Illustration by Mike Reed, text by me
My wife has a coworker who’s sickeningly pro-Obama. I’m not talking about run of the mill support for the man like you would expect from a typical Democrat. I’m talking full-blown “whatever he says is right” zealotry. A few weeks ago they were talking about gay marriage (incidentally, I love when my wife starts talking about it because she doesn’t pull any punches and just outright tells you she has no problem with gay people, but that gays shouldn’t be marrying because that’s not what marriage is) and this zealot actually told her that “Obama is for gay marriage.”
My wife pays enough attention to politics to know that’s not a misinterpretation of any kind, just an outright example of willful ignorance. “Are you sure?” she asked. “I could’ve sworn he’s already come out and said that marriage is between a man and a woman.” We all know that he’s said exactly that, and we know his opinion on the matter. There’s no gray area at all. So how, when confronted with a position that’s contrary to hers and what she perceives as the proper ideological stance that’s harbored by someone who she believes embodies the ideology she subscribes, does she react? Lie.
“Well actually, he’s not against it; he’s on the fence. He’ll come around.”
A textbook example of a new disorder I’ve discovered called Ideological Dissociative Disorder. A little definition work here is probably in order.
We’ve all seen IDD in action, and mostly since President Obama took office in January. Many positions long held to be conservative ones are popping up, from time to time, in the Obama White House. This leaves true believers stunned. So far, Obama has waffled on closing Guantanamo Bay, threw tons of money at corporations, oppose gay marriage (or at the very least not support it despite its front-page news status lately), and send more troops into Afghanistan and Iraq as recently as a month and a half ago.
People with IDD will generally react to the difference in an idol’s policies or politics in one of a few ways:
a. Denial: Usually this involves the person with IDD outright denying that the person in question even has the position to begin with. Often times, it’ll also involve the mentioning of an ideological opposite in an attempt to deflect the conversation.
b. Selective Editing: Essentially, this is when a person with IDD just ignores the position they find disagreeable and pretends that their subject doesn’t have it. For example, someone arguing that Barack Obama is great on all liberal issues and failing to mention his opposition to gay marriage is selective editing.
c. Rationalization: This involves coming up with a “good explanation” (in their mind) for why the subject’s ideology differs from their own. “Barack Obama isn’t opposed to gay marriage, he just thinks the federal government shouldn’t make that decision.”
d. The Flexibility Defense: The exchange with my wife above is a perfect example of the Flexibility Defense. In essence, the person with the ideological difference attributes flexibility in the position where it doesn’t necessarily exist. Her implication that Barack Obama is “on the fence” about gay marriage belies the fact that he’s never indicated any kind of flexibility in his opinions on the issue and there is no reason to believe he ever will be flexible on the issue.
e. Deflection: This often takes the form of finding an ideological opposite and attacking them, their policies, or some other aspect of their ideology so as to deflect from the uncomfortable nature of discussing their idol’s shortcomings. In this situation, a perfect deflection would’ve been “Oh, you mean like George W. Bush?”
It’s hard to argue with someone suffering from IDD because they don’t often have any logic to their arguments. Their arguments are often more about protecting the pristine image of their hero than having a discussion about an issue. Your best bet, should you realize you’re in a discussion with someone with IDD is to just move on. You won’t win, you won’t make headway, and most of the time you’ll just get more and more angry as the discussion wears on.
