What does conservatism mean to you? - Page 2 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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Traditional 'common sense' values and duty to the state.
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#15075821
Hong Wu wrote:Conservatism is to try and preserve old orders and traditions against change, or to take actions "conservatively" or carefully. The problem with this to my understanding is that as more time passes, just what is to be conserved gets confusing. It's usually irritating to people with bad family backgrounds since it is associated with families, although it's completely possible to be a conservative without a family.


Let's look at progress(ives), which means change. With many changes you can achieve something desirabale, but when you change you are getting rid of the bad of what currently exists but you also get rid of the good of it too. Few issues are black and white, they often contain both good and bad.

Take the legalization and popularization of divorce in the 20th century. Countless people were freed from abusive or loveless relationships (good), but broken families resulted and many children grew up emotionally scarred or lacking a regular mother/father figure (bad). The family unit was much stronger before the 1960's, but now couples are more free. The left cheers people being freed from bad relationships, while the right laments about the decline of the family. The left says "Why does the right want to keep women/people in chains?", while the right says "Why does the left want to destroy the family?". Which is better depends on your priorities. Both have worthwhile goals.

Progressives tend to see things now that are currently bad/unjust, and want to change it to something new that's never existed to make it better (ie: Obama's "Yes We Can" & "Hope"). Conservatives tend to see society changing from what was once good and is becoming worse (ie: MAGA) and want to stop it or even turn back the clock (reactionary).

That's why conservatives tend to be older, and progressives younger. Conservatives, with time of living, can better see how certain things about what once was were better than what exists now or will exist soon. They are also just used to having society a certain way their whole lives and resist change. Progressives tend to be younger, they haven't lived with society being a certain way for half a century or whatnot, so changing it doesn't bother them, they see new change as positive.

Do not hate your political enemies, empathize with them. People usually don't have evil intentions.
Last edited by Unthinking Majority on 17 Mar 2020 00:35, edited 2 times in total.
#15075822
OK. I'll play your sill game. Silly is what it is...

What's the good part of racism and inequality?

What is good about discrimination?

What is good about maintaining traditions that are no longer valid or have been shown to be obsolete?
#15075824
Godstud wrote:OK. I'll play your sill game. Silly is what it is...

What's the good part of racism and inequality?


Inequality...be more specific.

Not much is good about racism. I said most issues, not all. Racism is about tribalism, about fear of the other in order to protect your "tribe" and maintaining your tribe and its culture and genetics. If 200 million Chinese people move to the USA you gain diversity of people, culture, and language (could be seen as good), but you also lose the the American culture that existed before and the Caucasian genetics would slowly be lost through interbreeding (could be seen as bad).

Ending slavery, for instance, very little bad there. Maybe some economic suffering by plantation owners LOL. But conservatives didn't want that. I prioritize the human rights of black ppl over their economics.

What is good about discrimination?


Not much good there. Give an example.

What is good about maintaining traditions that are no longer valid or have been shown to be obsolete?


Like religion? Well, loss of sense of community, where everyone would gather every week for church. Rise of moral relativism and nihilism can cause a decay in moral values in society. Having sex out of wedlock causes more unwanted births and STDs. Prayer brings psychological conform to people. etc.
#15075826
American culture? You mean the one based on immigrants and people coming from all over the world and mixing?

How is fighting against immigration not xenophobia and against the American culture?

American culture:
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
- on Statue of Liberty (The New Colossus)

THAT is American culture! Chinese people coming here is not against that, but a part of it.

Your example of 200 million Chinese coming to the USA, is absurd. USA hardly lets a million immigrants into the country, every year.

Nothing about genetics is BAD. Chinese people are human. Racial diversity is good for humans. Only a racist can see it as bad.

Examples: Discrimination against people based on who they sleep with(homosexuality), who they want to be(transgenderism). These are not harmful to others nor are they harmful to society.

No one is saying religion is obsolete. It can be used for good or bad and it is a PERSONAL CHOICE, just like choosing not to believe.

Having sex out of wedlock is nothing new, and has existed for a millennia. Society hurting people for it, is something BAD about conservativism. Humans have sex. Your attitude, incidentally, is decidedly Christian.

STDs exist regardless of premarital sex(diseases don't care if you are married, or not). Unwanted births happen even in relationships.
#15075848
Godstud wrote:One comedian made a joke in extremely bad taste(panned by EVERYONE). Only a small number are nutters, but on the other hand, you have tens of millions of Trump supporters(the new strain of conservatives).

