There was a hint of a contradiction lingering there in that previous discussion on the relation of ideology to reality, and I think working out that logic could be helpful and illuminating.
On the one hand, we have the contention that part of an ideology's power lies in its ability to faithfully describe reality, and in so doing, allow its adherents to successfully navigate that reality, which seems to ring true. Bald lies and sad, desperate iterative representations of an increasingly irrelevant and bygone era can certainly hold things together for a little while and motivate some, but we can observe that phenomena to progressively weaken and eventually fail, and it often becomes ever more vivid and insistent before the moment it finally collapses.
On the other hand, a mass movement charged with the prevailing instincts and moving forces at the time can achieve a sort of escape velocity all of its own, regardless of its proper descriptive relation to reality, and indeed, set in motion forces that confirm its own contentions, thereby functioning as a self-fulfilling prophecy.
One example that comes to immediate mind was the emergence of neoliberal ideology in the 70s and 80s, which of course had its roots extending back long before that. There were complex reasons for this emergence and rise to dominance, but part of it had to do with the fact that its basic thrust appealed to a broad range of economic and political actors. The ideology's prescriptions of turning the private sector loose once again and setting free the suffocating webs of regulation and so on were enough to get the broadly stagnant and dysfunctional political and economic machinery moving again. Nevermind that its basic contentions were nonsense, and that half a century later we'd be cursing its name with clenched teeth and flying spittle, trying to kick it into the wastebin as it holds fast through its death throes.
And for that matter, we have ideology after ideology that do in fact do a good job of describing reality while holding consonance with its moving forces, only to be smothered in their cribs or stamped out, or which have to go underground and subsist on roots while holding out hope of an eventual re-emergence.
As always, we have to take into account the movement and concentration of power. Who is associated with whom toward what end, and to what extent can they bring ideas into their full embodiment in material reality? From the perspective of us truth-lovers, attempting to greet the world with an open heart and converse in good faith with the spirits, reality appears bent by the long historical evolution of human power, along the contours of which lies the aforementioned contradiction. But that too is reality.
