I can see most folks becoming more conservative as they grow older if your basing it off of fear. We tend to fear more things as we become more knowledgeable about the world and have more things we care about. I do think the study is flawed or at least the language surrounding it is biased agains't conservatives.
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Are people born conservatives?
- Thread starter StrikeNinja24
- Start date
StrikeNinja24
Banned
While the study is likely flawed, that's what got me thinking. It's always a worry about things. As kids and young adults, most are almost fearless, sometimes thinking themselves to be invincible and without many major responsibilities. As one grows up, more responsibilities are placed on a person. Therefore, more fear. Fear of losing your job. Fear of outside harm. Fear of fraud. Fear of being late. Fear of rejection. I could absolutely keep going. So what happens? You become more cautious, more conservative.
I figured why not, let's hear from their side as well.
I’m not sure I quite understand your point. He’s comparing the United States with large cities removed but not removing large cities from any other countries in the world. It should be obvious how this renders the results totally meaningless.
I’m not talking about solutions to anything. I’m talking about people who don’t even have the ability to understand the most elementary statistics. I honestly think he doesn’t understand why the statistic doesn’t make sense and that’s the problem. When people get their information from fucking infographics we’re fucked.
StrikeNinja24
Banned
Kids don't know enough to fear though. They have a heightened sense of fear, but fear comes from what a person has vs something they realize they can lose at a moment's notice. It is something brought on by knowing what could happen.
way more
Member
I think so. There are numerous studies of the conservative or liberal brain. It seems like a 80% nature 20% nurture thing.
I realize how timid that statement is but I stand by it. Also, most people don't vote so maybe the natural state is being unconcerned about thinking of things as right or left.
I realize how timid that statement is but I stand by it. Also, most people don't vote so maybe the natural state is being unconcerned about thinking of things as right or left.
Gun Animal
Member
that is what race is. race is an extension of family, kin, tribe, etc.
the irish?
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Vicetrailia
Member
Control and certainty are a thing. I think it's mostly environmental. On shifting politics, if you're super liberal at 25 you'll generally be liberal at 40, then you'll be a little less liberal at 60. The absolute level goes down, but it may not often be libreal to conservative massive. There is more to conservatism than "I got mine" as well.
Uncertainty and ambiguity are not desired.
Uncertainty and ambiguity are not desired.
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Corrik
Member
Linking conservatism to fear is propaganda. There are valid reasons to have the opposite views that you are likely fond of.
Trying to dismiss them as fearmongering or such is just propaganda and frankly a juvenlie argument.
Relativ9
Member
Conservatism isn't caused by fear. I'd agree that there are certainly a lot of "traditional US republicans" that have a lot of fear in their heart, but I don't think it's a causal relationship. If anything it's probably the other way around; conservatism causes fear. Demagogues from the tea-party take peoples misfortune, doubts, and hardships and spin it into a narrative of prejudice, blame, and fear towards others. They know that they won't get votes by saying "sort yourself out" so instead, they scapegoat some other group or philosophy (socialism), it's not called fearmongering for nothing.
Also, I can definitely mirror what everyone saying with it being related to age. When I was younger (I'm currently 29), I was definitely a lot more left. That said, I feel like the major reason for me being so far left in my teens/early 20s was that I was more or less a single issue voter (religion = bad). I still am very much critical of religion and religious institutions, but I've become more layered, mellow and accommodating in my approach, and it's no longer the only issue important to me. I view religion as a type of authoritarian rule, and I'm incredibly sensitive and against any type of authoritarianism.
Right now it just so happens that it's the left that is evangelizing and displaying authoritarianism the most, so naturally, I've been pushed more to the right (or center really). I'd argue that my politics are mostly unchanged and that it's the left that has spun out of control, but that's a separate conversation.
Also, I can definitely mirror what everyone saying with it being related to age. When I was younger (I'm currently 29), I was definitely a lot more left. That said, I feel like the major reason for me being so far left in my teens/early 20s was that I was more or less a single issue voter (religion = bad). I still am very much critical of religion and religious institutions, but I've become more layered, mellow and accommodating in my approach, and it's no longer the only issue important to me. I view religion as a type of authoritarian rule, and I'm incredibly sensitive and against any type of authoritarianism.
Right now it just so happens that it's the left that is evangelizing and displaying authoritarianism the most, so naturally, I've been pushed more to the right (or center really). I'd argue that my politics are mostly unchanged and that it's the left that has spun out of control, but that's a separate conversation.
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ar0s
Member
People being born into an ideology and fundamentally physically different stinks of the worst of Nazism and concentration camp experiments.
This study that makes out people who are conservative/moderate/libertarian are physically and genetically worse is doing exactly what it throws accusations of around. Fear that the other is essentially subhuman.
