“An ideology is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons, especially those held for non-epistemic* reasons, in which "practical elements are as prominent as theoretical ones.” –Wikipedia

    I suspect that we are not qualified to judge our personal ideologies; we’d naturally ‘judge’ them at the very least “superbly adequate,” if not outright The Best!!

    And quite naturally, the only evaluation that ought to satisfy us is that each ideology was the best possible ideology in the world (no matter how variant they were!).

    Since there’s no sense talking to you about the specifics of your ideology, how about asking you where you got it? Where were you situated, and what tools were available when you stood (or sat or squatted) at the altar of your consciousness, hammering and tonging at it with all your might until you got your ideology just right?

    Also, do you remember a time when you didn’t have an ideology, not even a pre-pubescent ideology, when all that mattered was that you be allowed to be active when the sun was up?

    How about this: How much of your ideology is based on fulfilling your base humanity? As exmos, we have some hints that JoJu was big on this particular fulfillment. But also, as exmos, we are aware that our glorious (but mundane) leaders are always trying their best to smack down carnality whenever they see it. Even when they’re being carnal on the side, they pretend they are against it…

    Finally, I, personally, did not “suffer” when I stopped pretending to be mormon. I’m aware that there are those among you who did. I suspect that we don’t choose ideologies that cause us suffering, or at the very least, we do what we can to change our environment so that any suffering is diminished, if not eliminated. There are those still in the throes of this process.

    Are we, here on RfM, all members of more-or-less related ideology? Obviously, I’m aware of some of our differences!

    Are we a tribe?




*non-epistemic means, basically, you see “it,” you know “it” is there, but you don’t know what “it” is!  

Imagine the first time a toddler sees a piano… At that moment in time, the toddler is having a non-epistemic adventure… The toddler sees something that has weight and occupies space but isn’t ‘seeing’ what you see when you look at a piano (which is likely different for each of us but consistent individually.

I'm sure most of us are quite happy to assess others as having allowed the non-epistemic values to carry too much weight.

I have one ideology which can't actually be an ideology since one idea is not a group of ideas but the idea I have is that one idea is enough. And that is---It is impossible to tell a crossroads from a dead end.

But in your gut, subconsciously, you are spurred to act--anyways---irregardless of not solving the puzzle.

Make a quick U-turn and peel rubber after you hit the end of the cul de sac? Or, or meander into someone's yard and hop a fence, poke through the garbage and then on down the alley glancing into windows not meant to be seen through with curtains carelessly open.


Do RFMer's have a "more-or-less" related ideology? We all went into the yard and ransacked the garbage, so, yeah, maybe, but, we all went into different yards and down different alleys so a little bit not too. Lots of ways to trespass.

All I know is I wish the world had more in common with those of us who hit the alleys and found they led to the good stuff. And, as Exmos we have just enough related ideology to be understood by each other which is life's greatest gift. Being understood---The only chance we have of avoiding our idio--ologies.



"Tell me this, why is the past tense always longer?" Ocean Vuong

We have a common experience that impacted our lives. A lot of us have a similar background because of the way Mormonism dominated our families, sometimes for generations.

I think of it more like cancer survivors talking about the thing that impacted their lives.

Maybe it's tribal. Maybe it's an ideology. We're kind of like overlapping areas in a Venn diagram. The amount of overlapping varies.

Nicely put.

It's the track star in her!

Oh, that's cruel!

Thankfully I didn't get his joke.

To whom on a track & field team might a person conceivably say "nicely put?"

To a shot-putter, of course!

It was, I thought, one of EOD's more subtle jests.

I suspect that most of you, like me, are involved with more than one ideology, depending on our circumstances. I have ideas about blindness that were imparted to me by my parents and those who taught me how to function as a blind person. Those ideas changed somewhat as I went to college and became involved with a (then so-called) militant blind organization, the National Federation of the Blind, which considers itself to be more than just a blind consumer group--it considers itself to be a movement.

I was also raised as a Roman Catholic. I took conservative Catholic catechism classes when I was younger, but some of that conservative thought was changed when I attended both a Jesuit-run high school and a Jesuit-run college. My religious thoughts moved in a very different direction after I began reading (and sometimes responding to) posts on this very Board--I now consider myself to be an atheist.

What is the constant in all of this for me? Change. As I have aged, I have been flexible enough to change my ideologies as I learned new things. This is what a lot of people don't do, but it is ultimately the best method of survival in a world that is changing around us all of the time. Some changes we can affect; most (at least for me) I cannot. So, I've learned to survive in a world where change is the only constant. And that, fellow readers and posters, is my only real ideology--being able to change your own ideologies as both you and the world around you change, be they for better or worse. Good luck!

Amen to your excellent last paragraph.

Agreed.

Well said, victory goes to those who learn how to change.

I am the old guy in the office who has over 25 years under his belt. I am still there because I have learned how to change for the younger bosses.