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One of the great quotations of our time is from James Burnham, a former Trotskyite Communist-turned-conservative who became an editor at National Review.

Fifty years ago, he wrote in his book Suicide of the West that “Modern liberalism, for most liberals, is not a consciously understood set of rational beliefs, but a bundle of unexamined prejudices and conjoined sentiments. The basic ideas and beliefs seem more satisfactory when they are not made fully explicit, when they merely lurk rather obscurely in the background, coloring the rhetoric and adding a certain emotive glow.”

To compensate for five decades of public education and pop culture, let's simplify Burnham's message to say that most left-wingers do not base their views on facts but on their feelings.

The truth of Burnham's observation can be proven by examining the cavernous gulch that exists between the ideas modern pop culture idols must believe and espouse at the same time. For example, to be a sexual revolutionary in good standing, you must believe:

  • That someone's sex is an infinitely malleable social construct that can be changed at will, but who someone feels the desire to have sexual intercourse with is permanently fixed and can never be altered, even if the person wants to change it. 
     
  • That capitalism is evil, and that in our corporatist society every big business will lie, cheat, steal, and possibly kill its own customers for the sake of short term profit – except Big Abortion.
     
  • That government should more closely regulate every corporation in the world for health and safety standards – except the abortion industry.
     
  • That conservatives are waging a “war on science” – and that scientists have never determined when life begins.
     
  • That gay “marriage” is “inevitable,” because the rapid, tidal wave sea change in public opinion on the issue of same-sex “marriage” proves that the polls can never, ever change again.
     
  • That it's wrong to abuse a position of power to dictate private health care decisions, especially about birth control and abortion – unless you are telling your boss or the U.S. taxpayer that he has to pay for your birth control and abortion(s).
     
  • That feminism frees women to have it all, as long as their children and home are not their whole world.
     
  • That there is no difference between the races or sexes of mankind – and that we need special testing scores and government programs to compensate for those differences.
     
  • That eating chicken eggs is immoral but aborting a child should be available free, on demand, and without apology.
     
  • That only women should make decisions on abortion – and that men have abortions.
     
  • That teens and preteens are responsible enough to decide whether to have sex or do drugs, but they are not mature enough to pay for their own health insurance until they are 26.
     
  • That is it wrong to sexually objectify women – and that men should lust after all women regardless of their weight or appearance.
     
  • That the sex lives of Bill and Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barney Frank, and Ted Kennedy have no bearing on their fitness to serve in office. And the sex lives of Scott DesJarlais, David Vitter, Mark Foley, and Larry Craig are the only criteria determining whether they should hold office.
     
  • That there are no moral absolutes – and that is absolutely certain.
     
  • That it's wrong to be prejudiced against anyone because of their race, sex, religion, or ideology, and it's certainly wrong to base your social life around these artificial distinctions. But you would already know that if you weren't an ignorant, closed-minded, racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, knuckle-dragging, Neanderthal, rural, Christian, white, cisgendered male. Which is why I'm unfriending you on Facebook.

This far-from-complete list of contradictions affirms the words of a greater writer than Burnham or I, who wrote, “A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.” Sorry, double-minded men or womyn.

So, which ones did I miss?

Cross-posted at TheRightsWriter.com.

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Ben Johnson is U.S. Bureau Chief of LifeSiteNews.com. The author of three books, Ben was Managing Editor of FrontPage Magazine from 2003-10. He is also a regular guest on the AFR Talk network's “Nothing But Truth with Crane Durham.”