why conservative?

Great Debates
1

my disclaimer:

i’m curious about this, so i’d appreciate answers rather than defensive posters feeling that i’m attacking their views. i’m just wondering, that’s all…

my question:

aren’t conservative/right wing political viewpoints just ‘putting off the inevitable’? society, on the whole seems to be growing increasingly liberal, as can be seen in the femenist movement; the growing unacceptability of racism, homophobia; the legality of abortions; the freedom of religions found in (western) societies; the emancipation of slaves; etc. on the whole, there seems to be a shift towards more liberal attitudes in western society, and there seems to be no indication that this trend is going to reverse at any time in the near future.

so, it seems to me that conservatism is just hindering the natural progression of society, prohibiting the attitudes that shall undoubtedly flourish regardless.

am i missing something? anyone who’d describe themselves as conservative, please tell me.

2

You’re confusing conservative with regressive.

As evidenced by the founder of modern conservatism, Barry Goldwater, conservatism can be extremely progressive.

3

Perhaps conservitism is the “brakes” on the runaway train of liberalism?

4

You are also confusing “liberal” with “Liberal.” Taking only one of your examples, emancipation of the slaves, illustrates this point. That act was in keeping with a liberal political philosophy (as in liberalism) but not considered, from a political perspective, a Liberal cause. In fact, it served as one of the rallying causes for the formation of the Republican party. Generally, the modern discussion of Liberal v. conservative does not center on beliefs about personal freedom as much as it centers on views of the function of government (particularly the federal government) within our society. Most Libertarians are generally considered to be political “conservatives” in that they believe government is an inefficient and invasive entity, and therefore to be kept as small as possible, but are probably closer to the philosophical tradition of liberalism than any other political party.

5

Oy.

gex gex, there are numerous sources on the internet which can explain conservative political philosophy to you, none of which lists racial prejudice, homophobia, religious intolerance or gender bias as the tenets of that philosophy.

Try these links:

http://counterrevolution.net/consfaq.html

http://www.xrefer.com/entry/551667

http://www.friesian.com/conserv.htm

http://www.nhinet.org/raeder.htm

All of these are on the first page of a Google search on “conservatism”.
Enjoy your stay in Great Debates. Others will be by shortly to assist you further.

6

conservatism. me bad spelller.

7

Conservatism isn’t synonomous with intolerence or hate.

8

This is a fair question, gg. I don’t have time now to write the full response that your question may deserve.

I was a far-left liberal who became a libertarian-leaning conservative. For me, the biggest issues are:

  1. Size of government. IMHO a bigger, more powerful government will automatically be more corrupt will permit less freedom.

  2. Workability or reality. Many liberal approaches just won’t produce the desired result. E.g., public education is failing many children. Liberals tend to oppose alternatives that work better, such as home-schooling and vouchers. Many other liberal approaches have failed to achieve their goal, but it’s almost impossible to undo a program once it’s in place.

BTW gg, I wish you’d delete the reference to slavery, which could be misunderstood. No conservative supports slavery. In fact, conservatives have been more concerned than liberals regarding slavery that exists right now in the Sudan.

9

I went to
http://counterrevolution.net/consfaq.html and to my amazement found this **3.5 Aren’t conservatives racist sexist homophobes?

That depends on what those words mean. They are often used very broadly.

“Racist”–Conservatives consider community loyalty important. The communities people grow up in are generally connected to ethnicity. That’s no accident, because ethnicity is what develops when people live together with a common way of life for a long time. Accordingly, conservatives think some degree of ethnic loyalty and separateness is OK. Ethnicity is not the same thing as “race” as a biological category; on the other hand, the two are difficult to disentangle because both arise out of shared history and common descent.

“Sexist”–All known societies have engaged in sex-role stereotyping, with men undertaking more responsibility for public affairs and women for home, family, and childcare. There are obvious benefits to such stereotypes, since they make it far more likely that individual men and women will complement each other and form stable and functional unions for the rearing of children. Also, some degree of differentiation seems to fit the presocial tendencies of men and women better than unisex would. Conservatives see no reason to struggle against those benefits, especially in view of the evident bad consequences of the weakening of stereotypical obligations between the sexes in recent decades.

“Homophobes”–Finally, sex-role stereotyping implies a tendency to reject patterns of impulse, attitude and conduct that don’t fit the stereotypes, such as homosexuality.**

So basically from this faq that you provided about conservatism, it is fair to say that Sex-ROLEs are important. Basically,isn’t it saying that Women should stay at home and have babies? Remember this is from your source of conservatism faq --> http://counterrevolution.net/consfaq.html#12

10

dierson, that faq seems to be saying that conservatives want to allow “communities” to follow established, traditional social constraints within the framework of accepted social mores. Immediately prior to the passage you quoted, we find the following description of conservative attitudes toward government enforcement of egalitarian values:

None of the above tells me that conservatism requires strict gender roles, segregation or intolerance of sexual preference.
BTW, this is not my source of conservatism faq; just a source I found quite readily by searching on Google.

