What is the good of words if they aren't important
enough to quarrel over? Why do we choose one word more than another if there
isn't any difference between them? If you called a woman a chimpanzee instead
of an angel, wouldn't there be a quarrel about a word? If you're not going to
argue about words, what are you going to argue about? Are you going to convey
your meaning to me by moving your ears? The Church and the heresies always used
to fight about words, because they are the only things worth fighting about.
- GK Chesterton
(As there are many Democrats
who read this blog, many whom are dear and respected friends of mine, I am not
writing to argue with or persuade you to change your mind. If you choose to read this, think
of it as something that may offer some insights as to how to converse or debate
with conservatives, as well as how to tell what sort of conservative you are
encountering.)
Fear Based Conservatives
Fear of change These people’s fears are not so much a dread of future consequences
based on principles, but simply a mindless loyalty to “how things have always
worked.” Any change, for these people, is perceived as a threat to the
foundations of their way of life.
Fear of Loss These men and women see their earning power dwindling, the cost of
onerous regulations forcing them to charge more for their products or services,
and the omen of higher taxes, and, “Dammit, this needs to end.” The problem is,
however understandable, that this is a fear based gut reaction, not a
principled belief in justice.
And why does this matter?
Because each of these fears
belies a sense-based or sentimental conservatism that rarely has any
intellectual foundation. While you may
applaud their voting for your preferred candidate or cause, such “conservatism”
is ephemeral: tomorrow, they will support whoever buys off their fears with
impossible promises. Remember: Fearful
people vote their fears not their principles. (Note to liberals: these
people are low-hanging fruit!)
Politically Ideological
Conservatives
These True Believers have
turned conservatism into a Political Religion - with dogmas and anathemas
thrown in for free! These people are like Roger Williams (the Puritan, not the
singer), whose demand for purity led him to refuse to eat the Lord’s Supper with
sinners, which, at the end of his life, left him eating alone.
Conservatism is not a
religion. This mindset is something that any principled conservative - from
Edmund Burk to Russell Kirk – would vehemently oppose. Frankly, properly
understood, it is not even an ideology. Conservatism is a mindset, a particular
kind of character and approach to life, and the quest to discover and live by
and for the “permanent things.” (TS Eliot) While a conservative mindset affects
how one engages within the sphere of politics and political economics, it is
about far more than politics.
Instinctual Conservatives
These people’s hearts resonate
with conservative principles. However, as they have yet to spend time reading
and reflecting, they have no intellectual basis upon which to stand or from
which to debate. Quite often this leaves them as “reeds in the wind,” not to
mention lousy debaters. (Note to
liberals: higher hanging fruit but ripe with possibility.)
Principled Conservatism
Conservatism is about
reverence for the permanent things: those values, precedents, and traditions
that have been winnowed and sifted throughout history, where God has revealed
His purposes for our existence and how societies can best live and function in
harmony.
Conservatives believe in a constitutional
limited government, not in populism or in “despotic democracy.” (Tocqueville)
Conservatives see an
inexorable link between respect for private property and freedom.
Conservatism has a deep
regard for what will make humans truly happy: virtue, not net-worth. Trust me
here: if you meet a professing conservative who places no value on virtue, the public’s
or his own, his conservatism is dying or already is dead, if it ever existed. (Note
to {some} liberals: seize the day!)
Conservatives believe that tragedy
will always be a part of human existence. While its effects can be ameliorated
by the charitable acts of others, it cannot be eradicated. There are no utopias
in our future.
Conservatives believe in the
equality of worth of all humans before God, as well as equality before the
courts. They do not believe, however, that equality of character and abilities
exists, so do not advocate legislating an equality of results from demonstrably
unequal people. Such equality has never existed and no matter what is legislated
never will.
Conservatives believe in
individuality but not individualism. Individuality is about respecting the
diversity, variety, and uniqueness of all people. (This is one of the reasons
for the Bill of Right’s Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Association, Freedom of
Religion, and etc.) Individualism is about self-glorification (or deification)
with no regard for living in community, societal harmony, or of permanent
things.
Conservatives are averse to
alterations of long standing norms, traditions, customs and institutions. I do
not say that they are “against” change, only that they believe it should be organic
- the culmination of a long and deliberative national conversation, rather than
legislated by the fiat word of the Powers
That Be.
Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2016
