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John Cleese Explains the Psychological Advantages of Extremism

joker44

In the wind

“It Makes You Feel Good Because It Provides You with Enemies”

https://youtu.be/HLNhPMQnWu4

"What we never hear about extremism is its advantages," says Monty Python's John Cleese in the television advertisement above. "The biggest advantage of extremism is that it makes you feel good because it provides you with enemies." When you have enemies, "you can pretend that all the badness in the whole world is in your enemies and all the goodness in the whole world is in you."

If you "have a lot of anger and resentment in you anyway," you can justify your own uncivilized behavior "because these enemies of yours are such very bad persons, and that if it wasn't for them, you'd actually be good-natured and courteous and rational all the time."

Sign on with the "hard left," Cleese says, and you'll receive "their list of authorized enemies: almost all kinds of authority, especially the police, the City, Americans, judges, multinational corporations, public schools, furriers, newspaper owners, fox hunters, generals, class traitors — and of course, moderates."

If you prefer the "hard right," they have a list of their own, one including "noisy minority groups, unions, Russia, weirdos, demonstrators, welfare sponges, meddlesome clergy, peaceniks, the BBC, strikers, social workers, communists — and of course, moderates."

As an extremist, Cleese reminds us "you can strut around abusing people and telling them you could eat them for breakfast and still think of yourself as a champion of the truth, a fighter for the greater good, and not the rather sad, paranoid schizoid that you really are"

Cleese recorded this more than 30 years ago!