cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/17713638
““If we jail Trump, get rid of Maga, end the electoral college, ban voter ID, censor free speech, we’ll save democracy,” says one meme in a QAnon channel on Telegram that depicts Biden in a Nazi uniform with a Hitler mustache”
Apparently they at least understand their opponent’s view .
Hard disagree here.
I agree with you that Conservatism is an outdated concept that it’s done far more harm than good in the world. It’s a relic that needs to be relegated to the dust-bin of history, yes.
But Conservatism is nothing more than a series of economic and political ideals. Nothing more. There are a thousand different reasons for people to identify with one side or the other. Neither Conservatism nor the left equivalent are monolithic static things. They’re protean and change depending on the motivations of the people who currently hold their reins in the public sphere.
Does Conservatism (ie. The Right) generally attract more people with intolerant beliefs and hateful dogmatic behaviours? You’ll get no argument from me there. But the number of them that are willing to pick up arms and commit treason because of it. The number of the right that is wiling to use their intolerance as an excuse for violence, is still the minority no matter how many ways you slice it.
Conservatism might be old and outdated. It might be a haven for the uneducated and the intolerant. But here’s the thing…
It always has been.
And if it always has been, than why were the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, all violence free? Why was there heated debate between the two sides, but not violence? What’s changed now?
And you know the answer to that.
But Conservatism is nothing more than a series of economic and political ideals. Nothing more.
Uh huh, and what do those policies look like?
- No right to vote. (See: Kansas Supreme Court)
- Government decides who you get to marry. (No gay marriage)
- Government-enforced dress codes. (No Drag or “Transgenderism”)
- Book Bans. (Criminalizing LGBTQ+ literature or writings by non-white authors)
- Expanding the Death Penalty to include non-violent criminals. (Currently targeted at sex offenders, but with a clear aim to target LGBTQ+ people)
- Expanding the justice system to include torture and other deliberate forms of cruelty. (Currently targeted at sex offenders, but with a clear aim to target LGBTQ+ people)
- Right Wing Dictatorship. (Crush “Wokeness” and make the Democratic party illegal)
- Genocide. (Calls to “exterminate” trans people at CPAC)
- Genocide. (Calls to completely wipe out Palestine)
- Genocide. (Openly celebrate police killing PoC)
- Genocide. (Lots of literal Neo-Nazis, including in elected party positions)
- Genocide. (Happy to let poor people die from lack of access to health care)
- Genocide. (Regularly calling for Nuclear War, especially against Arab/Muslim nations)
- Genocide. (Regularly calling for Civil War because they want to wipe out their political enemies)
- Murder. (Calling for citizens to engage in vigilante justice, such as running people over in the street or throwing them off of bridges)
- Murder. (Celebrating killers like Kyle Rittenhouse and calling them “heroes” for killing democrats/leftists.)
So yeah, “Nothing more” than some perfectly normal “political ideals”. Nothing to see here. /s
I’m going to concede defeat here because obviously I’m not doing a good enough job in explaining my position. But everything you just listed is exactly my point. When did all of those things start occuring? Was it before or after MAGA took over the Republican Party?
Essentially all I’m saying is that Correlation does not equal causation. All of those things you’ve just listed aren’t because they’re conservatives, it’s because they’re assholes. They just happened to find a party (Republicans) that told them that it’s okay to let your asshole flag fly. Conservatism and Republicanism are two different things. Always have been. Conservatism is economic theory (low taxes, high privatization, lower goverment oversight, etc…) Republicanism is political theory (immigration, law and order, militarization, etc…)
MAGA took over Republicanism, convinced everyone that it was Conservatism in order to appeal to the “common folk” in order to take over the GOP.
You’re list isn’t a list of Conservative ideals, it’s a list of Republican ideals. Those aren’t the same thing.
I guess what I’m saying is, again, Correlation is not causation. All republicans are are conservatives, yes. But not all Conservatives are Republicans (or at least they wouldn’t be if the country wasn’t in the grip of some two-party system bullshit. They’re two very different things.
But again, I’m not doing a good job of explaining that, obviously, so I’m going to back out with grace and take the “L”.
Have a good day.
You so desperately want to separate the two, you’re literally arguing the opposite. Conservatism has been the Republican Party since the 1950s at minimum and much more likely quite earlier than that.
If conservatives think the Republican Party doesn’t represent them, then why has that party continued to exist?
Short answer: because they’re the same thing. You can’t on one hand declare that “they don’t represent conservativism” and then on the other hand allow the party to continue.
It’s not at all correlation — it is exactly causation. Conservatism == Republicanism. And the reason it does is because it gives conservatives the platform and power that they desperately want in order to enact their backward ideals, whether economic or political, it makes no difference.
If you feel so strongly in your position, then instead of quibbling over semantics, maybe start your own party of such righteous conservative ideology and let’s see whether it serves those ideals or whether it devolves into the same bullshit that the Republican Party has for decades.
I would assert that any party based on conservative ideals will, at some point, become akin to what the Republican Party has become. And the sole reason — critical thinking is not a part of the ideology.
I’m going to concede defeat here because obviously I’m not doing a good enough job in explaining my position.
It’s because your position is indefensible given recent history and the trajectory of the political landscape.
When did all of those things start occuring? Was it before or after MAGA took over the Republican Party?
It was before. MAGA made it worse, but everything I listed has been a Republican party position for the past several decades.
You only started noticing after Trump took office, which is a lot of people’s experience if they were politically apathetic before Trump.
And if it always has been, than why were the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, all violence free? Why was there heated debate between the two sides, but not violence? What’s changed now?
This is the most straight white comment ever. Most of those decades still had lynchings. And why are you ignoring the '60s while looking back at our history? Seems like you don’t want to look at that decade specifically. The reality is that conservatives have been murdering liberals for as long as this country has been around. Even people as conservative as West Virginia coal diggers were massacred by conservatives using police and the pinkertons for being just liberal enough to believe in getting paid fairly.
It takes some extreme cognitive dissonance to look at the 80’s and 90’s and declare them “violence free”.
We’re at a 50-year low for violent crime right now. Politically-motivated violence is surging though. And what side of the aisle is committing the most politically-motivated violence? It’s the right. Every time, without exception, the right is the side pushing violence.
