You are quite remarkable. One might almost think you were a socialist in deep cover such is your ability to make conservatism look bad.
Modesty forbids me from agreeing with your first comment.
As for your second comment I refer you to this comment made in the original post
My goal is to demonstrate that conservatives are not all of one type, just as liberals are not, and stereotyping is a fool's game whichever way you're facing.
Oh, gosh. I am so sorry. I completely misunderstood. So LC presents herself as a thoughtful and considerate conservative and you in a spirit of heroic self-sacrifice wish to demonstrate that other forms of conservative are available. You champion you.
Perhaps it comes down not only to where you were, but when.
I was born in 1950. The state gave me free orange juice and powdered milk and immunisations. It provided schools and paid me to go to university. Now it gives me free drugs and a pension. Why shouldn't I think of it as benevolent?
Perhaps it comes down not only to where you were, but when.
I was born in 1950. The state gave me free orange juice and powdered milk and immunisations. It provided schools and paid me to go to university. Now it gives me free drugs and a pension. Why shouldn't I think of it as benevolent?
Precisely. 1961 for me. I got actual milk, immunisations, free school and college (twice) NHS saved my mother's life when I was twenty, and lately the state has paid for my rent, wifi, and brandy. Last time I checked I can still think for myself so assume I have not succumbed to dependency.
You are quite remarkable. One might almost think you were a socialist in deep cover such is your ability to make conservatism look bad.
Modesty forbids me from agreeing with your first comment.
As for your second comment I refer you to this comment made in the original post
My goal is to demonstrate that conservatives are not all of one type, just as liberals are not, and stereotyping is a fool's game whichever way you're facing.
Oh, gosh. I am so sorry. I completely misunderstood. So LC presents herself as a thoughtful and considerate conservative and you in a spirit of heroic self-sacrifice wish to demonstrate that other forms of conservative are available. You champion you.
I had my doubts about how long a thread that is essentially political could maintain a heavenly tone, and I'm impressed so far at how well it's been going, but there's definitely a snarkiness creeping into discussion that is going to take it out of the Heavenly realms if continued. @Colin Smith , striking out a snide comment and leaving it there to be read is not in keeping with the general tone of discussion in Heaven, so I'll single that out, but Colin is certainly not the only one walking close to the line.
The general tone of discussion here has been surprisingly polite; keep it up if you want this to stay in Heaven.
My dad was a life-long Republican. And while we had our moments over issues, especially immigration, I admired how he thought things over and sometimes came surprisingly on the non-Republican side. He even gave donations to a NY, Democratic congresswoman who stood up to the NRA. If he were alive, I bet he would have donated to Mark Kelly, a former astronaut running for Senate from Arizona. His congress woman wife survived an assassination attempt.
I had my doubts about how long a thread that is essentially political could maintain a heavenly tone, and I'm impressed so far at how well it's been going, but there's definitely a snarkiness creeping into discussion that is going to take it out of the Heavenly realms if continued. @Colin Smith , striking out a snide comment and leaving it there to be read is not in keeping with the general tone of discussion in Heaven, so I'll single that out, but Colin is certainly not the only one walking close to the line.
The general tone of discussion here has been surprisingly polite; keep it up if you want this to stay in Heaven.
Trudy, Heavenly Host
Thanks Trudy, noted.
I am guilty of sliding in a purgatorial direction and possibly lower still...
There is obviously the potential for a Purg thread here but I think there is great value in this Heavenly one.
(A hoping to manage to be better behaved from now on...) AFZ
P.s. that doesn't preclude me from calling someone to Hell though...
I think this thread has confirmed my belief that there are fundamental temperaments which manifest in certain ways, not necessarily on the same 'side'. (Always remember trying to explain the hard-line Paisleyite Protestantism to a Dominican Father. 'Ah' he nodded. 'Jesuits'.)
I can see how attachment to the comfortable and familiar can give rise to attitudes the novelty-hunger (like me) find reactionary or stultifying. Which is why I tend not to argue the point, but rather try to discover the emotional bias.
There are positive and negative versions however. ISTM that what goes under the Conservative label at the moment is a Chaotic Evil version of the desire for change. It is the desire to smash everything in a regenerative catharsis from which a new, purged order will emerge. It is tied into the myth of the übermensch.
I think this thread has confirmed my belief that there are fundamental temperaments which manifest in certain ways, not necessarily on the same 'side'. (Always remember trying to explain the hard-line Paisleyite Protestantism to a Dominican Father. 'Ah' he nodded. 'Jesuits'.)
I can see how attachment to the comfortable and familiar can give rise to attitudes the novelty-hunger (like me) find reactionary or stultifying. Which is why I tend not to argue the point, but rather try to discover the emotional bias.
