Decius wrote:

the cry I do not have an idealogy (i was taught by my left wing teachers) is the cry of a person so immersed in what Gramsci called hegemony that their idealogy is held entirely unconsciously.

That perspective is a bit circular. I'm not talking about hegemony. I'm talking about people who conciously choose to evaluate what they think about an issue based on their favorite philosophy as opposed to considering the effect that they wish to acheive and asking how they might acheive it. An example would be Catholics opposing sexual education in Africa on purely idealogical grounds in spite of the fact that distributing condoms will in fact lead to a healthier society there and in no way limits their ability to advocate abstinance. They justify their policies based on philosophy rather then strategy.

I think we agree but are arguing at cross purposes. By idealogy I mean the consistent or not set of ideas and beliefs used to make judgements. What you refer to I would simply call dogma.

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