11

re: slavery. i honestly did not mean any offence with this; i was using emancipation as another example of a view that would have been considered ‘radical’ at some time in history, whereas it is now viewed as an integral part of our society. i’m sorry if i suggested otherwise, after all, i don’t think that there are many people in the modern world who would advocate slavery, whatever their political leaning.

similarly, i know i may have suggested that conservatism is synonymous with intolerance or hate, this is not what i meant at all (and i know it does seem like did suggest that). while there are some elements of conservatism, that i personally see as infringing on personal rights, they should be discussed in their own threads, and here i’m more interested in gaining an insight into what i proposed in the op.

thanks to everyone for their responses, i’ll speak more when i’ve had some time to look at the links.

12

Yeah, but a lot of intolerant and hateful folks often use conservative views to justify their positions. I can’t imagine offhand the kind of argument that’d be needed for a self-professed liberal to shout “God hates fags!”, for instance.

13

The OP’s position seems to be that, if it appears my side is losing, if it appears that the momentum is against my side, if most people are rejecting my arguments and embracing values I find abhorrent, I should just give up, and go with the flow.

Well, one needn’t be a conservative to reject that kind of logic. No matter what your beliefs are, you’re going to find that, sometimes at least, the majority of Americans are going to view you as a fruitcake or oddball.

Despite the best efforts of liberals everywhere, the overwhelming majority of Americans support the death penalty- so, should a good liberal give up his efforts to abolish it?

It’s clear that, despite the best efforts of environmentalists, few Americans are willing to cut back their consumption of energy. So, should Greenpeace and the Sierra Club disband?

Since George W. Bush has 90+ % approval ratings, and most Americans are eager to kick Arab butt, should peace activists just give up, and accept that war is inevitable?

I grant you, it’s lonely and frustrating being an ideological purist! As an idealist (of any stripe), you WANT to believe that most of your fellow citizens are decent people, and that they’d surely come around to your point of view, IF ONLY they’d listen to your eloquent arguments! In reality, most people have HEARD all your eloquent arguments, many times, and don’t find them persuasive.

But whether you’re on the right or on the left, you have an obligation to hang in there and keep pressing your cause, even when it appears nobody’s listening.

I seem to recall that, in the first issue of National Review, the editor’s note said something like, "We stand before the onrushing tides of Progress, screaming “STOP!”

A thankless task, sometimes an impossible one. But hey, SOMEBODY’S gotta do it!

14

Can you imagine the kind of argument that would be needed for a self-professed liberal – say, for example, a radical Black activist – to call a murdered police officer a “pimp” and a “monster”? (Cite. Pam Africa of MOVE, at a “Free Mumia” concert at Madison Square Garden, referred to Daniel Faulkner thus: “Who the hell is Danny Faulkner?… We’ve known who Mumia Abu-Jamal is from the time he exited his mother’s womb. Now who the hell is Danny Faulkner? Why is the government so hell-bent on breaking the law that they won’t tell us who Danny Faulkner is? I don’t know, but I got some hearsay. . . . I heard from reliable sources that this man was a pimp to some black women, teenagers in schools. . . . I don’t know, it’s hearsay. But if you are calling this monster a hero, like we’re calling Mumia a hero, then dammit, prove it! . . . We are demanding to know who’s Danny Faulkner!” )

We can both come up with examples all day long if you’d like. Do you think there’s much point to it, or can we agree that both capital-C Conservatives and capital-L Liberals have their fair share of hateful and intolerant morons?

15

The National Review’s editorial purpose was “To stand athwart history yelling stop” If you recall the times in which the magazine was first published it was a time of liberal supremacy. Communism was spreading revolution around the world and socialism was gaining ground in the west. Many thought that society’s natural evolution was from capitalism and democracy to communism and totalitarinism. Thus conservatism was against this and for the preservation of freedom and liberty. There will always be people who mistake change for progress but conservatives know that this is not the case and exchanging the new and untried for the tried and true is usually not a good idea.
As for liberal whig histiography it is demonstrably untrue. Liberalism was tried in this country and it did not work and now conservatism is on the rise. Welfare reform is wildly succesful and no politician who has national ambitions dare assail it. Every politician is trying to appear tough on crime. The democrats have not nominated someone who was anti-death penalty since 1988. Free trade is increasingly the norm throughout the world. Politicians who promise to raise taxes are as popular as root canal. The kind of liberalism once so prevalent is now increasingly an anachronism. Just think of the contenders for the democratic nomination in '04, every one of them at least pretends to be a ‘new democrat’.

