Dyer states that authoritarians often display a mistrust of "intellectuals," particularly people who make their living as thinkers, but he adds this caveat:
"Today of course, there is no lack of authoritarians in academic fields; however, these people tend to be devoted followers of some 'school of thought,' and more often than not are notable only for blindly following what some 'great man' has taught."
Authoritarians tend to resist looking into their own motivations. Dyer observes that one of the things such a person seems most afraid of - is admitting (to others or to themselves) that they have not always been "right." Authoritarians reject looking inward because they have come to rely so strongly on external support systems to convince themselves of their own value - and the "rightness" of their position.
6) PARANOIA
Authoritarians' basic distrust of themselves tends to make them suspicious about every human encounter, projecting their distrust outward. Because they find it so difficult to admit that they, themselves, are responsible (at least in part) for creating many of the problems they complain about, they feel compelled to blame someone else.
As Dyer notes - "even to [be able to] support the relatively mild paranoia of the majority of authoritarians it is necessary for them to imagine a multitude of enemies out there. (Yet these same individuals seldom allow themselves to be moved to greater sympathy or support for others who really are being persecuted). Their paranoid picture of the world [usually] simply leads such people to withdraw into ever-tightening spirals of paranoia."
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