Passionate Idealist or Dangerous Ideologue?

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For the purposes of this article, an ideologue is a person who is a dogmatic advocate for, or adherent of, a particular ideology. This person is an idealist who does not compromise their beliefs for anyone or anything even if these beliefs are clearly quixotic or impractical and deny objective evidence to the contrary.

 

This kind of person is dangerous because of their strong and unquestionable identification with their beliefs. They are able to rationalize away the slightest assault on their beliefs, perceived or real, and they moralize conformity with these beliefs. This person feels morally obligated to believe in the ideology, to the point of self-sacrifice in whatever form that may take.

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The dangerous ideologue lives to serve the ideology instead of using the ideology to serve them. They are the willing slave, the ideology the master. There is no sense of self; there is only the greater good—perpetuating the ideology. To this person, the ideology is an omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient superior intelligence that must be believed without question or doubt.    

  

These people are dangerous because they possess a glaring blindspot to their own fallibility. Any challenge to their beliefs—regardless of the logical credibility of the challenge or validity of the evidence presented in the challenge—merely confirms the “truth” of these beliefs. The more their beliefs are challenged, the more deeply these beliefs are entrenched in the person’s psychology, further strengthening their bond with the beliefs.

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To not accept these beliefs or emulate them in one’s own life is the worst form of sin against this person’s beliefs. This is looked at by that person as a betrayal of not just the beliefs, but of that person as well. And this, in no uncertain terms, makes the non-believer a sworn enemy of the dangerous ideologue.

  

To not uncritically accept the dangerous ideologue’s beliefs and hold these beliefs as one’s own conviction of truth and to not consider these beliefs to be true on their face is the most heinous of crimes against the dangerous ideologue. This unbelief is deserving of only the most vengeful form of punishment. Ethics and justice be damned because the ideology is superior to these “trivial” human conventions. Unbelievers must either be brought into compliance with the ideology or punished for their noncompliance.

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Nevertheless, despite this sinister characterization of the dangerous ideologue, they almost always present their public persona in a much more positive and less menacing light. Thus, it’s essential to be able to see behind their social façade. To see the real person behind the public persona is to see the dangerous ideologue disguised as a passionate idealist. This ability to distinguish the one from the other can help protect against these dangerous ideologues.

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Protecting Yourself Against Dangerous Ideologues

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Protecting yourself against dangerous ideologues means you must understand the who-what-why-where-when-how of the ideologue. Sun Tzu said: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

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If you’re getting tripped on the term “enemy” here because you may not consider the dangerous ideologue an enemy, understand that they consider you an enemy regardless of how you characterize them.

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Self-protection is not only synonymous with defense; it also encompasses offensive tactics and strategies. It doesn’t do the individual much good to beg for mercy if the offending person isn’t merciful. It certainly won’t “tug on the heart strings” of a heartless person to play the emotional appeal card.  

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Thus, to know how to protect against the dangerous ideologue, one must understand the ideologue. That one must look past the public persona of “passionate idealist” to see the dangerous ideologue that lies beneath. There are certain tells or signals that can help distinguish the dangerous ideologue from the authentically passionate idealist.

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Using reason isn’t an effective strategy with the dangerous ideologue because they depend on emotional appeal.

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The dangerous ideologue won’t be swayed by reason. No amount of rational challenges to their ideology will stir even the slightest bit of curiosity in this person. But challenges will likely trigger reactive and defensive emotional responses by this person that will likely be uncontrolled and irrational.  

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Because this person does not or cannot reason, they will act out in aggressive and often violent ways against what they perceive as attacks on, or affronts to, their beliefs all the while claiming “moral superiority” with “righteous indignation.” After all, who dares to question a “passionate” outburst. And doesn’t an “emotional response” indicate truth manifested?

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Despite how convincingly the dangerous ideologue can pull off their positive persona of passionate idealist simply advocating for their beliefs, they nevertheless remain a prisoner of their own emotional nature. Easily triggered by appeals to reason, this person will betray their authentic emotional defensiveness when responding to rational challenges.

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Dangerous ideologues regularly play mind games and use psychological warfare.  

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For dangerous ideologues, civility is merely a byword used to invoke guilt in their enemies in order to gain an advantage in their mission of spreading their truth. Humans are, after all, a competitive species. We compete in everything, whether we are consciously aware of this or not. Thus, if the dangerous ideologue can successfully accuse their “enemies” of being uncivil whilst claiming the civil high ground, then by the laws of competition they are morally superior.  

