Far-Left Mental Illness Explained

Yes, liberals are far more likely to suffer from mental illness.

[The following is a summary of a presentation I offered at an event in Ludlow, Vermont]

In his recent book, The End of Race Politics, Coleman Hughes writes this:

“Mainstream American society isn’t morally confused about white supremacy; it’s an ideology that most Americans reject on moral grounds. By contrast, many Americans are morally confused about neoracism. They’re fooled by the self-proclaimed “anti-racist” label that neo-racists have adopted. That moral confusion makes neoracism a more dangerous threat to the dream.

“White supremacy is a wolf in wolf’s clothing. It has long been exposed for what it is, and people aren’t fooled by it. Neo-racism, by contrast, is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It uses the guise of anti-racism as a lure to garner support from well-intentioned – if misguided – people who want to support the cause of anti-racism but are no longer sure how.”

This neoracism is what is taught in Vermont as Critical Race Theory (CRT), and under the misnomer of DEI. It is patently, blatantly racist. It is important to understand that toxic ideology fuses with other falsehoods to fuel race hate and social justice ideology.

Coleman Hughes’ book also helps us shift our attention to the impacts of social media and social justice ideology on our schoolchildren, and onto our modern American political landscape

As to social media, Hughes writes:

“[It] turns out that certain content has a much higher ‘top speed’ than other content. Anything that appeals to our tribal identities, us versus them narratives, or historical grievances travels fast … Anything that emphasizes common humanity, rational analysis, or fact-checking, on the other hand, travels far more slowly …

“[S]martphones and social media changed the speed limit of information – which in turn gave a massive competitive advantage to ideas, information, narratives, and arguments that tap into division, tribalism, and grievances. Neoracism was among the ideologies able to take advantage of this seismic change. Ultimately, this change resulted in an information diet that is less tethered to reality, not more.”

As I recently quoted in a Liberty Nation News article:

“Social media use is the second leading cause of disability among psychiatric disorders … This era of progressively increasing digitalization, the recent trend of a dramatic shift toward online social life, and the desire to get social attention is expected to take a gruesome toll on the population’s mental health.”

China uses TikTok in the US to fan the flames of mental illness and anger. Children in China are limited in how much time they are permitted to spend on TikTok, and content is filtered to be positive. Not in the United States.

Add to this the social justice woke movement, and you have a prescription for blue-haired crazy people to key and defecate on Teslas, physically assault people over their red hats like we are matadors (and they are crazed bulls), break off family relationships, label people racist or misogynistic with zero evidence, embrace weighing 600 pounds as a good thing, threaten to kill people who don’t abide by gender pronoun demands, etc. Frankly, it is demonic.

Let’s turn then to TDS/MDS/KDS/ anti-MAGA hat and sign attacks, etc. (By this I mean Musk Derangement Syndrome and Kennedy Derangement Syndrome, added to TDS.)

Quote from The Paradox of "Trump Derangement Syndrome" | Psychology Today, Alex Pattakos, PhD, span between stimulus and response

“Against this backdrop, one antidote to the debilitating effects of TDS requires the reclaiming of the space between stimulus and response, both as a way to change ourselves and as a proactive strategy for influencing situations or events that are yet to come, such as the 2024 election. Once again, this recommendation depends upon both freedom of will—“to choose one’s way”—and personal responsibility—to commit to meaningful values and goals that only you can actualize and fulfill.”

Think about how this connects to what we see – knee-jerk, visceral reactions to red MAHA hats. Screaming at people who share real facts or science. How about screaming at people who are unvaccinated out of fear that those who have “safe and effective” vaccines are at risk? Those who call for “safe spaces” cannot navigate the space between external stimuli and their own reaction.

Free will and personal responsibility – hey, those are conservative strengths! But also, these are people conditioned to see everything in grotesquely simplistic terms of good and evil. Trump bad. Me good. Ugh. Bernie and Obama voters fled to DT – see why? We have to be responsible for our side of the equation – personal responsibility, and pausing in the space the far-out left is incapable of occupying without freaking out. Studies show we will have better mental health, and I submit, better likelihood over time of attracting people in the middle to join our cause, if we just hold on to what we already have – facts, civility, and personal responsibility. Let’s just play nice, and tolerant.

This is an outstanding summary of the mental health issues we are talking about here: How to Understand the Well-Being Gap between Liberals and Conservatives - American Affairs Journal By Musa al-Gharbi, March 21, 2023.

“it’s a scientific fact that conservatives tend to be happier and more well-adjusted than liberals, and ideological gaps in well-being have expanded since 2011.”

“...investigations consistently find that people who identify with liberal ideology are significantly more likely than others to be depressed, anxious, and to rank high on neuroticism. Liberals are also much more likely than conservatives to be diagnosed with mental illnesses or disorders. As Jonathan Haidt recently illustrated with Pew Research data, these trends hold across genders and across age groups.

“It’s possible that genetics and biology could explain much of the observed relationship between liberal identification and mental illness.” Social justice liberals engage in reverse CBT.

“Cognitive behavioral therapy encourages people to avoid global labeling and black-and-white or zero-sum thinking. It pushes people to abstain from hyperbole and catastrophizing or filtering out the good while highlighting the bad. CBT encourages people to resist emotional reasoning, jumping to conclusions, mind-reading, and uncharitable motive attribution.”

Did the “Great Awokening” Significantly Exacerbate Psychological Distress in Liberals?

Finally, let’s look at a very recent brain scan study that pulls all of this together physiologically. It comes down t the frontal lobe of the brain, where “thinking” takes place. The frontal lobe, it turns out, is where that free will and personal responsibility are exercised in that fragile snowflake space between stimulus and response.

Neuroscientists link low self-awareness to stronger brain reactions to moralized issues

“Participants with lower ability to distinguish between correct and incorrect judgments—those with poor metacognitive insight—showed stronger brain activity in response to moral conviction. This was particularly evident in the lateral prefrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex.

“In practical terms, people who lack insight into the accuracy of their own beliefs may be more likely to treat political issues as moral imperatives and less willing to consider alternative viewpoints. This could help explain why low metacognitive ability has been linked to greater dogmatism and political extremism in previous research.”

This is related to cognitive dissonance or what the bible calls willful ignorance – the inability to accept truth that conflicts with established false viewpoints. Consider masking, or the safety and efficacy of COVID shots, or 911, or neo-racism, systemic racism, trans ideology, the Ukraine war, that EVs and solar panels generate massive amounts of forever chemicals regardless of CO2, climate change fear, gun phobia, etc. In all of these cases, very clear facts and scientific evidance are routinely jettisoned, usually accompanied by anger, screaming, name-calling, or other conduct that reflects not just an aversion to critical thinking but anger, hatred, and a form of declining mental health.

This is our political playing field in Vermont for 2026 and beyond. Reason, real science, truth, mental health. It is truly a battle, but we have already won. If you are a conservative, consider running for office without regard for whether or not you can win. Run to lose in style, have fun, meet people, kiss some ugly babies. Evil triumphs when good people do nothing. Don’t be do-nothings. If you can’t run, help those who are – your taxes, crime rates, and your mental health, and that of your kids and grandkids, depend on it.

You have free will and personal responsibility. Get in the race, and find a safe space, in sanity, civility, and fighting evil by being good.