Did I mention them driving cars thru protesters and killing them? Carrying torches and yelling racist slogans?

The current strain of conservativism isn't a reflection of the progressivism and doubt you've EVER been progressive! I call BULLSHIT, @Unthinking Majority !!


I was. I was a communist sympathizer. I still am progressive on certain things.

I think Trump conservatives are dangerous as you point out, but todays progressives are dangerous too just in a different way. Like a shotgun blast vs a slow rot. Easier to see the shotgun blast, but better notice the slow rot before it's too late or the house collapses.
#15075850
Godstud wrote:American culture? You mean the one based on immigrants and people coming from all over the world and mixing?

How is fighting against immigration not xenophobia and against the American culture?

THAT is American culture! Chinese people coming here is not against that, but a part of it.

Your example of 200 million Chinese coming to the USA, is absurd. USA hardly lets a million immigrants into the country, every year.

Nothing about genetics is BAD. Chinese people are human. Racial diversity is good for humans. Only a racist can see it as bad.

Examples: Discrimination against people based on who they sleep with(homosexuality), who they want to be(transgenderism). These are not harmful to others nor are they harmful to society.

No one is saying religion is obsolete. It can be used for good or bad and it is a PERSONAL CHOICE, just like choosing not to believe.

Having sex out of wedlock is nothing new, and has existed for a millennia. Society hurting people for it, is something BAD about conservativism. Humans have sex. Your attitude, incidentally, is decidedly Christian.

STDs exist regardless of premarital sex(diseases don't care if you are married, or not). Unwanted births happen even in relationships.


You totally missed my point.

Ok you're an ideologue and think all things conservative are bad, I get it. Continue to resent them, not understand them.
#15075860
@Unthinking Majority No, your ad hominem is stupid. I am not a person that thinks all things conservative is bad. What a dumb thing to say! :lol:

Common sense law enforcement. Good.

Conservative economics. Good.

Family unit. Good.

Traditional marriage. Good.

Respecting your elders and history. Good.

Personal responsibility. Good.

Shall I go on?

You're as bad as the lunatic progressives you claim to hate so much, if you are willing to label people because they don't agree with you on a few things.

@Politics_Observer Trump has given a bad name to conservativism, but then he's not truly a conservative, only a sick parody of one.He's right-wing, but as guys like @Drlee (a conservative Republican) have pointed out, he's not actually conservative.
#15075977
Unthinking Majority wrote:Conservatism is the ying to the progressive's yang. 2 sides of the same coin, neither better nor worse than the other generally. It's like saying cold is better than hot. Some people prefer a cold room, some people prefer a hot room. Sometimes cool or warm is nice, but I prefer it room temperature mostly, relatively balanced. Too far on the extremes and people start to die.


Fallacy of the middle ground.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_to_moderation

    Argument to moderation (Latin: argumentum ad temperantiam)—also known as false equivalence, false compromise, argument from middle ground, fallacy of gray, middle ground, equidistance fallacy, and the golden mean fallacy[1]—is an informal use of flawed reasoning which says that the truth is a compromise between two opposite positions.[2][3]

    An example of a fallacious use of the argument to moderation would be to regard two opposed arguments—one person saying that the sky is blue, while another claims that the sky is in fact yellow—and conclude that the truth is that the sky is green.[4] While green is the colour created by combining blue and yellow, therefore being a compromise between the two positions—the sky is obviously not green, demonstrating that taking the middle ground of two positions does not always lead to the truth.

    Vladimir Bukovsky maintained that the middle ground between the Big Lie of Soviet propaganda and the truth was itself a lie, and one should not be looking for a middle ground between disinformation and information. According to him, people from the Western pluralistic civilization are more prone to this fallacy because they are used to resolving problems by making compromises and accepting alternative interpretations—unlike Russians, who are looking for the absolute truth.[5]
#15075988
Conservatism:

1) commitment to traditional values and ideas with opposition to change or innovation.

The irony is that they profess a blind allegiance to capitalism. Which is the most powerful engine of change in human history.

It's a contradiction you could easily drive an extinction through.

Traditional Conservatism is an attitude, nothing more than a desire to keep things the way they are. But if you were serious about keeping things going, that means adapting to changing circumstances.

