There’s a reason ‘polite society’ avoids the topics of politics and religion.  Both are incredibly divisive, yes, but they also come from the same hidey-hole in our brains.

One of the hallmarks of religion in general is the ‘fluidity’ of belief.

The ‘rules’ such as they are can be manipulated and often are.  When the warm fuzzies of Magical Thinking bump into the harsh, stone-cold realities of Reality, Magical Thinking always loses — as does the person doing the Magical Thinking — unless, of course, the Magical Thinker adapts to reality, poorer in beliefs but richer in actual knowledge.  Result — what they ‘believe’ changes (for the better, one hopes) because now they operate from a place of Knowledge instead of Ignorance.

Ah, but… it can take an awful lot of those warm fuzzies getting pulverized before their owner sees the light.

Magical Thinking is powerful, powerful stuff.  And the same way it works on peoples’ macro awe and wonder at the cosmos and existence, it also works on their micro focus on more quotidian matters — day-to-day shit.  Local politics and politics in general.

So — you want to know WHY that conservative remains intransigent about conserving things despite all evidence that it’s 1) a losing argument and 2) an argument that will NOT get the results they say?

Say it with me, class: “MAGICAL THINKING”.

That shit’s gonna be the death of us.  For reals.