There are positive and negative versions however. ISTM that what goes under the Conservative label at the moment is a Chaotic Evil version of the desire for change. It is the desire to smash everything in a regenerative catharsis from which a new, purged order will emerge. It is tied into the myth of the übermensch.
While conservatism is often tied up with a fear of changing what is in case something worse arises it can also be deeply nostalgic and want to sweep away decades or more of change to restore some previous order. Often the previous order is, to say the least, seen through rose-tinted spectacles or is even semi-mythical. Almost always the previous order was only favourable to that section of society to which the nostalgicist belongs and was pretty vile to everyone else. Almost always this previous order coincided with the youth of the nostalgically minded.
I've concluded that those hankering for a return to the past don't have any preference for a particular kind of politics or social order, they just want the return of whatever they most associate with flexible knees and fully-functioning genitalia.
Because politics is usually an extension of the personal and dressing so as not to stand out is dressing conservatively.
I'm not sure what this has to do with conservative politics. Boris Johnson is by nature a somewhat flamboyant person, yet leads the UK Conservative party. Donald Trump is a flamboyant narcissist who always wants to be the centre of attention.
By contrast, take every young person I've ever met selling "Socialist Worker" on street corners, and they're all wearing basically the same outfit as each other. Are they the conservatives?
Lovely reply thanks. If you haven’t read it I second AFZ’s pointer to the Jim Wallis book ‘God’s Politics: why the Right gets it wrong and the Left doesn’t get it.’ It’s a serious and honourable attempt to move away from sterile Left/Right polarisation.
I think you’re right about callings. Some are called to fish the drowning out of rivers, others to speak truth to power about who is throwing them in upstream. Some pastors, some prophets.
I think this thread has confirmed my belief that there are fundamental temperaments which manifest in certain ways, not necessarily on the same 'side'. (Always remember trying to explain the hard-line Paisleyite Protestantism to a Dominican Father. 'Ah' he nodded. 'Jesuits'.)
I think you're right - and the ways that those temperaments manifest is often conditioned by the 'side' the person espouses, their corresponding blind spots expressing themselves in different, complementary ways. To suggest a very obvious example, left wingers are often better at pointing out social / structural sins, and right wingers are usually better at spotting personal failures of responsibility. Both sides tend to get stuck with interpreting some new problem through their own favoured lens, and the dualism which results is often not helpful in resolving the actual issue at hand.
Because politics is usually an extension of the personal and dressing so as not to stand out is dressing conservatively.
I'm not sure what this has to do with conservative politics. Boris Johnson is by nature a somewhat flamboyant person, yet leads the UK Conservative party. Donald Trump is a flamboyant narcissist who always wants to be the centre of attention.
By contrast, take every young person I've ever met selling "Socialist Worker" on street corners, and they're all wearing basically the same outfit as each other. Are they the conservatives?
It's not clear-cut. Johnson is Conservative (big C) but not conservative (small c) in either dress or personal morality - hence lots of sexual partners and lots of children by those partners.
Small c conservatives are more likely to vote Conservative but by no means all will do so and conversely many traditional Labour voters are deeply conservative in taste and social values.
Hence why Labour, supposedly a progressive party, did nothing for same-sex marriage despite having power for thirteen years, whereas the Conservatives, supposedly the party of conservative values, introduced same-sex marriage within a few years of taking office in alliance with the Lib-Dems.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
Because politics is usually an extension of the personal and dressing so as not to stand out is dressing conservatively.
I'm not sure what this has to do with conservative politics. Boris Johnson is by nature a somewhat flamboyant person, yet leads the UK Conservative party. Donald Trump is a flamboyant narcissist who always wants to be the centre of attention.
By contrast, take every young person I've ever met selling "Socialist Worker" on street corners, and they're all wearing basically the same outfit as each other. Are they the conservatives?
It's not clear-cut. Johnson is Conservative (big C) but not conservative (small c) in either dress or personal morality - hence lots of sexual partners and lots of children by those partners.
Small c conservatives are more likely to vote Conservative but by no means all will do so and conversely many traditional Labour voters are deeply conservative in taste and social values.
Hence why Labour, supposedly a progressive party, did nothing for same-sex marriage despite having power for thirteen years, whereas the Conservatives, supposedly the party of conservative values, introduced same-sex marriage within a few years of taking office in alliance with the Lib-Dems.
The Labour government did, however, bring in civil partnerships, repeal Section 28 and make sexuality a protected characteristic on a par with race and sex. The tories may have taken the last step on equal marriage but all the others were made by Labour. It's also worth noting that a majority of tory MPs opposed equal marriage. And we now have a PM who refers to gay men as "bum boys".
Hence why Labour, supposedly a progressive party, did nothing for same-sex marriage despite having power for thirteen years, whereas the Conservatives, supposedly the party of conservative values, introduced same-sex marriage within a few years of taking office in alliance with the Lib-Dems.
