In the 1950s my mother and father were walking along in London when a guy walked up and said, “You’re an American, aren’t you?”

Well, at least he didn’t say “Yank” so my father said yes, Brits consider you an idiot if you call a Scotsman an Englishman but they have never got the effervesce between a Yank and a human straight.

The fellow went on, “The difference between America and England is that in America the bosses run things and here Labour runs things.”

My father replied, “Yea, and where Labour runs things your shoes are worn out, your clothes are dirty, you haven’t shaved for several days,” he was pointing at different parts of the man in front of him.

Then he leaned forward and said, “And he’s probably HUNGRY, too, right?”

My mother pulled my father away and ended the exchange.

I have pointed out to Brits that we killed more Yanks in one war than they did in two.

ANOTHER Brit walked up to my father and said, “You’re from America, right?”

My father agreed to that.

The man said, “I know a lot of bad things about America.”

My father replied, “I know a lot more bad things about America than you do.”

In fact, like me, my father expostulated endlessly about bad things in America, though in this case the fellow did not seem to want to continue the talk.

In fact, what my father replied was the ultimate response. He knew all about how bad America REALLY was, but he was an American, and wouldn’t be anything else for love nor money.

I know some bad things about the Catholic Church, but BBG knows a hundred to one, and he wouldn’t be anything else. Others hate the South while other outsiders see Gone With the Wind as truth. I despise those who let the South pay for the entire Federal Government PLUS a subsidy to Yankees through tariffs.

I DESPISE the HEROIC confederate leaders who didn’t secede earlier when WE could have won. But I am Southerner.

This is how identity works. BBG and other Catholics put up with my specific criticisms because they trust me. I listen carefully to criticisms of the South from people who have an identity of their OWN.

We do not trust people who criticize the South or the Church if they are Wordists. A Wordist has no gut loyalties.

A Wordist is an instant traitor. When he criticizes the South or the Church he is against Southerners and Catholics. To a Western man, nothing is so evil as hating your own. To Political Correctness, goodness is truly despising your own people.

If BBG criticizes the South, I weigh what he says. Id a Wordist attacks the South, I take it for what it is, an expression of hatred.

This is a distinction no Wordist can understand.

Identity gives you a gut loyalty. You are a part of your own people. You can love them and despise them at the same time. In fact, all of us do love and despise our own people simultaneously.

Wordism depends entirely on one’s current opinion. A Wordist loves or hates according to his current feeling about a group from one set of words against another set of words. He HATES Evil, as he defines Evil according to his Wordist outlook.

Sop whoever he is currently criticizing, best of all if it has the virtue of being his own group, he currently Hates, because they are Evil on the only scale he knows.

The Wordist assumes the same motivation in others. To him, Hate is the basic motivation.

Loyalty is the most natural motivation for any animal above the level of a cockroach. Meer Kats hate other groups of Meer Kats during the period they are competing with them. Over tens of millions of years of years of evolution, there has never been a social animal who judged all others of his species objectively.

Wordists are very unnatural animals. What passes for loyalty in them is whether a group represents Good or Evil. Someone who is wrong is not just wrong, it is Hate of all things that are Good. No healthy minded person can think that way. He loves his family and knows what is right and wrong about them. The loyalty does not vary.

It is inevitable that the Wordist sees the world in terms of Hate versus Love, of Good versus Evil.

To a person with a healthy mind, this is a very sick way to look at things.