Reductio Ad Absurdum, Part II: My Reply to 'Why Don't Liberals Leave America and Found Their Own Country?'

Dear Anonymous,

Originally, I wasn’t going to answer this question. I find it insulting, based on partisan hate, and full of ignorance. And, of course, chances are that the original creator of this “query” is a paid troll working for Russia’s destabilizing efforts.

But, hey, it’s rather early on a Sunday morning, and since I have nothing better to do, I’ll try to enlighten you. Not that I’ll succeed, especially if you are one of those Trump supporters who believe that “liberalism is a mental disorder.”

First of all, let’s look at a map of the world.

Let’s, for a few minutes, take seriously the “modest proposal” that is the basis for this, ahem, question. Examine closely, my conservative friend, the map above.

You no doubt recall from your high school science class that three-quarters of the Earth’s surface is covered by water, most of it salty ocean water that humans can’t consume without desalination and purification.

The other quarter of the Earth’s surface is, of course, land. This is divided into various continents. According to geographical convention, there are seven continents, including Antarctica (not pictured here because, alas, it is uninhabitable.) Realistically, though, there are only two super-continents: The American land mass and the Eurasia-Africa landmass, plus one smaller continent, Australia. (Africa is only separated from Asia by the man-made Suez Canal; the division between Europe and Asia is only a geographical convention invented by Europeans.)

As you can see by looking at all the squiggly lines on the map called “borders,” all of the inhabitable, arable land is “spoken for.” There is precious little usable, uninhabited real estate left on the planet.

Thus, the notion that hundreds of millions of Americans who identify as liberals can simply emulate the European colonists of the 17th Century and seek a Newer World so that conservatives can live in their idealized version of America without the “stain” of liberalism is, in a word, absurd.

I mean, seriously, original poster, the Age of Discovery ended centuries ago. There are no New Worlds to colonize, and wars of conquest went out of fashion in 1945 with the end of World War II. So unless you are the 21st Century incarnation of Adolf Hitler (because that’s the kind of mindset that’s needed for this scenario) and are willing to see liberals create an army, adopt ruthless policies based on Nazi principles of lebensraum (living space), and invade, say, Russia, there’s no way that liberals can leave the United States and “found their own country.”

I don’t know, Dear Anonymous, but it seems to me that your notion is not only absurdly illogical, but it also ignores a basic fact that quite a few of my fellow Quorans have mentioned in their replies:

We won’t leave the United States of America because, whether you like it or not, this is our country, too. We live here. Many of the principles we all hold dear are based on liberal ideas. And, as unpleasant as this basic truth may be to you, we aren’t going anywhere.