The Labour government did, however, abolish the infamous "section 28" of the Local Government Act, and introduced (with support from the opposition parties) civil partnerships for same-sex couples. And whilst it's true that the Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government brought in the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) bill, slightly more Conservative MPs voted against it than voted for it, whereas the other parties were all strongly in favour.
What I was trying to say was that it isn't cut and dried, which @Arethosemyfeet and @Leorning Cniht confirm. Yes, more Tories voted against same sex marriage than for but it had the enthusiastic backing of Cameron.
What I was trying to say was that it isn't cut and dried, which @Arethosemyfeet and @Leorning Cniht confirm. Yes, more Tories voted against same sex marriage than for but it had the enthusiastic backing of Cameron.
I am a supporter of same sex marriage and all long term relationships. I do not expect everyone else to agree with me. .
Because caution IMHO is the defining characteristic of conservatism prior to the Trump and Trump-like takeover. I have already lost the Republican party to that ilk, and I refuse to concede conservatism in general to them.
That position requires a very selective view of the Republican party and American conservatism. For example, George W. Bush wasn't particularly cautious in the invasion of Iraq. Nor was he especially especially cautious about the federal deficit, something you say is a concern of yours. His vice president, Dick Cheney, even went so far as to claim that "deficits don't matter". Newt Gingrich's tendency towards brinksmanship and normalizing government shutdowns as a negotiating tactic doesn't seem particularly cautious to me, either. Nor Reagan's decision to fight secret wars in Central America and fund them through arms sales to terrorist states so he didn't have to deal with any pesky Congress.
In a lot of ways what Trump has done is simply taken the mask off of the American conservative movement and the Republican party that is its standard bearer. A lot of folks like @Lamb Chopped didn't like it when they dropped the pretense, but even more folks liked it a lot.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
Fact vs fiction?
Puzzled.
Are you saying that environmental concerns are fiction or suggesting I might think they are fiction or that those who claim there are no environmental concerns are peddling fiction?
To me, the spectra dealing with authoritarian vs libertarian, conservative vs radical, and left vs right (the nature of authority/government, social issues, and economics) are all anthropocentric whereas environmental concerns step beyond mere human interest and deal with our relationship with the biosphere as a whole. For example, you could make an economic argument for saving the tiger but that doesn't really address why people think saving the tiger is a worthwhile thing to do and why the state/politics should get involved . Art and culture also does not fit readily on any of the three spectra and yet most of us value them and think politics/the state has a role to play in supporting them.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
Fact vs fiction?
Puzzled.
Are you saying that environmental concerns are fiction or suggesting I might think they are fiction or that those who claim there are no environmental concerns are peddling fiction?
That's not confined to environmental issues - there are lots of cases where people prefer to listen to their own prejudices and preferences, rather than examining what the data says is actually happenning. (It's not limited to the political right either, although I think the majority of the obvious examples find their home there.)
In some ways, it's an idealist vs pragmatist axis. And there certainly seems to be significant correlation between people who think climate change is a hoax and people who think Covid-19 is a hoax.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
Fact vs fiction?
Puzzled.
Are you saying that environmental concerns are fiction or suggesting I might think they are fiction or that those who claim there are no environmental concerns are peddling fiction?
Sorry, I meant the last of those.
Ah. Phew. I didn't take you for a climate-change denier
I think that suggests the possibility of a whole spectrum all to itself. Not sure what it should be called but at one end it would have data, peer-reviewed research, rationality and logic, objectivity, and so on, and at the other it would have anecdata, "common-sense", confirmation bias, and so on.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
Liberty vs. authority--well, you see, I don't do abstractions well. I would need a concrete example, including the people (i.e. don't just say what if President X wanted to do Y to people group Z).
What I can say is basically what I said before--that I believe all human beings are flawed (well, except one), that all of them will mismanage themselves and any others they happen to be in authority over (though the extent to which they do this varies wildly) and so I do not, can not, give my complete trust to any particular political stance or position on a spectrum. It's always more along the lines of, "Yeah, I voted for you, but don't get uppity about it, or I'll vote for your recall so fast your head will spin."
I think there's an issue of terminology here. Whilst I do not and will not presume to tell @Lamb Chopped what she is or how she wishes to define herself, I think we have to acknowledge that the word 'conservative' has different meanings to different people. This is a great excuse for me to quote C.S. Lewis - I will resist, except to say that I agree with him that whilst language does evolve there is always a risk of confusion when people use terms very differently.
I was listening to yesterday's Daily Beans podcast and they referred to the some of current Supreme Court Justices as 'Activist Conservative.' I want to note the oxymoron herein.
