So, I kind of realized, going through my trajectory on conservatism and morality lately, that man, I'm basically almost putting myself into a position of having to say conservatism is evil. I mean, I consider it an intellectually bankrupt philosophy. I recognize that its thinking is based on a relatively low level of moral development. I've come to recognize that conservatives don't actually want to make the world a better place. And I've even come to realize that cruelty is literally built into their worldview.
So why don't I just come out and call a spade, a spade, conservatism is evil, isn't it?
Well, before I get into this, I want to offer some nuance. The realm of conservatism is kind of broad, and not all conservatism is bad. Conservatism based on the concept of structural functionalism can be quite necessary. As I see it, there are two forces in a political debate, conservatism and progressivism. Progressives want to move society forward, conservatives wanna keep it the same. Sometimes keeping things the same is actually for the best. We do want to conserve institutions like liberal democracy, for example, and the rule of law, and freedom of speech. And if we just gave leftists everything they want, then we would actually be in deep trouble because often they wanna change society too fast, too dramatically, and in ways that are not worth the costs. Progressivism has the risk of being evil too if the progress they want isnt positive or is too much. And I would argue, and have argued, that at some point, everyone is gonna become a conservative. You achieve all of your ideological views and want no further change? Congrats, you're now conservative. To categorically oppose all conservatism is to say that every single aspect of society is bad and needs to be changed in dramatic ways. And then once that's achieved, we need to keep changing things because yay change. So let's not say that ALL conservatism is bad, and some level of conservatism actually does moderate my views.
Of course you can probably argue I'm being pedantic at this point. When i talk about conservatism being evil, I obviously dont mean all conservative impulses which are necessary to reasonably balance any conversation. And of course, as I've noted before, it's actually liberals who are truly conservative, and "conservatives" are regressive. And obviously I'm not talking true conservative impulses within liberalism which are positive and do offer something to the discussion (even if I don't always agree with them), I'm talking about AMERICAN CONSERVATISM. You know, the one associated with the REPUBLICAN PARTY. Ie, the actual elephant in the room, because as we know the GOP represents itself with an elephant as its party animal. THAT conservatism. What I call "regressivism." Is THAT evil?
I would say YES. I don't like to call things evil very often. I am a moral relativist to some degree, I dont think there is a such thing as objective morality, but in trying to develop a universal concept of morality, I would generally agree that such a system should at least attempt to reduce harm and improve human well being. The metrics of that are relative, and can be debated, but honestly, for me to consider something evil, they would have to fail even THAT low standard.
And modern American conservatism does. What else do I call an ideology that 1) is based on authoritarian religion, 2) has effectively abandoned reason, 3) seems to not only not concern itself with reducing suffering and improving well being, but also effectively seem to impose cruelty on people to make them conform to their weird idea of morality based on divine command theory? Quite frankly, modern American conservatism is going even further than just that, trending toward literal fascism as we speak, and in the modern western world, the Nazis are the epitome of "the bad guy". I mean, I won't say that American conservatism is the most degenerate force in the world. I have a much more dismal view of say, the authoritarianism of China, Russia, or North Korea, or the bloodthirstiness of cartels in Latin America, or Islamic fundamentalists in the Middle East, but the ideology of America's right wing is trending dangerously close to at least SOME of those things. It's led by a guy who seems to fashion himself after Putin or Xi or the Kim family and wants to be like them, and Christian fundamentalism is only outdone in its extremism by Islamic fundamentalism.
If America had no liberal movement to moderate the GOP's worst impulses, we would be like them, and many are worrying that America is backsliding into that stuff with the modern MAGA movement. It might not be the worst movement in the world, or in all of history, but yes, it sucks, and it fails to meet even my minimum standards for goodness, which very low and very generous. Seriously. For the most part, I can look at others and their value systems and generally believe most people are "good" and have some value system that at least TRIES to reduce suffering and improve well being. Maybe not everyone completely gets it right, or gets there, but by intention alone, they are generally noble. But modern American conservatism IS intellectually bankrupt, it DOES NOT concern itself with human well being, and it DOES have cruelty baked into it in order to force conformity to whatever authoritarian power fantasy those types believe in. As such, it IS evil by my own definition of the word.
This is not to say all conservatives are evil. Many of them do mean well, but are brainwashed. And maybe on the individual level, they have some Edmund Burke-esque view of "we live in the best possible world and all change is regressive." I don't agree with that, but I used to be like that when I didn't know any better and can at least respect that. They're trying to meet my minimum standard of morality at least.
But the ideology in and of itself, as practiced by the modern GOP, is evil, and it is regressive in my own views. And politically, it should be given no quarter. I mean, sure, we should respect everyone's right to exist, to live as they want as long as they dont force it on others, and their constitutional rights. But as far as politics goes, yeah, we need to be strongly and passionately anti what these guys are for, and be uncompromising for the most part. If you meet evil half way, you're kinda coming up with something that's half evil. And let's face it, they are even more aware than most of us that we are in a battle of worldviews, and they play for keeps. So must we, if we wanna get anywhere in politics.
We can't keep playing paddycakes with these guys. If they want a culture war, we gotta give them one. Still, at the same time, I would encourage my fellow liberals and lefties to remember the human and to understand that just because the ideas are bad, doesn't mean the people necessarily are. That's an important distinction I feel like the modern left often fails to make. And it's one that we should make. Be scorched earth against the ideology, but be gracious to the human. If that makes any sense at all. Most of them don't know any better and are just brainwashed into some really bad stuff.
No comments:
Post a Comment