Why have Conservatives come to embrace ignorance and fascism?

[Anonymous]

Conservatism used to mean something, it had principals and an intellectual framework. That has all been completely abandoned. The Right is now anti-intellectual, anti-science, irrational, fully conspiratorial, and autocratic.

[goaded]

Well, the Republican party been taken over by their base of supporters that they've been courting votes from for the last half century or more.

They spent decades building a coalition of racist southerners (disgusted by the Democratic party's support for black people), businesspeople who don't see why they should pay people a living wage for their work, people who want their religion to be imposed by law on the rest of the population, and rural people who believe the horror stories they're told about "liberal cities".

And now the leadership acts all surprised that they want the power Trump told them was their right. A good chunk of them also believe that Trump really won the 2020 election.

Almost nobody in the Republican party is willing to stand up to any of those groups and tell the truth because they will lose their next primary election, like Liz Cheney.

If anyone tells you the Republican party isn't monolithic, ask them when the last time a small number of Republicans went against their party and stopped them from passing something they wanted (or helped the Democrats from passing something against their party). The only time I can think of was McCain's third Republican vote against taking health insurance away from millions of Americans, and that was 5 years ago. Manchin and Sinema both royally screwed over their own party's aims multiple times in the last two years.

[goaded]

On a plus side for the republic, according to Nate Cohen:

"In state after state, the final turnout data shows that registered Republicans turned out at a higher rate — and in some places a much higher rate — than registered Democrats, including in many of the states where Republicans were dealt some of their most embarrassing losses.

Instead, high-profile Republicans like Herschel Walker in Georgia or Blake Masters in Arizona lost because Republican-leaning voters decided to cast ballots for Democrats, even as they voted for Republican candidates for U. S. House or other down-ballot races in their states."
www.nytimes.com/.../...er-turnout-republicans.html

[slatyb]

Are you asking why the meaning of conservatism has changed, or why so much of the US electorate is ready to abandon our constitutional democracy for fascism?

in my opinion you have a lot of mostly older, relatively uneducated white men used to being privileged who can't handle being told that they are not "more equal" than others.

[nightdrot]

Because what is being called conservatism, is not. Rather, this nation is experiencing a period of populist politics not unlike the mid-19th century and the 1960s and 70s.

Further, because - and here you should take care when you slander people - because American political parties are not the ideological monoliths that you assume them to be. You need some historical context.

In the case of the GOP, it is a coalition made up of classical liberals - which Americans call conservatives, libertarians, small and medium sized business, religious and social traditionalists, lower middle and upper middle income earners, farmers, rural and exurban populations, older voters, the South, the Great Plains, the Rocky Mountain West and the state of Alaska, to name the most prominent groups.

On the Democratic side you get, ethnic and religious minorities, middle and high income wage earners, big business and entertainment industries, urban and inner suburban votes, radical liberals - which Americans call liberals. (Note, the term "radical" here does not mean as Americans use it, i. e. "extremist," but rather as the ancient Greeks used the term, meaning "to the root of.") The northeast, the mid-Atlantic, the Pacific coast and the state of Hawaii.

This is how you get a Republican Party that runs from Ted Cruz at one end to John Kasich at the other. This is how you get a Democratic Party that runs from Joe Manchin at one end to Elizabeth Warren at the other. Quite simply, party identification is not about ideological identity.

As to conservatism, it traces its intellectual pedigree through Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas - and probably most importantly - the 18th century British statesman and political philosopher, Edmund Burke, and also the British Prime Minsiters Benjamin Disraeli and Lord Salisbury.

In an American context, it shows up in the thinking of Alexander Hamilton and then - almost by historical accident, the American Whig Party, and the former Whig turned Republican, Abraham Lincoln. (It is a great historical "what if" as to what the GOP would have looked like had Lincoln lived and the radical Republicans not gained the ascendancy.)

To which classical conservatives respond that the purpose of government is to nurture civic virtue. To reinforce those habits and customs, legitimized by historical usage over time, that make a harmonious and stable social order possible.

Classical conservatives believe in the free market as a tool, rather than an end in itself. They recognize that it is a powerful wealth creator, efficient to some degree, and a guard against an overweening state. However, they believe, as Burke said, "The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please. We ought see what it will please them to do before we risk congratulations."

In terms of conservatism and "the right" as those terms are broadly used in the United States at this moment in time, there has in fact, notwithstanding the dominance of nominally "right wing" or "conservative" parties, a shift away from those principles. See also, in the United States, President Trump's support of protectionism and prison sentencing reform.