Let me switch sides of the Atlantic here. In the UK, the kind of conservatism LC describes is commonly known as One-nation conservatism. This is not a position that I hold, but it is one I respect. I would argue very strongly that as a Christian, one's faith must inform one's politics. That is not to party-politicize God, I resist that very strongly for lots of reasons but that one's political thinking has to be shaped by one's faith. I know a lot of Christians who are one-nation conservatives and I understand and respect that position, even though my thinking takes me to a slightly different place. There's a really interesting and positive discussion about values and political ideologies and practical policies to be had around this. However, the modern Conservative Party since Mrs Thatcher became leader (i.e. more than my entire lifetime) has not been a one-nation conservative party.
Under Thatcher, the Tories moved very strongly to a neo-liberal economic position. I won't go into the details of that here but it is not compatible with traditional one-nation conservatism and I would argue, actually, that neo-liberal economics are not morally compatible with Christianity.
The problem I have is that so many of my Christian friends who are politically conservative don't seem to have noticed. That's unfair but what I mean is they support a party that for 4 decades now has not held the same values they do. It's one of those things that is so obvious from the outside. (Of course, this begs the question as to what are my own blind spots but putting that aside...)
I think the same phenomenon exists on the other side of the pond. That is a traditional conservatism which is indeed conservative - I respect that and love to discuss with this position as it challenges my own thinking. However the right wing in America is not conservative in that sense at all. It a form of aggressive right-wing activism. It has been this way for several decades. Hence it seems to me that so many of these people who call themselves 'conservative' are nothing of the sort. And yet true conservatives still align themselves with these non-conservative conservatives and that confuses me.
Trump is a special case in the extent to which he embodies and demonstrates this contradiction but only in extent. This radical right-wing capture of the Conservative Party and the Republican Party is nothing new.
I once suggested that Jeremy Corbyn was the most conservative mainstream politician in the UK, in that he wants to take the country back to where it actually was when he grew up. (I don't think anyone got the point.)
Pardon me, but what in the hell is one nation conservatism? It sounds depressingly like "my own country is all I care about."
It's actually a lot more benign than that. One Nation Conservatism is an idea that a Conservative government must govern in the best interests of everyone in the country regardless of who they vote for. That means that their policies must benefit everyone. That's what Conservative governments used to do fifty years ago and may possibly do in the future.
The other version of Conservatism, largely created by Mrs Thatcher, is the idea that you govern primarily in the interest of a particular section of society. So tax breaks for the rich and welfare cuts for the poor, and so on.
I apologise that I wasn't entirely clear... it does rather underline my point about terminology and clarity though.
@Colin Smith and @Robert Armin have covered it well, thank you. It's definitely not nationalistic, the concept is meant to be unifying of the nation... we are all one society. The Wiki article emphasises paternalism which I think is not quite right but otherwise covers it well. This I think is a good summary.
My point remains that so much that is labelled 'conservative' is really anything but. 'Conservative' =/= 'right wing'
...Corbyn is a marxist regardless as to how often you deny it. ...
Ignoring reams of Sun articles (a right-wing paper, I assume?) which referred to Mr. Corbyn as "Marxist Corbyn," I went to an actual Marxist source, which says he's emphatically not. I also checked out his listing in Wikipedia, which says he identifies as a socialist. I would need to wait and see a little more.
My point remains that so much that is labelled 'conservative' is really anything but. 'Conservative' =/= 'right wing'
Thanks, AFZ. Agree that seems a good summary.
"One-nation" politics is the opposite of the "class war" politics of the far left. And says that government should not be an instrument by which a majority (however composed) screws over a minority, but in a non-zero-sum world manages the economy and the systems of health and education for the benefit of everyone.
Agree that Mrs Thatcher was radical rather than small-c conservative.
But her radicalism was directed not against any social class of people but against the inefficiency of big government and nationalised industries and trade union inflexibility.
It's possible to believe both in government-provided health and education and macro-economic management and a government duty to do these things as efficiently as possible. Government that spends citizens' money as carefully as they would spend their own, as opposed to Galbraithian role-maximisation.
Thanks for that post. I agree with you up to a point. But I would argue strongly that in Thatcherism, the notion of fiscal conservatism was a myth.
For example, if you compare Thatcher / Major 79-97 with Blair/Brown 97-08* you see very similar aggregate deficits. But with two key differences. Under Thatcher and Major there were multiple privatisations, whether that was good policy or not isn't relevant here;** you can only sell the assets once! Working out the total privatisations receipts is actually quite complex but it's multiple billions (at contemporary prices, equivalent to hundreds of billions today). This money went into government revenue directly thus if you strip out this money, they ran very large deficits essentially throughout those 18 years. Secondly, the Blair/Brown governments invested heavily - not just public services but also capital investment. Whatever you think of these policies, it is simply mathematically false to suppose that the previous Tory governments were more fiscally conservative. Even though they constantly claim to be.
