So, I read this Letter of Amends from a Recovering Liberal in Berkeley. Normally, I would have just jumped and cheered that someone has finally seen the light. Except, I happen to be in a particularly introspective mood today, and something just didn't sit right with me.
So, I read the letter again. It only took a moment for it to hit me: This is no conversion of ideology, this is a conversion of "I feel better, here." Now, this doesn't mean that the author hasn't had a true ideological conversion, but the letter focused exclusively on "conservatives are nice people," not "conservative ideology is right." (No pun intended.)
Spending time with people because they are "nice" is a good idea--at the very least, it's preferable to spending time with "mean" people. I know many "nice" liberals, and I enjoy my time with them. I will not be persuaded to be a liberal, conservative, moderate, or otherwise simply by the company it would allow me to keep.
I can imagine that enduring events like the author recounts would certainly be cause for reconsidering one's affiliations, but why not take the simpler route and find some nice liberals to go play with?
Thoughts? (Other than the snark, "but if you hadn't have 'felt' something funny, you wouldn't have posted this in the first place." Yeah, I know, that's not totally "rational" of me, but wouldn't it be irrational to not question something after having a disquieted feeling about it?)
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