Up to very recently, the Republican party was a staunch supporter of global free trade consistent with free market principles. Ditto, the party took a culturally traditionalist approach and was therefore "tough on crime." Yet former President Trump adopted protectionist tariffs and signed prison sentencing reform into law - actions that would have previously horrified his party.

In this, President Trump's protectionism has its echoes in the hyper-nationalism - in some cases to the point of almost tribalism - in places like Poland, Hungary and Brazil. The point being that the internationalism inherent in free market economics is being rejected in favor of a greater emphasis on national particularities and national interests narrowly defined. (This is also what is tearing at the EU and helped to inspire Brexit.)

The difference is that populism is not a schematic philosophy. Rather it is a broadly cultural attitude characterized by distrust of complexity, a disdain for elites, and an emphasis on the inherent goodness and virtue of the "common man." Given this, its approach to policy - as can be seen in former President Trump's policies in the US, and also, by the way , in the politics of figures like Senator Bernie Sanders - is a mishmash of what has historically been seen as policies of the left and right.

Some free market economics - see tax cuts. Some not - see also protectionism and tariffs. Some socially traditionalist - see also in the United States, opposition to abortion. Some more based in an assumption of institutions and the unfairness of "the system" - see again prison sentencing reform.

The causes for this populist wave are varied, but generally are rooted in the weakening of traditional social institutions like civic groups and the church. This aggravated by new technologies and the shifting of the global economy toward more manufacturing/extractions from agricultural/mercantile in the Third World and in the West from manufacturing/extractions to service/high tech.

Indeed, as above, this has been seen before. History has seen these populist waves. In the United States it was manifest in the presidential campaigns of William Jennings Bryan. The Donald Trump of his day. That is if you can imagine an eloquent and deeply religious Donald Trump.

Bottom line, this is an excellent question but its premise is flawed in that it mistakes contemporary usage for a deeper study of the pedigree of political ideas. (Indeed, even the terms "conservatism" and "liberalism" in their current usage do not mean what they have historically. See also, as an example, my answer to this question - Are you a conservative or a liberal? ) There is a shift right now, but it is a populist direction - its particular expression in any given country being framed within a particular national context.

[MCheetah]

Oh my god, will you people shut the fuck up already? NO ONE is more hateful, bigoted, and fascist than the Progressive Left right now, and I'm not even a fuckin' Conservative. I'm so SICK of people trolling on this site while Joe Biden literally destroys America day by day.

Some on the right may be anti-intellectual, anti-science, irrational, fully conspiratorial, and autocratic, but the left is completely anti-intellectual with the woke shit, anti-science with the "gender is a social construct" and "what is a woman?" tranny shit, irrational in everything they say and do, fully conspiratorial with the Trump Derangement Syndrome and Russia collusion shit, and fascist as fuck with the censorship and Cancel Culture nonsense.

The right has its issues (especially with retarded takes like pro-life/anti-abortion), but the left is literally destroying Western civilization right now, not that there's any difference between the two at the very top with the elites. I'd rather take the Christian crap, the Republican cronyism, and conservative values right now, over the tranny crap, pedophiles teaching children in American schools and trying to groom 2nd graders.

[Anonymous]

It's the left that has subverted science and intellectualism by putting out false data that supports their ideals, but not the facts. Science and universities are phony leftist bastions now, so people point that out and support their arguments with verifiable facts, which the left tries to shoot down with nothing more than childish name-calling. People on the leftist news repeat the same exact words and phrases hundreds of times in a day to try to force their point into the truth. The stupid people they rely on buy into this.

[jshm2]

Because that is what past thinking politics aka "conservativism" leads you to. It's why it always fails and leads to wars.

Liberals tend to have a more "lets kick this virtue, and see if things improve!" framework, but that has it's own problems.

Only centrist or coalition politics is the answer. But sadly there are very few neutral intellectuals to make them always possible.

[Anonymous]

Anti science, like 99 genders, denying natural immunity science, and wanting people who caught covid to take the vaccine anyways? You believe life magically started out of nowhere but it's scientifically impossible to create life from non living material. The guy with the highest iq on the planet Christopher Langan is an American who believes in multiple conspiracy theories and has far right views.

[Hispanic-Cool-Guy]

Conservatism never was about being a intellectual, it's actually the opposite.

They celebrate ignorance and simplicity

Now, American conservatives to me are mostly idiots but you can't accuse them of being anti science when the current liberals actually think a biological man can transition into a woman and a woman into a man. 🙄

Liberals now, don't even believe in biology 101.

[Avicenna]

That’s some alternative universe you live in. And You’re bravely anonymous.

[Kaneki05]

People like to create a hell on earth to punish themselves and call it creating heaven.

[Anonymous]

True.