AFZ
*For reasons that I hope are obvious, I have ignored the Global Financial Crisis for this comparison; in the same way that it would be deeply disingenuous to look at the current government's spending in response to Covid-19 as part of their overall fiscal record.
**FWIW, I think there are some good privatisations and bad ones: I don't really think governments should be running airlines so BA; good. Similarly the sale of Rolls Royce aero engines makes sense (although the government buyout in the early 70's is an excellent example of the positive effect of governments intervening in key industries). Conversely I think that privatisatising natural monopolies like the railways or utilities is just dumb.
I think not. According to that description, the Nordic model (described at one point as "cuddly capitalism") doesn't seem very far left of one-nation conservatism.
My point remains that so much that is labelled 'conservative' is really anything but. 'Conservative' =/= 'right wing'
"One-nation" politics is the opposite of the "class war" politics of the far left. And says that government should not be an instrument by which a majority (however composed) screws over a minority, but in a non-zero-sum world manages the economy and the systems of health and education for the benefit of everyone.
It's only the opposite in the sense that it's the victory of the opposing side, the victory of the capitalist class and the treaty by which the working class does not challenge that victory in exchange for the capitalist class generously returning some of the fruits of the working class' labour in the form of public services. It only gets called class war when the working class start fighting back.
I think not. According to that description, the Nordic model (described at one point as "cuddly capitalism") doesn't seem very far left of one-nation conservatism.
And yet the Labour Party offering a milder version of that at the last election were painted as far left or Marxists.
No one side is totally compatible with Christian beliefs (which in itself is very wide). Even though I think left is closer to loving your neighbour and providing for the poor etc it can be unhappy with other things. The right can be the same. I cannot see how a right Leaning party can uphold what Jesus told us but others can.
I think you're right Hugal - an upright left-winger and an upright right-winger will both do good, in different ways and with different perverse outcomes built-in. But as LC has reminded us a few times, 'but people'...
Back to the "one nation" conservatism. It seems to me, to the extent that this is real and not a mere cynical facade, that it is ... well, a "Yeah, duh" position. Of course any government ought to be for the benefit of the whole people it governs, and not just for a particular faction! In fact, of course any government ought to be for that, AND with fair-minded concern for those in other nations as well. ("America first" and parallel expressions are the sort of thing that ought to cause terminal blushing on the part of those who use them--pity it doesn't happen.)
The problem, of course, is that you often have a choice between open and concealed assholes (aka hypocrites), without the third option of someone who truly believes in doing right by everybody--at least, as much right as can be managed given the broken world in which we live. And the hypocrites are great at masking their assholery by making wise noises about deregulation and the magical powers of the free market and what not, which (if you've not been taught to think, or are of a trusting disposition), may easily catch the unwary and their votes. (I've no doubt there are parallels on the left in terms of hypocrisy--it's a human problem, not a party problem.)
I suppose it boils down to this: Me, I suspect everybody. Since we must have government of some sort, I want to vote for the ones that seem the most competent and honest, and then watch them like a hawk. (hey, we just got Medicaid expansion in our state! You should have seen the turnout for what was supposed to be an unimportant election. Even with social distancing limiting the number of people who could enter the school gym at one time, I counted four obvious mother-and-new-voter-son pairs, grimly standing in line to do their duty. Rather like watching lionesses giving hunting lessons...)
Comments
Oh, gosh. I am so sorry. I completely misunderstood. So LC presents herself as a thoughtful and considerate conservative and you in a spirit of heroic self-sacrifice wish to demonstrate that other forms of conservative are available. You champion you.
I was born in 1950. The state gave me free orange juice and powdered milk and immunisations. It provided schools and paid me to go to university. Now it gives me free drugs and a pension. Why shouldn't I think of it as benevolent?
Precisely. 1961 for me. I got actual milk, immunisations, free school and college (twice) NHS saved my mother's life when I was twenty, and lately the state has paid for my rent, wifi, and brandy. Last time I checked I can still think for myself so assume I have not succumbed to dependency.
Mind you, isn't Rishi Sunak lovely.....
No need to apologise. You couldn't help it.
The general tone of discussion here has been surprisingly polite; keep it up if you want this to stay in Heaven.
Trudy, Heavenly Host
Posted something before seeing Trudy's post above. Don't seem able simply to delete the entire post.
Thanks Trudy, noted.
I am guilty of sliding in a purgatorial direction and possibly lower still...
There is obviously the potential for a Purg thread here but I think there is great value in this Heavenly one.
(A hoping to manage to be better behaved from now on...) AFZ
P.s. that doesn't preclude me from calling someone to Hell though...
