question is fairly self explanatory, but i’m curious as to your thoughts. i personally think being educated on the nuances of conservative perspectives (because they are just as multi-dimensional as left wing beliefs) helps me feel more grounded in my own political ideals, and helps me have a clearer idea of what the right is actually fighting for by and large. i see a lot of questions on this sub that would be much better leveraged on a conservative sub, so i’m curious as to whether you guys appreciate it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.
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question is fairly self explanatory, but i’m curious as to your thoughts. i personally think being educated on the nuances of conservative perspectives (because they are just as multi-dimensional as left wing beliefs) helps me feel more grounded in my own political ideals, and helps me have a clearer idea of what the right is actually fighting for by and large. i see a lot of questions on this sub that would be much better leveraged on a conservative sub, so i’m curious as to whether you guys appreciate it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.
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No.
Every word out of their mouth is a shallow lie aimed to produce political advantage for themselves. There is no value in the words they speak or write, at all.
No, not even slightly.
I think the idea that hierarchies are natural and just is a huge misnomer that has no basis in any study. The idea that the free market encourages competition is also demonstrably bunk considering the massive consolidations that happen every time oversight is reduced.
Ma Bell alone completely debunks the right wing economic position in my opinion.
I value people … I try to. I don’t much care for how they are wrong unless they try to act on their wrong information to hurt people. Then they suck.
I used to. But they’re too self-justifying and antagonistic to really offer much of value.
No.
Conservatism is a world view based on fear, hate and greed.
The problem is that conservatives don’t even know what they believe, or at least they don’t understand the world well enough to actually form beliefs with any intellectual vigor.
The classic example is with race issues. They’ll tell you over and over that they aren’t racist, their policies aren’t based on race, yada yada. Yet somehow their policies consistently end up with racist outcomes. I believe that they think they aren’t racist, but that’s clearly not the case. So why should I ask for a conservatives opinion on a race issue when they literally arent capable of engaging with the topic?
I regularly visit conservative subreddits, not to “brigade” or “downvote” or whatever – mostly just to get some sense of how people who voted for this shit are actually reacting. Over the last couple days I’ve seen:
Like in just a couple days they’re all for it, all for being against it, all for it not happening. Do you see a pattern? Criticism of dear leader is impossible. Even the most mild objections have to be sandwiched inside paragraph long preambles reassuring everyone that dear leader is infallible.
I don’t even know what right wing perspective is other than sucking on donny’s toes.
No
I don’t know that there is a right wing perspective any more. Their stance changes daily on any given topic. Their only consistent stance seems to be “If trump does it, we support it.”
I’m a former Republican (left when W won the nomination) and no, I find no value in the right wing view today. Any rational or intelligent arguments that used to exist over there have been dissolved and replaced with something unusable.
i don’t really care what “conservatives” do. i kinda have an attitude of better someone else do something silly than me. i don’t really get upset, i just see things like at least i’m not dumb enough to believe certain stuff.
it’s my belief that by and large people are intelligent enough to do what they’re supposed to do and no one needs (NEEDS) to point them in a certain direction. it’s an innate thing we have. do i value conservative ideology? not really. i like a few things that are seen as being conservative in nature but i don’t think they are. anyway my point is we’re mostly smart and don’t give ourselves enough credit for it. we’re too concerned with who’s right and who’s wrong.
Conservatism broadly? yes, I think balancing out your knowledge and opinions by considering conservate perspectives is good.
Pro-Trump trolling and incoherence? No. I’ve never seen a sane, reasonable person make anything close to a compelling argument for anything Trump does. It’s always just fever-dream conspiracy bullshit, insincere misdirection, lies, or ignorance.
I value individuals perspectives.
But the conservative line/response that they disseminate to their mouthpieces I put zero stock in. My senator is Ron Johnson – he has no opinions that aren’t directly received from the talking points bulletin from the Republican Party. I do not value those.
I try to understand conservative views, but I find it difficult to respect many of them when they seem to cause real harm to the most vulnerable—especially refugees, immigrants, the poor, and marginalized communities. Republican policies often come across as cold or even cruel, cutting support systems, targeting minorities, and closing doors to people fleeing violence or poverty. What’s especially hard to stomach is when this is wrapped in claims of Christian values. I was raised to believe Christianity meant love, compassion, and caring for “the least of these,” not turning our backs on them. I can’t overlook the contradiction between what they preach and what they support in practice.