I know this is meant to be aimed at American authoritarians but given the 20th century it makes me very uncomfortable. An extremely poor study that does not actually show us anything, as well as being a very dangerous road to start going down again.
This study that makes out people who are conservative/moderate/libertarian are physically and genetically worse is doing exactly what it throws accusations of around. Fear that the other is essentially subhuman.
I know this is meant to be aimed at American authoritarians but given the 20th century it makes me very uncomfortable. An extremely poor study that does not actually show us anything, as well as being a very dangerous road to start going down again.
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pramod
Banned
I've been thinking about this and I sort of figure out that the relation between getting older and more conservative, while it could depend on some factors like becoming wiser, or more cynical or pragmatic, probably has more to do with the "grumpy old man" syndrome. ie what I mean by that is, as you grew older you had to endure all sorts of awful things, and you simply feel that everyone else should also have to go thru the same crap you did, without all the whining because goddamit, that's the way it used to be and we loved it! That's why conservatives are more prone to call others "pussies" or "cucks".
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mushy tailspin
Banned
In this thread(among everywhere else in this stinking country) we paint with broad strokes.
Left = we love you, we understand you, and we've got a one size fits all solution.
Right = we walked 15 miles in the mean streets of small town nowhere and it made us cold it made us scared. Heil Trump Amirite?
Ever think we're not all so different and our crazys on both sides are meeting in their middle where the two extremes meet? Maybe the talking heads on tv convinced us some trivial b.s. issues were bigger issues than how we naturally would feel about them. Should we really be ripping each others heads off when we get along famously if we leave the talking heads bullet points out of it?
Left = we love you, we understand you, and we've got a one size fits all solution.
Right = we walked 15 miles in the mean streets of small town nowhere and it made us cold it made us scared. Heil Trump Amirite?
Ever think we're not all so different and our crazys on both sides are meeting in their middle where the two extremes meet? Maybe the talking heads on tv convinced us some trivial b.s. issues were bigger issues than how we naturally would feel about them. Should we really be ripping each others heads off when we get along famously if we leave the talking heads bullet points out of it?
camelCase
Member
Lol. Chuckled a good bit.
I_D
Member
My experience with most toddlers is they're in the 'me me me' stage of life. It's got to be their way, or it's time for a meltdown.
I wouldn't tie this to a political leaning, but things like sharing, sacrificing for the overall population, and listening to differing opinions aren't really high on a child's list of priorities. I guess that makes them conservative?
I wouldn't tie this to a political leaning, but things like sharing, sacrificing for the overall population, and listening to differing opinions aren't really high on a child's list of priorities. I guess that makes them conservative?
Warm Machine
Member
I'd argue that through indoctrination via their parents life experiences, society around them, and guidance children are typically more conservative. As they get older they experience life for themselves and realize all the fear distilled in them isn't exactly as it was described. Then as you get older you see what is actually a problem based on peoples often times irresponsible actions and you begin becoming more protective again.
I'm a very different person than I was when I was fifteen years old. My biases of which I had many, have almost all gone away. Most people change simply due to having to interact and live along other people and most people are good natured. As I have gotten older, my biases are different and more nuanced, usually existing around a subset of issues.
I'm a very different person than I was when I was fifteen years old. My biases of which I had many, have almost all gone away. Most people change simply due to having to interact and live along other people and most people are good natured. As I have gotten older, my biases are different and more nuanced, usually existing around a subset of issues.
mushy tailspin
Banned
May I ask where conservatives are getting this fearful tag?
Vicetrailia
Member
There are studies that link conservatives being more sensitive to threats.
We know that fear makes ones more conservative in the instant of experiencing it (duh), but it may link to politics as well.
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AaronB
Member
Portraying it as "fear" is deliberately negative, but I think it's not far off what "liberal" and "conservative" represent.
There's been a lot of shifting around in politics, but at root liberals believe in bringing about what they view as a better system, based on their views of what is rational or just. Conservatives are more skeptical of the intellectual class' ability to make massive changes, and prefer measured changes.
Think of the more radical steps that the French revolutionaries took, or considered taking. Getting rid of the old power structures in the aristocracy and the church, for example. Most modern people would be ok with those moves. However, seizing property and instituting the reign of terror is pretty radical. A lot of people thought that was going too far; most prominently Edmund Burke, who is considered the father of conservatism. In countries that went outright communist, we saw how far things can go when those in power have a free hand to reshape society in accordance with their own reason or sense of what is right. Private property, individual rights, religion, the family structure - holding on to those is generally conservative. Believing you can radically change or eliminate them and society would survive and be better off is very liberal.
Take immigration. It's kind of unfair to block people from coming here. They're just as good as the people here are; they just happened to be born somewhere else. On the other hand, completely open borders would probably result in overcrowding that would overwhelm our infrastructure, and cause many other problems. Do you let more people in in the name of fairness and compassion, or let fewer people in in the name of survival?