I can see how attachment to the comfortable and familiar can give rise to attitudes the novelty-hunger (like me) find reactionary or stultifying. Which is why I tend not to argue the point, but rather try to discover the emotional bias.
There are positive and negative versions however. ISTM that what goes under the Conservative label at the moment is a Chaotic Evil version of the desire for change. It is the desire to smash everything in a regenerative catharsis from which a new, purged order will emerge. It is tied into the myth of the übermensch.
While conservatism is often tied up with a fear of changing what is in case something worse arises it can also be deeply nostalgic and want to sweep away decades or more of change to restore some previous order. Often the previous order is, to say the least, seen through rose-tinted spectacles or is even semi-mythical. Almost always the previous order was only favourable to that section of society to which the nostalgicist belongs and was pretty vile to everyone else. Almost always this previous order coincided with the youth of the nostalgically minded.
I've concluded that those hankering for a return to the past don't have any preference for a particular kind of politics or social order, they just want the return of whatever they most associate with flexible knees and fully-functioning genitalia.
I'm not sure what this has to do with conservative politics. Boris Johnson is by nature a somewhat flamboyant person, yet leads the UK Conservative party. Donald Trump is a flamboyant narcissist who always wants to be the centre of attention.
By contrast, take every young person I've ever met selling "Socialist Worker" on street corners, and they're all wearing basically the same outfit as each other. Are they the conservatives?
Lovely reply thanks. If you haven’t read it I second AFZ’s pointer to the Jim Wallis book ‘God’s Politics: why the Right gets it wrong and the Left doesn’t get it.’ It’s a serious and honourable attempt to move away from sterile Left/Right polarisation.
I think you’re right about callings. Some are called to fish the drowning out of rivers, others to speak truth to power about who is throwing them in upstream. Some pastors, some prophets.
I think you're right - and the ways that those temperaments manifest is often conditioned by the 'side' the person espouses, their corresponding blind spots expressing themselves in different, complementary ways. To suggest a very obvious example, left wingers are often better at pointing out social / structural sins, and right wingers are usually better at spotting personal failures of responsibility. Both sides tend to get stuck with interpreting some new problem through their own favoured lens, and the dualism which results is often not helpful in resolving the actual issue at hand.
I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that’s why I’m holding on to the remnants of my Christian faith.
🤔
It's not clear-cut. Johnson is Conservative (big C) but not conservative (small c) in either dress or personal morality - hence lots of sexual partners and lots of children by those partners.
Small c conservatives are more likely to vote Conservative but by no means all will do so and conversely many traditional Labour voters are deeply conservative in taste and social values.
Hence why Labour, supposedly a progressive party, did nothing for same-sex marriage despite having power for thirteen years, whereas the Conservatives, supposedly the party of conservative values, introduced same-sex marriage within a few years of taking office in alliance with the Lib-Dems.
It all makes a bit more sense if you see politics as more than a left-right divide. Both left and right are divided between Authoritarian and Libertarian tendencies and sometimes the right are more libertarian than the left and hence inclined to bring in a policy like same sex marriage and sometimes the left is more libertarian than the right.
The Labour government did, however, bring in civil partnerships, repeal Section 28 and make sexuality a protected characteristic on a par with race and sex. The tories may have taken the last step on equal marriage but all the others were made by Labour. It's also worth noting that a majority of tory MPs opposed equal marriage. And we now have a PM who refers to gay men as "bum boys".
The Labour government did, however, abolish the infamous "section 28" of the Local Government Act, and introduced (with support from the opposition parties) civil partnerships for same-sex couples. And whilst it's true that the Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government brought in the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) bill, slightly more Conservative MPs voted against it than voted for it, whereas the other parties were all strongly in favour.
I am a supporter of same sex marriage and all long term relationships. I do not expect everyone else to agree with me. .
That position requires a very selective view of the Republican party and American conservatism. For example, George W. Bush wasn't particularly cautious in the invasion of Iraq. Nor was he especially especially cautious about the federal deficit, something you say is a concern of yours. His vice president, Dick Cheney, even went so far as to claim that "deficits don't matter". Newt Gingrich's tendency towards brinksmanship and normalizing government shutdowns as a negotiating tactic doesn't seem particularly cautious to me, either. Nor Reagan's decision to fight secret wars in Central America and fund them through arms sales to terrorist states so he didn't have to deal with any pesky Congress.
In a lot of ways what Trump has done is simply taken the mask off of the American conservative movement and the Republican party that is its standard bearer. A lot of folks like @Lamb Chopped didn't like it when they dropped the pretense, but even more folks liked it a lot.
The way I learnt it (on these boards, some years ago now) is that there are at least three dimensions:
- authoritarian vs libertarian
- conservative vs radical
- left vs right.
Each of which is a spectrum.
