much? Why do they act in reprehensible ways, and then shriek that it is everybody else who committed those horrible acts?
We need a political psychologist to decipher the Freudian rationales. But until then, we will simply have to endure their constant lecturing, and repeated threats, and loud shrieks about the vile behavior of others.
And we will have to wonder exactly what they are trying to hide.
