Can America Fight Off the Socialist Mind Virus?

In the early 1990’s, the famous biologist Richard Dawkins wrote an essay entitled Viruses of the Mind. In this essay, Dawkins describes religion as a mind virus that spreads from human to human for the sake of its own survival. 

Think whatever you want about Dawkins or his theories on religion. I personally think religion has become much less of a threat than political ideology since The Enlightenment period, which is why I will attempt to apply his mind virus theory to what I consider the biggest ideological threat to American values, socialism.
Here are a few symptoms that Dawkins believes are exhibited by the “faith-sufferer” (i.e. a person with the mind virus):

• It is impelled by some deep, inner conviction that something is true, or right, or virtuous: a conviction that doesn’t seem to owe anything to evidence or reason, but which, nevertheless, the believer feels as totally compelling and convincing.
• The believer typically makes a positive virtue of faith’s being strong and unshakable, despite it not being based upon evidence.
• There may be intolerant behavior towards perceived rival faiths, in extreme cases even the killing of opponents or advocating of their deaths. Believers may be similarly violent in disposition towards apostates or heretics, even if those espouse only a slightly different version of the faith.
• If the believer is one of the rare exceptions who follows a different religion from his parents, the explanation may be cultural transmission from a charismatic individual.

If you’ve followed along closely to the rise of socialism in the US, you may notice striking similarities between the “faith-sufferer” and the “socialism-sufferer.”

Consider the first point. Socialists are the most ardent moralists in today’s society. They are convinced that they are on the virtuous path, despite all the evidence over the past 100 years that shows how disastrous and evil socialism is in practice. You can see the mind virus in full effect from the interview snippet below, where socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez implies that it’s better to be morally right than factual.