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Peace is used in a futuristic tense because the dangerous ideologue cannot rest until every nonbeliever is either converted to their ideology or eradicated from the earth. Thus, they will preach “peace” whilst openly and unashamedly promoting and engaging in violence and war. War is a means and peace is the end (which hasn’t happened yet nor will it happen in their lifetime lest they lose meaning derived from converting the world from its sinful ways to their righteous cause).

 

Unity is an oxymoron because it’s used to bring others into compliance with the ideology whilst simultaneously creating divisions by classifying as enemies those nonbelievers who refuse to toe the line. Thus, in the dangerous ideologue’s mind “unity” is harmony and accord in the sense that everyone dogmatically and unquestioningly conforms to their ideology. Any deviation from it is separateness, and separateness is a direct threat to their idea of unity.   

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Dangerous ideologues will gaslight you until you question your own sanity. This person will accuse others of that which they themselves are guilty, by habit. They are constantly projecting and seek out those whom they can get to identify with their projections. They will displace any and all blame onto others and never admit mistake or fault or their own personal responsibility (to do so would be to admit error in their ideology). How could they? They are faithful followers of the one true truth—the ideology.

 

Their consistent strategy is to always accuse, never admitting fault or error, always keeping others on the defense so the others look guilty in their defensiveness. To the dangerous ideologue, it doesn’t matter what is actually true, only what appears to be true.

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For dangerous ideologues, there is only one truth—the ideology—and everything else is false or falsifiable and thus everything else is worthy of destruction.  

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There is only one true standard by which dangerous ideologues live: their ideological beliefs. They are accountable only to the ideology but not to anyone or anything else. Thus, they are split in their thinking—they see two of everything and everything is adversarial instead of complimentary, supplemental, or coexistent, e.g., good (their way) v. bad (others’ ways); believers (conformists) v. nonbelievers (nonconformists); truth (their truth) v. lies (all other ideologies); real (their ideology) v. fake (any reality that challenges their reality); etc. To these dangerous ideologues there are no shades of gray, no nuance; only black and white, only polar opposites. You are either for them or you are against them.

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In their narrow and distorted worldview, they believe they are unimpeachable; in reality, they are textbook hypocrites who literally embody the very thing they profess to detest. They preach against discrimination whilst openly and unabashedly discriminating against anything and anyone whom they don’t consider fellow ideologues. They loudly protest against anything their ideology has defined as bad or evil whilst acting out the very bad and evil behavior they claim to fight against.

  

Because there is only one truth and everything else is false, it matters not that this one truth may change shape. All that matters, all that is important is to always conform to that truth whatever shape it may take so long as it derives from the ideology. And that shape is to be determined by those who shape it, whomever they may be.

     

Dangerous ideologues find strength in numbers.

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Dangerous ideologues will rarely operate alone because strength for them is in numbers. They detest individuality because their ideology seeks to infect every individual, and all must ultimately conform to its precepts and principles or be dealt with accordingly.

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There can be no individual if the ideology is to remain omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient. There is only the ideology and those who faithfully perpetuate it (whatever that looks like). Any attempts to individuate are met with immediate punishment. The group is responsible to keep the individuals out whilst prioritizing the ideology above all else. Thus, bullying others into compliance is not really bullying because it is for the greater good.  

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Accountability with dangerous ideologues means utter and unquestionable conformity to the group. Without groupthink, there is no ideology. Thus, groupthink transcends the members of that group. The whole is greater than the parts in that the parts are insignificant and either conform to the whole or face the consequences of nonconformity.    

  

Don’t be Deceived by the Dangerous Ideologue, See Them for What They Really Are

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In general, humans are easily deceived by people who act out as long as the person acting out does so “passionately” and with “great fervor.” Humans are suckers for conviction and dedication to principles and beliefs. So, when someone appears to possess these attributes, other people tend to accept them at face value and hold that person in high esteem.  

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This is partially because emotions are powerful at influencing and persuading us and partially because people are generally naïve. To make matters worse, the persuasive effect of emotions often happens below our conscious awareness. This further emphasizes the necessity of regularly checking these emotions using a reasoned and objective approach to determine their relevance, validity, and purpose.  

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This emotional appeal is precisely what dangerous ideologues operationalize on to perpetuate their ideologies. They fraudulently present their dogmatic beliefs and hostile behaviors as passionate idealism and righteous advocacy. They broadcast their ideology loudly to appear more virtuous, intending volume and intensity of presentation to validate the truth of this ideology.  

   

Thus, to avoid being harmed by the dangerous ideologue, don’t fall for their persona of passionate idealist and instead see them for what they really are.