No.
Conservatism would be fine if it was about actually preserving traditional values at a reasonable pace for gradual changes to occur. Unfortunately, today’s Republicans appear to be reactionaries retroactively changing America into a society with antiquated values the rest of the developed world largely rejects.
It has no inherent value. My friends and family are looked down on in their eyes. People in my community are kidnapped by brown shirts called ICE. At work, I have never seen even one right wing policy increase my paycheck. Instead, I see my bosses get richer. Before the ACA, I had no insurance. The ACA they continue to threaten to repeal. What value is there from a right wing that takes and takes and takes?
To be conservative is to subscribe to an America that steals from the poor and gives to the rich under the guise of affording opportunities. Opportunities only redeemable by the top 1% at the expense of the 99%. Jingoism and nationalism passed off as patriotism. Punching down the marginalized while giving a platform to fascists. What kind of value is that I ask again? Nothing. In fact they owe the American people better and have a running negative balance that only grows bigger.
Nope
Long ago, conservatism was about being a good steward of our resources.
For my lifetime (Reagan is the first US President I really remember), conservatism has been about serving the interests of the wealthy and well-connected at the expense of everyone else and used a very narrow set of social issues to claim a reliable block of the electorate.
Since the Tea Party years, conservatism has become disconnected from reality and facts. This current administration has moved the party into full-blown kleptocratic authoritarian lawlessness and punishing people they don’t like.
I used to.
I think when you talk about the current “conservative” movement, it’s difficult to separate it from Trump. And in my view, Trump is entirely devoid of any ideology other than his own self-interest and whatever feeds his insatiable need for narcissistic supply. The current tariff debacle is a perfect example: broadly instituted tariffs are certainly not traditionally conservative but Trump somehow believes they are a magic elixir, therefore many of the so-called “conservatives” in his orbit (as well as his supporters in general) have to prostrate themselves into believing what he believes, or else. So does that make tariffs now conservative? Who knows!?
This honestly makes it difficult to know what the current conservative/right wing perspective is. Is it MAGA? Is it what Trump believes in that moment? Your guess is as good as mine.
No. They tolerate language like “poisoning the blood of the nation” and calling migrants “vermin.” They have continuously tried to create skepticism in the legitimacy of our institutions and elections, they argue against the notion of the US being a democracy at all and vote into power or support those funded by billionaires who want to abandon democracy as a concept all together.
Most of all of their gripes would have been solved by the Confederacy winning. A nation that supported antifederalism, social norms, respecting hierarchy, and nationalism. They value freedom of association, believe in a biological distinction between races, and deny systemic affects of slavery, redlining, and disparate sentencing and racial profiling. Their worldview would tolerate all of these injustices. Their perspectives are wrong.
I honestly really wish I could. Not only do I not live around right wing politics but online readily accessible right wing politics is both low fidelity and scarce. I want to believe someone could rigorously assess the GOP’s platform as the right path for the nation but emotionally charged propaganda is always making it difficult to believe these are not low information voters.
Obviously, it’s difficult to find someone online willing to engage in discussion about right wing policy.
I do know there is more information accessible regarding somewhat fringe economic theory associated with right wing politics. It isn’t always very credible but that isn’t nothing.
Have you seen the official white house office’s website? The articles there are written from within an irony tesseract.
Not in the current political context. The center is gone from the GOP, the fringe is the party. People like Tucker Carlson talk about how they have personally seen demons and vampires? Or RFK jr, the man who eats roadkill who thinks measles and heroin are good for you? MTG with her jewish space lasers and government manufactured hurricanes? These people are literally psychotic. Any other time in history they would probably be tossed into padded cells, and yet they are the conservative intelligentsia in the US. There is nothing of value to get from them.
I do, but I appreciate it when it comes from an honest and educated perspective. Unfortunately, there has been a decades long decline in the intellectual quality, coherence, and moral decency in conservatism, at least among the intelligencia and talking heads. Many of the conservatives I respected 20 years ago have stepped away from the conservative movement, so I find it harder to find perspectives that are sensible, coherent, well thought out, and ethically reasonable.
