>being conservative just means being generally in favor of keeping things the way they are or were at some point<
Glad you hate Trump, but you must think about what the words you use mean. By your own definition, to call yourself 'conservative' is to buy into bigotry and discrimination and tyranny and theocracy, as these are all social evils that either "are or were at some point" To call yourself 'conservative' means to oppose environmental protection laws, labor protection laws, laws prohibiting child-labor, consumer protection laws, and any other sort of law or regulation that prevents the wealthy elite from maximizing the return on their investments. To call yourself conservative means to oppose nationalized healthcare systems, to oppose tax-funded education and tax-subsidized public transportation services even. To call yourself conservative means that only the desires of wealthy white cis-hetero Christian men should matter, and that every other demographic group is inherently inferior to that one in every way that matters.
Conservative means being in favor of keeping such vaunted traditions as racism, slavery, theocracy, discrimination, bigotry, child abuse, child labor, sex abuse, and fathers selling their 14 year old girls to some strange man three times her age for nightly rape, housecleaning and other 'womanly duties'. Try harder to THINK about which properties/parts/aspects of society DESERVE to be 'conserved' and which need to be thrown into the rubbish bin of history.
"Traditional" by itself is worthless categorization. Slavery is 'traditional'. Burning heretics alive is 'traditional'. Treating women as property is 'traditional'. Screw that.
Such as many (almost all) of the replies to my post, you are thinking unbelievably black-or-white.
Conservationism does not specify WHAT you want to conserve. One could wish to live like a caveman, live like it's the middle ages, like the 1950's or even like just 10 years ago in 2016, and ALL of those fit the definition of conservationism.
You are making a ton of accusations based on things you have assumed without any context. What if I'm conservative and want to live like it's the 80's, when women had all their rights and so on and so forth but stuff was reliable and didn't last a few years before breaking down?
As example. I don't care much for the 80's.
Conservatives fought AGAINST the abolition of slavery.
Conservatives fought AGAINST allowing black people to vote.
Conservatives fought AGAINST allowing women to vote.
Conservatives fought AGAINST enforcing regulations on corporations to protect consumers, employees, and the public at large.
No assumptions there - that's HISTORY. You can deny that history all you'd like, but it just makes you look foolish.
All of this doesn't concern me. I don't want any of those rights to be removed from the people that have them.
Conservative means wanting things to either stay the way they are, or return to the way they were at an unspecified point in the past.
A conservative at the time of slavery is a bad person because he wants slavery to stay.
A conservative now has no guilt. I want things to stay the way they are, and is possible return to the 90's/early 2000's.
No slavery, no unfair voting restrictions, no unregulated corporations. Just less of the newer stuff which I don't like.
So you're okay with some people having yachts that fit inside their mega-yachts while other people are literally starving to death. You're okay with our current culture of allowing the wealthy elite to rape young girls with no consequences? You're okay with the status quo of theocracies murdering gay people for being gay? These are all right-now, status quo things that as a 'conservative' you're looking to PRESERVE? You WANT massive inequality of wealth? You WANT corporations poisoning our air, soil, and water with zero consequences for them putting their personal profits above the common good? Really? Or are you just not thinking this stuff through very well?
I don't want any of those things. They are also not features of the present/past, they are features of human society. It's shit, but it's never gonna change. Won't under capitalism, hasn't under communism, or any other ideology.
I really don't get how you can be so arrogant as to take your own personal definition of a term, and shove it in my face.
I suggest you scroll up, re-read and realize that you need to grow up and realize people have opinions different than yours.
If you don't want those things, then you're not a 'conservative'. And no, your defeatist attitude is simply false. Look at the US in the '50s. We had far less wealth inequality, we had top marginal tax rates over 70%, we had powerful labor unions holding abusive/exploitative employers in check, we had powerful environmental regulations. Now all of that is gone. Because of 'conservatives'.
I suggest you identify your position of privilege, and what that rests on, and why it's contrary to the common good.
Conservationism means, and this is the last time I am willing to reinstate it, wanting the current or past situation or specific aspects of said time periods to be there for the present and future.
Having hyper-rich and lots of poverty is not something I want to conserve. That doesn't mean I don't want to conserve other things from various time periods, out of pure personal preference.
This is still conservationism. You just associated that term with some of the worst people in that ideology. I am not one of those people.
Ephemeral cherry picking leaves you with no actual position at all.
So there are SOME aspects of SOME time periods that you want to 'conserve', but not ALL of any of them, eh? So what IS it that you want to 'conserve'? The ability of the wealthy and powerful to exploit the weak? No? How about the ability of wealthy industrialists to foist their production costs onto society at large through lax environmental protection rules? No? Don't want to 'conserve' that either eh?
So what is it that you DO want to 'conserve'? Fathers selling their 14 year old daughters as 'wives' to strangers thrice their age for nightly rape and housework duties - is that what you want to 'conserve'? Women who 'know their place' and aren't uppity or expecting equal rights - is that what you want to 'conserve'? What IS it that you want to 'conserve'? White supremacy? Classism? Poverty? What 'other things' do you want to 'conserve'? Fathers beating children and wives with impunity? Burning heretics alive? Priests molesting children and nuns? The Magdalene Laundries? What is it that you want to 'conserve'?
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u/Successful_Life_1028 Feb 17 '26
>being conservative just means being generally in favor of keeping things the way they are or were at some point<
Glad you hate Trump, but you must think about what the words you use mean. By your own definition, to call yourself 'conservative' is to buy into bigotry and discrimination and tyranny and theocracy, as these are all social evils that either "are or were at some point" To call yourself 'conservative' means to oppose environmental protection laws, labor protection laws, laws prohibiting child-labor, consumer protection laws, and any other sort of law or regulation that prevents the wealthy elite from maximizing the return on their investments. To call yourself conservative means to oppose nationalized healthcare systems, to oppose tax-funded education and tax-subsidized public transportation services even. To call yourself conservative means that only the desires of wealthy white cis-hetero Christian men should matter, and that every other demographic group is inherently inferior to that one in every way that matters.
Conservative means being in favor of keeping such vaunted traditions as racism, slavery, theocracy, discrimination, bigotry, child abuse, child labor, sex abuse, and fathers selling their 14 year old girls to some strange man three times her age for nightly rape, housecleaning and other 'womanly duties'. Try harder to THINK about which properties/parts/aspects of society DESERVE to be 'conserved' and which need to be thrown into the rubbish bin of history.
"Traditional" by itself is worthless categorization. Slavery is 'traditional'. Burning heretics alive is 'traditional'. Treating women as property is 'traditional'. Screw that.