cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/17713638
““If we jail Trump, get rid of Maga, end the electoral college, ban voter ID, censor free speech, we’ll save democracy,” says one meme in a QAnon channel on Telegram that depicts Biden in a Nazi uniform with a Hitler mustache”
Apparently they at least understand their opponent’s view .
I’m going to concede defeat here because obviously I’m not doing a good enough job in explaining my position. But everything you just listed is exactly my point. When did all of those things start occuring? Was it before or after MAGA took over the Republican Party?
Essentially all I’m saying is that Correlation does not equal causation. All of those things you’ve just listed aren’t because they’re conservatives, it’s because they’re assholes. They just happened to find a party (Republicans) that told them that it’s okay to let your asshole flag fly. Conservatism and Republicanism are two different things. Always have been. Conservatism is economic theory (low taxes, high privatization, lower goverment oversight, etc…) Republicanism is political theory (immigration, law and order, militarization, etc…)
MAGA took over Republicanism, convinced everyone that it was Conservatism in order to appeal to the “common folk” in order to take over the GOP.
You’re list isn’t a list of Conservative ideals, it’s a list of Republican ideals. Those aren’t the same thing.
I guess what I’m saying is, again, Correlation is not causation. All republicans are are conservatives, yes. But not all Conservatives are Republicans (or at least they wouldn’t be if the country wasn’t in the grip of some two-party system bullshit. They’re two very different things.
But again, I’m not doing a good job of explaining that, obviously, so I’m going to back out with grace and take the “L”.
Have a good day.
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It’s because your position is indefensible given recent history and the trajectory of the political landscape.
Fair enough. You’re more than welcome to your opinion. But to my mind, what’s indefensible (and ridiculous, frankly) is painting absolutely everyone on one side with the same brush, no matter how much you may hate that side’s ideals (or lack thereof).
Uh, one side is unrelenting about suppressing everyone else’s rights, and has demonstrated that they’re willing to take control by force and violence if they don’t get ‘their ideals’. If you’re on that side, you’re an asshole, and being ‘painted’ as an asshole is the least that you deserve.
Please stop for a moment, step outside your yourself, and ask… “Am I the baddie?”
You so desperately want to separate the two, you’re literally arguing the opposite. Conservatism has been the Republican Party since the 1950s at minimum and much more likely quite earlier than that.
If conservatives think the Republican Party doesn’t represent them, then why has that party continued to exist?
Short answer: because they’re the same thing. You can’t on one hand declare that “they don’t represent conservativism” and then on the other hand allow the party to continue.
It’s not at all correlation — it is exactly causation. Conservatism == Republicanism. And the reason it does is because it gives conservatives the platform and power that they desperately want in order to enact their backward ideals, whether economic or political, it makes no difference.
If you feel so strongly in your position, then instead of quibbling over semantics, maybe start your own party of such righteous conservative ideology and let’s see whether it serves those ideals or whether it devolves into the same bullshit that the Republican Party has for decades.
I would assert that any party based on conservative ideals will, at some point, become akin to what the Republican Party has become. And the sole reason — critical thinking is not a part of the ideology.
Because money is power. The hard-liners running the show keep it that way while ma and pa everyman in the midwest really don’t have any kind of say in it.
I firmly do actually believe that, yes. Eventually. But even when it devolves, it’s not going to be all of them. It’ll be a minority or people who have the money, which gives them the power, while ma and pa everyman in the midwest (again) has little control over who uses their ideals for what purpose.
Like the original person that replied to me, you’re doing the indefensible of automatically painting every single conservative with the same brush, and that’s just flat out inaccurate.
There’s a difference between believing in some backwards ideals like conservativism, and acting on them. I live surrounded by Conservative thinkers. And yeah, they’ll admit that they don’t believe in gay marraige, lgbtq, immigtation, etc… all of that stuff. Is it backwards? Yes…absolutely. Will they take up arms against a government and think advocate violence? No, that’s stupid. Despite their individual beliefs in their own home, they generally have the opinion of let everyone live their life.
Yeah, there’s people who are insane like that, and want to push that belief onto everyone. And yeah, their unfortunately in charge of the narrative of the GOP and the Republican Party.
But painting every single person on one side of the line as the same is not only wrong, it’s harmful to any sort of debate because if you pretend all conservatives are violent racists than you’ll just alienate the ones who aren’t.
That’s because every single conservative I have met or known, act and think the exact same way — selfish and self-righteous, and they damn everyone else who isn’t themselves or their family members.
And I have met thousands, since I have lived in the bastion of conservatism for 30 years (and yes I’m quite unhappy here and can’t wait to move).
So yeah I’ll paint them all with that same brush because they ALL voted for Trump (the literal dozens that I know and keep tabs on, which is a fair sampling against all I’ve ever met) and took away rights from people I care about by getting 3 lying justices on the Supreme Court.
As the saying goes…if the shoe fits…