Sounds to me like Lanb Chopped leans to the conservative (in the true sense of putting the burden of proof on those who want change), and is not far from the political centre.
Any comment on liberty vs authority, @Lamb Chopped ?
That makes a lot of sense. Three dimensions would cover economics, social issues, and the nature of authority/government. I can also see the need for further dimensions for issues like the environment which doesn't seem to fit easily on the three spectra.
Fact vs fiction?
Puzzled.
Are you saying that environmental concerns are fiction or suggesting I might think they are fiction or that those who claim there are no environmental concerns are peddling fiction?
To me, the spectra dealing with authoritarian vs libertarian, conservative vs radical, and left vs right (the nature of authority/government, social issues, and economics) are all anthropocentric whereas environmental concerns step beyond mere human interest and deal with our relationship with the biosphere as a whole. For example, you could make an economic argument for saving the tiger but that doesn't really address why people think saving the tiger is a worthwhile thing to do and why the state/politics should get involved . Art and culture also does not fit readily on any of the three spectra and yet most of us value them and think politics/the state has a role to play in supporting them.
Sorry, I meant the last of those.
That's not confined to environmental issues - there are lots of cases where people prefer to listen to their own prejudices and preferences, rather than examining what the data says is actually happenning. (It's not limited to the political right either, although I think the majority of the obvious examples find their home there.)
In some ways, it's an idealist vs pragmatist axis. And there certainly seems to be significant correlation between people who think climate change is a hoax and people who think Covid-19 is a hoax.
Ah. Phew. I didn't take you for a climate-change denier
I think that suggests the possibility of a whole spectrum all to itself. Not sure what it should be called but at one end it would have data, peer-reviewed research, rationality and logic, objectivity, and so on, and at the other it would have anecdata, "common-sense", confirmation bias, and so on.
Liberty vs. authority--well, you see, I don't do abstractions well. I would need a concrete example, including the people (i.e. don't just say what if President X wanted to do Y to people group Z).
What I can say is basically what I said before--that I believe all human beings are flawed (well, except one), that all of them will mismanage themselves and any others they happen to be in authority over (though the extent to which they do this varies wildly) and so I do not, can not, give my complete trust to any particular political stance or position on a spectrum. It's always more along the lines of, "Yeah, I voted for you, but don't get uppity about it, or I'll vote for your recall so fast your head will spin."
That seems to me to be the best approach to take to politicians of any party!
So long as you don't end up voting for someone even worse out of spite (c.f. those who voted for Trump because they took against Clinton).
I was listening to yesterday's Daily Beans podcast and they referred to the some of current Supreme Court Justices as 'Activist Conservative.' I want to note the oxymoron herein.
Let me switch sides of the Atlantic here. In the UK, the kind of conservatism LC describes is commonly known as One-nation conservatism. This is not a position that I hold, but it is one I respect. I would argue very strongly that as a Christian, one's faith must inform one's politics. That is not to party-politicize God, I resist that very strongly for lots of reasons but that one's political thinking has to be shaped by one's faith. I know a lot of Christians who are one-nation conservatives and I understand and respect that position, even though my thinking takes me to a slightly different place. There's a really interesting and positive discussion about values and political ideologies and practical policies to be had around this. However, the modern Conservative Party since Mrs Thatcher became leader (i.e. more than my entire lifetime) has not been a one-nation conservative party.
Under Thatcher, the Tories moved very strongly to a neo-liberal economic position. I won't go into the details of that here but it is not compatible with traditional one-nation conservatism and I would argue, actually, that neo-liberal economics are not morally compatible with Christianity.
The problem I have is that so many of my Christian friends who are politically conservative don't seem to have noticed. That's unfair but what I mean is they support a party that for 4 decades now has not held the same values they do. It's one of those things that is so obvious from the outside. (Of course, this begs the question as to what are my own blind spots but putting that aside...)
I think the same phenomenon exists on the other side of the pond. That is a traditional conservatism which is indeed conservative - I respect that and love to discuss with this position as it challenges my own thinking. However the right wing in America is not conservative in that sense at all. It a form of aggressive right-wing activism. It has been this way for several decades. Hence it seems to me that so many of these people who call themselves 'conservative' are nothing of the sort. And yet true conservatives still align themselves with these non-conservative conservatives and that confuses me.
Trump is a special case in the extent to which he embodies and demonstrates this contradiction but only in extent. This radical right-wing capture of the Conservative Party and the Republican Party is nothing new.
AFZ
It's actually a lot more benign than that. One Nation Conservatism is an idea that a Conservative government must govern in the best interests of everyone in the country regardless of who they vote for. That means that their policies must benefit everyone. That's what Conservative governments used to do fifty years ago and may possibly do in the future.
