“Jane, you ignorant slut.”

Remember Dan Aykroyd and Jane Curtin’s spoof of the 60 Minutes Point/Counterpoint bit?

I sure do.

After a long, intentionally reasoned, and personally-beheld liberal argument set forth by Ms. Curtin, any opposition position would instantly be tantamount to an attack on her person. So… Mr. Aykroyd, not missing a trick, embraced that inevitability and just blurted out a string of ad hominem assaults.

It made for great comedy because SNL was actually observing subconscious truth about an important societal change that was going on.

“Liberalism of today is no longer about freedom,” said Shelby Steele, Senior Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution. He’s right. Being liberal today is now more about gaining and using authority believed to be found in moral superiority. That shift occurred in the 60’s, as well-intending individuals saw social travesties and felt personally inspired to fix them. They were rightly liberal in origin because they initially sought freedom from then-oppressive law that unfairly discriminated.

Can you dig that? The law was actually discrimination!

Perhaps at first, they wanted less government and more opportunity, but eventually they discovered that more, new law was actually somewhat useful to their cause. They also found that stigmatization is a powerful weapon of this type of moral authority—it marginalizes, muscling people aside. All you have to do is successfully label someone a racist or a sexist, and you can instantly shut down their point of view.

Jane Curtin and Dan Aykroyd certainly understood this.

Over time, this shift continually recast the word “liberalism” into today’s description of like-minded social champions who benefit from increasing government augmentation by way of additional law. This leaves those who actually desire the original freedom of liberty to join a different group—Libertarians. The Libertarians of today are actually much more formed in the mold of the “pre-60’s Liberal” than the Liberals of today.

That’s because modern liberalism, as a word, is not an ideology any more. It’s really an Identity. As Dr. Steele observed, some think, “I am the kind of person who is above racism…above sexism, and if you take a position that I don’t like, then you are challenging not just my ideas, but you are challenging me as a human being.”

Ya might as well call me a slut.

This, then, becomes a form of self-inflicted ad hominem. That is likely why the reaction-laden conversations of today are so filled with passion and vitriol. Thus, a liberal person might be wont to say, “I don’t have the patience to be reasonable, I need to annihilate you.”

In this, there’s a complete shutdown of any honest, intellectual exchange of ideas due to a necessitated rush to perceive ad hominem attacks. That means that through a position of Identity, Liberals may actually be drawing out from others the very thing that causes them to remain hyper-angry. It’s nearly perpetual motion in its victimization.

Making the shift from Identity back to Ideology, or even more fitting for today’s conversation—to populism (yes, there can be left-populism—e.g. Sanders for President), it may be a challenge, especially against behavioral habits that have been etched over decades of redefined Liberalism. Scientist tell us that to change a habit requires at least 30 days of conscious and consistent effort. That won’t happen by accident. It requires intent.

So where does that leave us?

If a Liberal feels a heightened sense of ad hominem attacks since last November, and they are tired of feeling hyper-angry, perhaps they could consider their own evolved sense of liberalism. Has it become part of their identity instead of merely an ideology they embrace? Then, instead of self-identifying as one who says, “I am the kind of person who is above racism,” they could instead think simply, “Racism is wrong,” or even better, “the absence of racism is a healthy societal goal we should all work towards.”

I don’t know many who would disagree.

That simple shift may push topics out to something they believe in instead of who they are. It will take at least 30 days for that habit to develop, but they may very well find their hyper-anger diminishes as their collaborations flourish.

…or maybe I’m just an ignorant slut.