That is, if they could think.
#15075996
These days progressive just seems to be a catch-all term for all manner of mental illnesses.

A hundred years ago it meant someone with an essentially teleological belief that the course of history was being magnetically attracted towards an "enlightened" outcome. A belief that is a secular spin off from the Christian's own teleological narrative.

It is possible to progress but real progress is a conservative process more than it is an innovative one because in order to progress one must conserve and build on past successes. Also one must be very discriminating against innovations because for every innovation that adds another useful feature there will be 99 that introduce fatal bugs. Those always trying to burn up the past accomplishments are the least capable of real progress.
#15076006
SolarCross wrote:
It is possible to progress but real progress is a conservative process more than it is an innovative one



That is what we call a distinction without a difference..

You did bring up something interesting, teleology. That's one of those two steps you have to do, you assume you can make things better, but then you have to take a step back to avoid the implications. It's the same dance that made evolution widely popular in intellectual circles.

But this is one of those perennial questions, the printing press was great, but it did set off a series of wars where Catholics tried to stomp Protestants into the dirt.

McLuhan liked to say "the medium is the message". Rarely more true than with the internet. Enthusiastic predictions of how it could transform humanity have given way to a grim reality, that it's also another way for humans to fight with each other.
#15076632
Pants-of-dog wrote:Fallacy of the middle ground.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_to_moderation

    Argument to moderation (Latin: argumentum ad temperantiam)—also known as false equivalence, false compromise, argument from middle ground, fallacy of gray, middle ground, equidistance fallacy, and the golden mean fallacy[1]—is an informal use of flawed reasoning which says that the truth is a compromise between two opposite positions.[2][3]

    An example of a fallacious use of the argument to moderation would be to regard two opposed arguments—one person saying that the sky is blue, while another claims that the sky is in fact yellow—and conclude that the truth is that the sky is green.[4] While green is the colour created by combining blue and yellow, therefore being a compromise between the two positions—the sky is obviously not green, demonstrating that taking the middle ground of two positions does not always lead to the truth.

    Vladimir Bukovsky maintained that the middle ground between the Big Lie of Soviet propaganda and the truth was itself a lie, and one should not be looking for a middle ground between disinformation and information. According to him, people from the Western pluralistic civilization are more prone to this fallacy because they are used to resolving problems by making compromises and accepting alternative interpretations—unlike Russians, who are looking for the absolute truth.[5]


I'm not talking about compromising on objective truth, like what colour the sky is. I'm talking about philosophical positions/ideology about how the would works and how it should work. Rightwing and leftwing ideologies are the polar opposites of each other, they are different lenses to see the world, which is subjective, and both valid philosophies generally.

That doesn't mean every leftwing or rightwing position is equally valid, especially when you bring objective facts into the argument, and it doesn't mean everything should result in a compromise.
#15076634
SolarCross wrote:It is possible to progress but real progress is a conservative process more than it is an innovative one because in order to progress one must conserve and build on past successes. Also one must be very discriminating against innovations because for every innovation that adds another useful feature there will be 99 that introduce fatal bugs. Those always trying to burn up the past accomplishments are the least capable of real progress.


My point is that we should be careful when getting rid of the past, because you can throw the baby out with the bathwater. We should also be careful when resisting change, we may be missing out on good changes simply based on not wanting to get rid of what we're used to.
#15126189
I divide conservatism into two parts.

First, there's the conservatism of the late, and missed, Mr. William F. Buckley, Jr. It is a political/social philosophy based upon principle* and grounded in erudition. It was a conservatism presented for discussion on rational grounds.

Then there's the 'conservatism' of the modern radio talk show hosts and their call-in enablers. It is based in pandering to the prejudices of people and centered upon a scapegoat 'them', responsible for all manner of things.

I appreciate the first on intellectual grounds. I indulge my wry sense of humor by tuning in from time to time to the other.

Regards, stay safe 'n well. Remember the Big 3: masks, hand washing and physical distancing.

* "Position, n. An ideological point on the political map. To take a position is to plant both feet firmly on an undefined location. The basic map coordinates are ego and the political zeitgeist.

"A politician, one fine day
Said, with a lofty air:
'I'm standing on my principles.
I'm sure you'll find them fair.'

"And then he turned and walked away.
I checked the floor with care;
Examined where he just had stood,
But there was nothing there."

A Modern Dictionary, Fragmentary Press, 2016, Chelm, IA
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