Yes, Leftists are 'Evil.' Here’s How They Got That Way — and Why You’ll Never Change Them

American Thinker ^ | February 16, 2026 | Selwyn Duke

[rlmorel]

Look to the moral foundations formed from the beginning.

“They are programmed…,” Soviet defector and ex-KGB man Yuri Bezmenov warned decades ago about the ideologues we call “leftists.” “You cannot change their mind…. You are stuck with them.” It’s common for people to say today when contrasting our two major ideological groups, “Conservatives think leftists are misguided; leftists think conservatives are evil.” I, though, am different. I know leftists are evil.

That is, practically speaking. Theologically speaking, I’m not judging their souls or inborn nature. Putting it plainly, however, and alluding to the reality that leftists have embraced evil, I will say they are so. I’m going to now explain how they got that way, too, and why Bezmenov was right: You will never, ever change their minds..."

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TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: democrats; leftists; liberals

[rlmorel]

Like many others on this forum, I have spent much of my life wondering why Leftists are the way they are. I find it puzzling that two people, growing up in the same household, with the same parents and the same schools, can turn out so radically different.

I saw, when working in Healthcare for 40 years, extremely intelligent people, Doctors, Nurses, and Technicians who were bright, smart, like-able, and principled in their work, yet were rabid Leftists in their personal life and supported all manner of Leftist policies.

And I also noted that with very few exceptions, these otherwise intelligent and educated people could not in any way be swayed from their Leftist beliefs, at least not by anything I might say or do. I have observed, however, that people rarely DO make a transition from Leftism to Conservatism. It happens. But it usually requires a violent earthquake in their personal lives to do so. Two famous and object examples of this are David Horowitz, who was a "Red Diaper Baby" and the administrator of the affairs of the Black Panthers, and the other was Tulsi Gabbard, who was the Assistant Chair of the DNC. In the former case of Horowitz, he was moved to conservatism by the violent death of an acquaintance he worked with who was an accountant in the Black Panther organization because "she knew too much". In the latter case of Gabbard, she was turned on by her own party for her deviation from the Party orthodoxy.

But it baffled me that Leftists most often cannot have their minds changed.

Leftism is nearly transparently evil in and of itself. There is a thin veneer of "virtue" the overlies all of it which serves as, at best, plausible camouflage, and at worst, an intentional and malignant tool of deception by people with different motives than virtue.

I do not have any formal training in Psychology to know how actually factual it is in that field of knowledge, but I know enough to recognize as empirical fact by observation that children before the age of 8 years old are malleable and formable in unique ways, and the Left leverages this in a variety of ways.

The fundamental premise of the author is that who you are is often solidified in your first seven years of life. The author observes that "...the “age of reason” has traditionally been considered seven...

This was a well written article. Many Freepers have discussed this with me over the years, and I would be interested in any commentary.

[sauropod]

Bflr

[V_TWIN]

Pretty simple to me.

How many liberal democrats you know that are Christ followers?

I know none.

Without THE One and only living God leading their lives they are lost and consumed by a broken and fallen world.....left to pursue worldly things like money and power as their idols.

That’s my 2 cent anyway.

[Leaning Right]

> “Conservatives think leftists are misguided; leftists think conservatives are evil.” <

Oh my goodness. So true.

Quick story:

I once went to a dinner party given by a liberal acquaintance of mine. Nice lady. Or so I thought.

Well, someone at the table made an innocent remark about Trump. It’s wasn’t political or ideological in any way.

Our host immediately went crazy. She jumped up from her chair and began waving her hands - screaming about Trump and anyone who supported him. It was like being in a horror movie.

Fortunately, someone else who was present was able to change the subject.

[AppyPappy]

I rarely encounter liberals. Almost all of them are a Democrat now. They sold out to the party. You’ll notice that their heartfelt beliefs go away when a Democrat is in the White House. “We believe the victims” until a Democrat gets accused. Democrats weren’t shouting about the Epstein files while Biden was in office. Democrats were silent when Obama was deporting people. They are not allowed to oppose the Party.

[bankwalker]

evidently, the folks from the frankfurt school were extremely effective ...

[devane617]

Blah blah blah...I hate these articles that are more confusing than rational. Good grief, go have some FRIED CHICKEN and back away from understanding you don’t have.

[drwoof]

It’s a very interesting subject. Recalling who I was at seven, I will attest to a certain state of reason, and the knowing of right from wrong. My teen years were a mess, however. Adrift, I adopted the then popular leftist identity. I had a subscription to Rolling Stone, and accepted all the propaganda as Truth. I fancied myself as being intellectual, a member of the Smart Set. I was in short an insufferable jackass. Then, at 21, my girlfriend announced one day that she might be pregnant. She in the same breath assured me, though, that if so, she would simply get an abortion. A bolt of lighting struck me, and I roared out a very definite “You will NOT!”. We were both shocked. That moment changed my life; I became aware of the fact that what I professed to believe/what I had been programmed to believe (that abortion was a just fine, for example) wasn’t what I knew at a spiritual level to be true. I began as a result to question my thinking on other matters, and over time, became quite conservative. One might say there was Divine Intervention in my life, and I would agree. No man or woman changed me: God did.

[Pete Dovgan]

Are they all really evil, or just a few of them?