If you think the status quo is so bad that we need radical changes yesterday, you probably lean liberal. If you're concerned that going too far or too fast could destroy the country, you probably lean conservative.
There's been a lot of shifting around in politics, but at root liberals believe in bringing about what they view as a better system, based on their views of what is rational or just. Conservatives are more skeptical of the intellectual class' ability to make massive changes, and prefer measured changes.
Think of the more radical steps that the French revolutionaries took, or considered taking. Getting rid of the old power structures in the aristocracy and the church, for example. Most modern people would be ok with those moves. However, seizing property and instituting the reign of terror is pretty radical. A lot of people thought that was going too far; most prominently Edmund Burke, who is considered the father of conservatism. In countries that went outright communist, we saw how far things can go when those in power have a free hand to reshape society in accordance with their own reason or sense of what is right. Private property, individual rights, religion, the family structure - holding on to those is generally conservative. Believing you can radically change or eliminate them and society would survive and be better off is very liberal.
Take immigration. It's kind of unfair to block people from coming here. They're just as good as the people here are; they just happened to be born somewhere else. On the other hand, completely open borders would probably result in overcrowding that would overwhelm our infrastructure, and cause many other problems. Do you let more people in in the name of fairness and compassion, or let fewer people in in the name of survival?
If you think the status quo is so bad that we need radical changes yesterday, you probably lean liberal. If you're concerned that going too far or too fast could destroy the country, you probably lean conservative.
Barsinister
Banned
My wife and I share a handheld solitaire game. I haven't changed the batteries in about three years or more, and it's starting to show. The cards are dimming and the scroll wheel won't work. Before I change the batteries, I want to get the win percentage above 80%. It's to the point now where to raise the percentage, I need to win ten or more games in a row. Any loss moves the percentage down a point.
My wife doesn't care about this and will forfeit a game if she thinks she can't solve it. I think it is setting at 77% right now.
My wife doesn't care about this and will forfeit a game if she thinks she can't solve it. I think it is setting at 77% right now.
TheShadowLord
Member
it depends if both parents are conservatives just like a baby born a liberal if both parents are liberal. Though there is a 50/50 if one parent is liberal and other is conservative.
Astral Dog
Member
Fear is a powerful tool
Astral Dog
Member
No that way you get a centrist
Liberty4all
Banned
I think it's a combination of family, society and close friends influence.
ar0s
Member
...Along with America only having two possible leanings. There are dozens more mindsets people can have for what is best for the future, often taking elements of both American sides without being centrist. For example I was the furthest left economically on the whole forum 
but believe in extremely strict border control & even mass removals of asylum seekers once we consider their country to be safe.
but believe in extremely strict border control & even mass removals of asylum seekers once we consider their country to be safe.
appaws
Banned
The winner. Absolutely right. There is too much flux over time in humans and their ways of processing information about the world around them to fall back to an overly reductionist position like the OP. Maybe there are elements of truth to some of it...but not enough to make any coherent statement about how brain construction or chemistry influences political views. (And even if you did, they change so quickly that it would not be all that useful.)
Plus today's "liberal" is tomorrow's "conservative." The founding fathers were "liberal," but those who value their legacy the most are "conservative...?" The founding fathers of the Soviet Union were violent leftists...but their heirs looked awfully "conservative" in the last 20 years of that regime, a bunch of old men struggling to hold on while they became irrelevant in a changing world.
The only thing we can be sure of is that generations as yet unborn will have different issues to deal with, ones that we could not imagine. And they will roll their eyes while reading history at the quaint issues we fight about.
pramod
Banned
Are Conservatives really more "fearful" than leftists? I think that being fearful of being taxed too much, of drugs and criminals coming across the border, of more terrorist attacks like those in San Bernadino or 9/11 are legitimate fears. Compare that to being fearful that a billionaire reality TV host is secretly colluding with Vladimir Putin to overthrow our democracy.
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ickythingz
Banned
It is really this. The sad part now is that general intelligence is on the decline, which keeps people in a more child like state. Fuse this with the amazing amount of left leaning propaganda and playing on people's need to be the center of attention (Facebook posting, IG, Twitter, etc) you get to where we are now. Common sense is tossed aside to virtue signal for some likes. Luckily it makes controlling these people easy as well, so for me it is good, but for a society it is bad in general as we now see.
ar0s
Member
Why is it good for you
ickythingz
?
ickythingz
?
Nicktendo86
Member
Na, people are born as socialists (expect everything to be given to them, don't want to work for anything etc) and grow up as they get older.