The other version of Conservatism, largely created by Mrs Thatcher, is the idea that you govern primarily in the interest of a particular section of society. So tax breaks for the rich and welfare cuts for the poor, and so on.
@Colin Smith and @Robert Armin have covered it well, thank you. It's definitely not nationalistic, the concept is meant to be unifying of the nation... we are all one society. The Wiki article emphasises paternalism which I think is not quite right but otherwise covers it well. This I think is a good summary.
My point remains that so much that is labelled 'conservative' is really anything but. 'Conservative' =/= 'right wing'
AFZ
Thanks, AFZ. Agree that seems a good summary.
"One-nation" politics is the opposite of the "class war" politics of the far left. And says that government should not be an instrument by which a majority (however composed) screws over a minority, but in a non-zero-sum world manages the economy and the systems of health and education for the benefit of everyone.
Agree that Mrs Thatcher was radical rather than small-c conservative.
But her radicalism was directed not against any social class of people but against the inefficiency of big government and nationalised industries and trade union inflexibility.
It's possible to believe both in government-provided health and education and macro-economic management and a government duty to do these things as efficiently as possible. Government that spends citizens' money as carefully as they would spend their own, as opposed to Galbraithian role-maximisation.
So there's less conflict than you suppose.
Thanks for that post. I agree with you up to a point. But I would argue strongly that in Thatcherism, the notion of fiscal conservatism was a myth.
For example, if you compare Thatcher / Major 79-97 with Blair/Brown 97-08* you see very similar aggregate deficits. But with two key differences. Under Thatcher and Major there were multiple privatisations, whether that was good policy or not isn't relevant here;** you can only sell the assets once! Working out the total privatisations receipts is actually quite complex but it's multiple billions (at contemporary prices, equivalent to hundreds of billions today). This money went into government revenue directly thus if you strip out this money, they ran very large deficits essentially throughout those 18 years. Secondly, the Blair/Brown governments invested heavily - not just public services but also capital investment. Whatever you think of these policies, it is simply mathematically false to suppose that the previous Tory governments were more fiscally conservative. Even though they constantly claim to be.
AFZ
*For reasons that I hope are obvious, I have ignored the Global Financial Crisis for this comparison; in the same way that it would be deeply disingenuous to look at the current government's spending in response to Covid-19 as part of their overall fiscal record.
**FWIW, I think there are some good privatisations and bad ones: I don't really think governments should be running airlines so BA; good. Similarly the sale of Rolls Royce aero engines makes sense (although the government buyout in the early 70's is an excellent example of the positive effect of governments intervening in key industries). Conversely I think that privatisatising natural monopolies like the railways or utilities is just dumb.
I think not. According to that description, the Nordic model (described at one point as "cuddly capitalism") doesn't seem very far left of one-nation conservatism.
It's only the opposite in the sense that it's the victory of the opposing side, the victory of the capitalist class and the treaty by which the working class does not challenge that victory in exchange for the capitalist class generously returning some of the fruits of the working class' labour in the form of public services. It only gets called class war when the working class start fighting back.
And yet the Labour Party offering a milder version of that at the last election were painted as far left or Marxists.
All we like sheep, have gone astray.
Have go-o-o-one astray...
Shall we get back to @Lamb Chopped's original OP??? There are other places *cough*Purgatory/Hell*cough* to discuss political stuff in Great Britain.
jedijudy, Heaven Host
Backing away from the lightsaber
Back to the "one nation" conservatism. It seems to me, to the extent that this is real and not a mere cynical facade, that it is ... well, a "Yeah, duh" position. Of course any government ought to be for the benefit of the whole people it governs, and not just for a particular faction! In fact, of course any government ought to be for that, AND with fair-minded concern for those in other nations as well. ("America first" and parallel expressions are the sort of thing that ought to cause terminal blushing on the part of those who use them--pity it doesn't happen.)
The problem, of course, is that you often have a choice between open and concealed assholes (aka hypocrites), without the third option of someone who truly believes in doing right by everybody--at least, as much right as can be managed given the broken world in which we live. And the hypocrites are great at masking their assholery by making wise noises about deregulation and the magical powers of the free market and what not, which (if you've not been taught to think, or are of a trusting disposition), may easily catch the unwary and their votes. (I've no doubt there are parallels on the left in terms of hypocrisy--it's a human problem, not a party problem.)
I suppose it boils down to this: Me, I suspect everybody. Since we must have government of some sort, I want to vote for the ones that seem the most competent and honest, and then watch them like a hawk. (hey, we just got Medicaid expansion in our state! You should have seen the turnout for what was supposed to be an unimportant election. Even with social distancing limiting the number of people who could enter the school gym at one time, I counted four obvious mother-and-new-voter-son pairs, grimly standing in line to do their duty. Rather like watching lionesses giving hunting lessons...)