I have battled with this question for years. I have discovered that they have a ‘viewpoint’ that is different from others. They see different things. Most of the time, they believe that they are ‘doing good’ by supporting the insane left wing things, because they don’t see the other side.

For instance, Conservatives see mass unscreened immigration as dangerous. We see it cause chaos, huge deficits, crime, and horrible murders, rapes, and theft. We see the open border as completely dangerous to a functional Republic. We see that ‘chaos’ as a tool of the left top echelon to replace Americans with those who are used to dictatorships, so they can gain and maintain power. We see open borders as destructive to the middle class of America, the Constitution, and rule of law. We see it as a great terrorism risk. We see it as a drain on programs that were intended for Americans; such as SS, Disability, Welfare, Food, and housing. Conservatives sense ‘open’ borders as a threat to family, Government, and Constitution.

The Democrats elite who want open borders are evil. They want to control and subjugate the population, which is impossible with a ‘free people’. So they bring in people who ‘vote’ for policies/politics of their control. The goal is strictly authoritarian, they want more power and money and separation from the ‘masses’.

The average democrat, the ones Obama called “stupid” and Hillary called “easily manipulated” believe in the ‘human spirit’. They want everyone to have the great experience of ‘America’ and don’t understand that their actions threaten other citizens future or ‘America’ itself. They don’t see ‘consequences’ they just ‘feel’ for the people. They honestly believe they are doing the ‘most good’. They feel that people that are blocking ‘open’ borders are ‘authoritarian’. They feel (now) that immigration laws should be ignored because they are bad laws right now when they don’t agree with them. The don’t understand how a group of people who ignore laws, because they are inconvenient, are a problem for a Republic. They can’t conceptualize the hypocrisy of screaming about ‘rights’ when they undermine the system that has provided them.

In sum, they aren’t ‘evil’ they want to do good. They just have a complete misunderstanding of Risks and Consequences of decisions. You either live life with ‘magical thinking’ or you live life with ‘actions and consequences’.

[Williams]

Considering this is a deep article seeking to answer a very important question (Why leftists are nuts/ evil) I’m astounded to agree with the whole thing 99.9%.

There might be a few tweaks needed because it’s tying all this in with how people were raised up to age 7, but essentially... yeah.

From my own “research” (life) boy is it true we are loaded with parents who teach their kids to lie, cut corners and worse. Plus the destruction of religious or moral education.

And ties in with my belief that democrats are immoral thugs, they know it and they like it.

[bankwalker]

so did she murder your kid?

[Williams]

You wznt to believe they aren’t evil.

Think about all the truly evil people in the world, the way ones to spot. They kill, rape, steal, lie, cheat.

Ever see one of them who didn’t make a very nice set of excuses for their behavior?

Essentially they wanted to do something bad and they selfishly acted on it. Liberals are dying the same thing.

They want to win elections, control society and the way people think, and damn it they are going to yell scream and fight until they get what they want by any means. They will cost you your job or beat you up in the street if they have to,burn down a city, loot - or justify those that do it for them.

Ever see a conservative justify a riot, stealing, burning, destruction of statues, stealing elections?? I haven’t.

[drwoof]

No. It turned out that she was not, in fact, pregnant. My affection for her completely evaporated that day, and I broke up with her shortly thereafter. I could not look at her in the same way; I saw her as a cold-hearted killer. As I said, the experience changed my life. Quite the lesson.

[DeplorablePaul]

I view liberals as zombies. Musk says that they are infected with a mind virus. Others say liberals are brainwashed. Whatever the cause they’re brain dead.

[T.B. Yoits]

It was fallacious to assume that dismantling cults would remove the drive for some people to be cult members.

Leftism gives followers the excuse to blame their faults on others.

Leftism gives followers the excuse to hand over their thinking to others.

Leftism gives followers an excuse for avoiding the truth.

"The first effect of not believing in God is to believe in anything." - Emile Cammaerts, The Laughing Prophet: The Seven Virtues and G.K. Chesterton

[curious7]

Exactly the same as the communist party. If it walks like a Duck, quacks like a Duck, lookss like a Duck....

[HIDEK6]

We should realize that leftists will never “return” to the sanity they did not, in the first place, possess.

They must be beaten into submission.

[unixfox]

These people are what I call SHEEPLE. They follow the meme of the day and are incapable of forming their own thoughts. The public school system has succeeded with indoctrination.

[Democrat = party of treason]

In my mind, it usually all boils down to whether or not the person’s heart is open to God and the things of God, or closed to God’s influence.

That said though, I know a number of Bible believing church going people who, for some reason I cannot explain, cling to the democrat party. They have always been democrats, and even though everyone but them can clearly see that the modern democrat party has left them behind in the dust, they cannot let go. They tend to ignore the what modern democrats say and do, and believe that these are just crazy people posing as democrats. In their minds, Jimmy Peanut Carter was the greatest American President ever and he was a democrat, period.

[aquila48]

It’s in the genes!

I truly believe that there is a significant difference in genetic predisposition between conservatives and leftists (radicals). That is why it is so hard to change with mere words.

Conservative look at this imperfect world and try to make the best of it, gradually improving it. Radicals look at the same world and see injustices everywhere and want to blow it up ASAP and replace it with their untested wet dreams.

And what grates them most are inequalities. To them that’s the ultimate injustice.