Collectivist Totalitarians, Right and Left

People on the extreme left and the extreme right, find diversity of opinion unbearable. Both groups are totalitarians and want to completely shut the other side up. They assume the exact same motive of any one who disagrees with them. They can’t imagine an EXCHANGE of ideas or learning anything new. They can’t imagine anyone else being right or themselves being wrong. None of their ideas are held provisionally pending new information.(I suspect that’s because their ideas are not based on information.) They certainly can’t imagine a marketplace of ideas where their views are on the exact same footing as everyone else’s.

Yes, I think government has an important role to play in people’s lives and I believe in a strong social safety net. But I also I believe in free market capitalism. I believe in private ownership of property. I believe in liberty, even for people I think are fools. I believe that extreme, lunatic right wingers get to say what they want and speak their mind. They even get to vote for whoever they think will represent them. I believe in their rights even when the right wingers are shocked that anyone to their left has all the same rights they do and work hard to strip them of their liberty.

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