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As an outsider looking in, I think it's because for the longest time American conservatism has waged a "war" of sorts against PoC, especially black people. I can't pretend to act like I understand why that is, and I feel like the only people qualified to explain why are Americans themselves, and me attempting to explain would just sound stupid. I've always found it strange that many conservatives don't ever look up the demographics of their party and wonder why it never aligns with the demographics of the country itself. And when they do, there's always like super "wow did you say that?" type explanations the one I see most is that black people aren't smart enough to realize they're on the "plantation" voting for democrats, and they just want "free stuff." I don't think that's going to woo minority voters to your platform lol.
I think America's biggest issue is the two party system because of your use of first to the post. It ultimately means a bunch of people with different focuses get channeled into either the liberal or conservative party.
mushy tailspin
Banned
Well the Republican party did free the slaves, had a black member on counsel years before the democrats. Democrat President was quoted as saying he'll have those ****** voting democrat for the next 50 years(or some number forget) it is untrue that all whites were slave owners but its taught they were very few rich ones were, it is not common knowledge blacks owned slaves in the states.
Slavery was outlawed in the south before the north.
And more yet all we hear is were Nazis racist slave owners on and on. Conservatives want small government that's our thing against federal welfare we believe it should be decided and funded by the state not the country.
By the way you're racist. Not justified? No shit
Yes the progressive (abolitionist?) ideology freed the slaves and invited a black member on the counsel years before the conservative party of the time did so, not really sure if that's worth pointing out. I'm not too knowledgeable on US history but somehow the statement of the south freeing slaves willingly doesn't really make sense considering you lot had a whole war over it and all. (Always crazy to me the same conservatives who brag about Lincoln are the same people who wave the confederate flag around).
And from what I've seen of US politics, conservatives really don't want small government in any true sense of the word. I see them funding, expanding, and creating new agencies, laws, regulations all the time much like their democrat counterparts, and conservatives basically write the military a blank cheque. That's not really small government at all that's selective government. Tories say the same shit here, less government spending blah blah blah but every time you turn around they spend spend spend.
Only time I've ever seen American conservatives actually stay true to austerity is on individual state levels. Other than that, it's just nonsense.
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mushy tailspin
Banned
The war wasn't over slavery. Do you really see people dying, families fighting families fathers and sons, to free slaves? Slavery was just one part
And that's why the republican party split up recently and why states always talk about succeeding from the union. No faith in our federal government nothing can get done its too large always at an impasse and over stepping to handle things that should be done at city or state level to reflect their population.
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mushy tailspin
Banned
What? The second paragraph was about large/small government and a host of other things in recent years with tea party for example. Which was called racist. Who brought race into it? Who do you think
mushy tailspin
Banned
I know then spaced on. I didn't distinguish my bad
Yea it was bruh, even we're taught that how do you lot in the US not know your own history? Nearly all of the seceding states wrote their own declarations of secession with the right to slaves being the principle reason. The war was over states' rights…to own slaves. Heck it's explicitly mentioned in the Corner Stone speech. Man America has really good universities but your primary school system seems to be very hit or miss apparently when I know more about your historical internal conflicts than actual Americans lol
In case you didn't know.
Your states have been talking about seceding in one way or another ever since the end of the civil war.
mushy tailspin
Banned
appaws
Banned
It's ridiculous to try to somehow give backhand credit to ANY current political ideology for ending chattel slavery. The people who did it are dead and gone and they were acting on impulses that don't line up with current impulses. Calling the abolitionists "progressive" might be a good strategy to score some points for the left in a political discussion...but it creates really broken historical information. Just like equating slave owners with modern "conservatives" really creates a false impression of what they fought for. The southern slave regime was fundamentally anti-capitalist and anti-modern, and a billion miles from any modern political ideology. Read some of their attacks on northern capitalists, and try to imagine them coming out of the mouths of any modern GOP person.
You are 100% correct about hypocrite "conservatives" and spending. They are liars, and they get in there and spend just as much as the Democrats, often more.
The reason states are often more austere than the national government is that almost every state has a law on the books requiring a balanced budget. They often get there only with shady accounting and smoke and mirrors, but they have to get there, at least on paper. The Federal government can also print money, which of course states cannot do.
Long term, it is all unsustainable. But politicians in democracies do not think of long term...they think of the next election. One of the great flaws of the system.
Progressive-ism and conservatism themselves are core human ideologies, you either want something to stay as it is, or you want things to change.
And no, that's not really trying to score points with the left, you're thinking of the whole "it was Republicans who freed the slaves!" argument that creates a broken historical narrative.
As you said, they were anti capitalism (they really weren't, slavery and the profits from it are capitalistic in nature) and anti-modern, one could say they were very…conservative and wanted to keep things the way they had been fearing that more…progressive measures being suggested by the North would change the country, especially the south for the worse.
Seeing a few of your states try austerity only for it to not work and just wreck the state, I shudder to think why any political party would think it'd work on the grand stage.
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Vicetrailia
Member
They just wanted to hold onto their cash cow until the bitter end.
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