Do conservatives misdefine integrity of character as obedience?

[erislover]

This has got to be the longest GD thread where the debate was on debating when the OP was about conservativism.

Originally found in the OP
The main problem I have with core conservatism in general is that I believe they completely misdefine integrity of character, and thus many of them end up lacking self-honesty, self-courage, self-loyalty in favor of being someone else’s fool.

In other words, core conservatives are dogmatists.

I define integrity of character as expressing one’s freely developed personality from a process of discovery that assumes equal opportunity, independence, common sense, knowledge, experience, which ultimately leads to self-awareness. I might also suggest that there is no substitute for this.

I would largely agree with this, and I think conservatives would too. I think your bounries for what an acceptable personality is just happens to be larger, though apparently not large enough to contain conservatives.
~~Next part of OP heads into a restatement, in different terms, that conservatives are simply dogmatic in thier beliefs.

[/quote]

I’m gonna leave off here, I think, and say this. Brian, if you simply replace “conservatives” with “dogmatists” and leave out the specifics you have a decent argument ready to go about why dogmatism is shitty. Can you concede here and hope that others can stop debating you?

Any attempt to go down the lines about conservatives or liberals will only get you deeper in the quicksand. There is no accepted definition for either term; people who consider themselves a part of that group do so largely because they find that they agree with that group on specific terms which they deem to be most important to their value system. Conservatives are not afraid of change; liberals are not all socialists, nor are they laizze faire capilitalists. Not all conservatives are religious.

What o you think? Can you be a moderate (heh) here and restart the discussion? Or am I out of line with this?

[Milossarian]

In a thread designed to be acrimonious and divisive, I’m not sure I’ve recalled seeing more consensus across political lines or levels of religious belief.

Well, when you tone out certain white-noise frequencies, that is.

[Grim_Beaker]

I didn’t know you were a compassionate conservative Gaudere!

[SPOOFE]

Your post itself was wildy inflammatory and insulting.

Look out, guys, he’s talking into the mirror again!

[capacitor]

So what you are saying, Brian, is that Clinton is the ideal politician, in that he has no principles to begin with?