I mean, which one? Someone who wants to make sure that property taxes don’t get out of control, or MAGA?
On paper, meaning what Conservative perspective theoretically is? Yes in a very narrow and limited way. I do not value modern real world perspectives of 99% of people that say they are Conservative though. They ceased to follow their own beliefs long ago.
I value all thought out perspectives. They often do not fit very nicely in a left right continuum.
Ezra Klein is pretty into deregulation, not sure what Roth Douthat’s deal is- but he clearly thinks Trump is an idiot- but interesting conversations. I have heard some thoughtful discussions about what is the correct response to China (I am not sure this is left/right).
I think most of the pundit talk (Pod save America, Rachel Maddow) are fundamentally about jockeying for power.
I think it is important to think through one’s own beliefs, work towards identifying inconsistency and work towards coherence. Sadly lacking across the political spectrum.
Fellow conservatives yea sure.
MAGA no they think 2020 was rigged? No
I’m glad members on this sub block conservative users instead of attempting good faith conversations. It makes the trifecta, winning the popular and electoral vote, and crushing all 7 swing states all the more validating.
You had an opportunity to reflect on the reasons you lost, and instead you just double down on the groupthink + block. I welcome it, because all you do is further push away the exact voters you need to win elections.
Conservative and Right wing are different.
I think there is some value in conservatism concerns over changing the status quo to fix an existing problem possibly leading to unforeseen worse outcomes than accepting the problem and maintaining the status quo.
I can’t think of any right wing perspectives I find at all valuable.
I suppose it depends on what you mean by that. I don’t think there’s any value in MAGA thought, if you can even call it that, but on a more basic level something like Chesterton’s Fence is a pretty classic conservative thought experiment and certainly has value.
Absolutely. I say this a lot, but one of the most important responsibilities of citizens in a democracy is to accept the possibility that I could be wrong. If you refuse to accept your political opponents have legitimate arguments, then why let them vote? And that way Authoritarianism lies.
So I try to hear out conservative positions, though I usually find them deeply flawed or based on a alternative reality, I am occasionally swayed to moderate my own position here or there.
are MAGAts “conservative?”
I don’t think right-wingers are honest enough for that to be a good idea.
I used to. Honestly, the last 10 years or so have made me a worse person. I dont value comservstive LIVES at this point, let alone their perspectives. I dont like it about myself, but if I saw a guy in a MAGA ha having a heart attack, I’d just keep walking. If I stop to do CPR, it might save his life, and I wont help there be one more MAGA in the world.
I SHOULDN’T feel that way, but they are just ao unrelentingly vile, I have wound up hating them.
Russell Kirk? Sure!
Charlie Kirk? Nada. 👎🏻
I recognize the need for a strong opposition party to balance out the overwhelming desire for progress. Sometimes we can go too far too quickly in our zeal. I can’t support what the GOP has become in the wake of Obama’s election though. I miss the party when Romney was considered an extremist. Now he’s too left!
The problem is there isn’t really a conservative perspective beyond glory to the in-group and subjugation of the out-group.
They’ll assure you they have “principles” like small government, freedom, personal responsibility – but they only hold to any of these so long as it serves the underlying tribal motivation.
Most of them don’t even seem to be self-aware that they’re doing it. They’ll offer wildly contradictory rationalizations based on whatever the propaganda trains them on, while still being internally convinced they’re giving you a principled view at every moment.
The result is that asking straightforward questions to understand their views is often kind of tedious. You can’t assume what they’re saying aligns with real internal principles. Instead, you have to ask questions on lots of different topics and consider the responses in context to put together a picture of their motivations.
I think people often ask “why do conservatives think X” questions here to try to shortcut that. People on this sub have often been listening to conservatives for years and have a good handle on how they react to things. This lets them assess if some new opinion is genuine, based on propaganda, based on disgust, based on tribal loyalty or whatever else.
Yes. More importantly I understand it, but I’m surrounded by them.
Conservative liberals sure, not social conservative groups (which is like 80% of American conservatives). They operate with a morally antagonistic ideology.