16

Fair enough. “A” source, but generally the jist of the whole fact is ‘Hey, what’s wrong with livin’ with your own kind in the way you think it used to be in the 50’s!’

I don’t have a problem with free association with ones “own kind”.

I just think it is funny to think of the old days as better.

BTW I think Bush is doing a good job; however, I still think he is a doofus. S

17

I think we need to be quite clear that the philosophy of liberalism, a decent but by no means authoritative summary is available here, was and is a key component of American democracy, economics and law. The writings of individuals such as Locke and Kant greatly influenced the founding fathers and the writings of Mill continue to have a profound impact on our system of government as do the works of Rawls for our legal system.

I, for one, would consider myself a conservative and a liberal (from that philosophical tradition). The essence of the modern liberal versus conservative debate (really Democrat versus Reublican) in this country is about the scope and function of government. It is a debate about who or what entity is best equipped to address the inequality, poverty, famine, etc. within our society. While that debate can be informed by liberalism, that philosophical tradition is distinct from arguments about whether, for example, the federal government or private orgaizations should run midnight basketball programs.

The biggest Democrat versus Republican myth in our society, in my opinion gg, is that conservatives do not care about their fellow human beings. Most Democrats and Republicans agree on the problems we face and agree that something should be done about them. (I grant you there are loonies in both camps but all movements have them.) Conservatism, then, is best seen as a method for solving problems that embraces more local and private solutions because conservatives generally see the government as inefficient or overly intrusive on the liberties of individual citizens. Liberals (in the Democrat sense of the word) view the government as an important tool which, though possibly not the most efficient, has the benefit of economies of scale and can overcome certain of the possible defects of a free market system (e.g., the Tragedy of the Commons), among others.

18

I think you can find a “fair share” of hateful and intolerant morons at a Star Trek convention. :wink:

Large gatherings of human beans are always trouble. It’s just my informal and anecdotal observation that a lot folks who perpetuate or support “hate crime”-type behavior (attacks on folks based on race, gender, sexual orientation, etc.) tend to use conservative-leaning arguments to justify their POV. But you’re right, it’s all a matter of what specific incidents you’re looking at.

19

Gex,

As a fairly conservative person, I do sometimes have that sinking feeling. The media has done a good job painting republicans as hatemongers, racists and ‘regressive’. Talk radio is about the only venue left that even tries to offer opinions without convincing people of the inherent goodness or Democrats and evil of Republicans. Your post is a good example of this.

The other issue that measures this is spending. In Clinton’s last year in office the federal government grew by 8%. This is an alarming figure. The private sector of the economy even in the best of a bull market does not grow at this fast a rate. If every year the budget increased by this amount then soon the government would grow to a level that could only be called socialist. Now, with George Bush in the white house his first budget calls for 4% growth. Certainly a step in the right direction, but it does seem like one step forward after Clinton’s two steps backward. The idea of any Republican (and certainly not any Dem) actually lowering the budget is just not going to happen. They already get slammed by many in the media for ‘cutting back’ on government programs when all they actually did is increase them by a lesser amount.

20

Even if we ignore, (at our peril), the philosophical points brought out by Thrasybulus, the quoted statement is simply a view of the constant pendulum of ideas in history, restricted to ignore the last sweep.

The “failed” liberalism that is (often correctly) rebuked at present was a direct response to the “failed” conservatism that preceded it. The notions of absolute free-market, governmental non-involvement in society led to practices among the rich and powerful that encouraged the rise of “progressives” and then “liberals.” Following the Depression, many liberal practices were institutionalized to the point that they became oppressive, but it is not hard to see where some of the “corrective” measures are planting the seeds of future abuse. If we are lucky, it is possible that the pendulum will swing in smaller arcs with less extreme measure. (When the newly elected Republicans began to carry out their Contract on America, they were quickly notified by their constituents that they did not have permission to destroy the EPA, only to blunt its more egregious arrogance.)

Welfare reform is wildly popular. It will be several more years before we know that it is actually successful. Many necessary reforms were instituted during a period of rising prosperity. The results of those reforms have not been put to the test in a period of decline. Perhaps they will be successful, perhaps they will not.

I reject the notion of the hard-hearted conservative. However, painting “liberals” or “conservatives” or “libertarians” as, ultimately, right or wrong in any absolute sense ignores the fact that ideals are always tested against both opposing philosophies and against the real world. As the world changes, philosophies tend to be modified and adjusted to account for that reality. It is unlikely that any single -ism will every deal properly with every situation. They will all need to be challenged to avoid excess and stagnation.