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Conservative values/principles

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  • Conservative values/principles

    What are they?

    It's a simple question, open to everyone. Looking for real answers/opinions.

  • #2
    Conservative fiscally? Conservative politically? Conservative socially?

    What is it you're looking for, other than to "GOTCHA" when you nail Trump for not being "that"?
    The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
      Conservative fiscally? Conservative politically? Conservative socially?

      What is it you're looking for, other than to "GOTCHA" when you nail Trump for not being "that"?
      I think it's a fair question
      "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
        I think it's a fair question
        Got suggestions?
        The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

        Comment


        • #5
          In trying to define what somebody is - like "conservative" - we can get so granular that we can't agree on a specific point.

          So, let's give this a start, and see if other conservatives agree with these points.


          1. Transcendent Order

          First, conservatives generally believe that there exists a transcendent moral order, to which we ought to try to conform the ways of society. A divine tactic, however dimly descried, is at work in human society. Such convictions may take the form of belief in “natural law” or may assume some other expression; but with few exceptions conservatives recognize the need for enduring moral authority. This conviction contrasts strongly with the liberals’ utilitarian view of the state (most consistently expressed by Bentham’s disciples), and with the radicals’ detestation of theological postulates.

          2. Social Continuity


          Second, conservatives uphold the principle of social continuity. They prefer the devil they know to the devil they don’t know. Order and justice and freedom, they believe, are the artificial products of a long and painful social experience, the results of centuries of trial and reflection and sacrifice. Thus the body social is a kind of spiritual corporation, comparable to the church; it may even be called a community of souls. Human society is no machine, to be treated mechanically. The continuity, the lifeblood, of a society must not be interrupted. Burke’s reminder of the social necessity for prudent change is in the minds of conservatives. But necessary change, they argue, ought to be gradual and discriminatory, never “unfixing old interests at once.” Revolution slices through the arteries of a culture, a cure that kills.

          3. Prescription

          Third, conservatives believe in what may be called the principle of prescription. “The wisdom of our ancestors” is one of the more important phrases in the writings of Burke; presumably Burke derived it from Richard Hooker. Conservatives sense that modern men and women are dwarfs on the shoulders of giants, able to see farther than their ancestors only because of the great stature of those who have preceded us in time. Therefore conservatives very frequently emphasize the importance of “prescription”—that is, of things established by immemorial usage, so “that the mind of man runneth not to the contrary.” There exist rights of which the chief sanction is their antiquity—including rights in property, often. Similarly, our morals are prescriptive in great part. Conservatives argue that we are unlikely, we moderns, to make any brave new discoveries in morals or politics or taste. It is perilous to weigh every passing issue on the basis of private judgment and private rationality. “The individual is foolish, but the species is wise,” Burke declared. In politics we do well to abide by precedent and precept and even prejudice, for “the great mysterious incorporation of the human race” has acquired habits, customs, and conventions of remote origin which are woven into the fabric of our social being; the innovator, in Santayana’s phrase, never knows how near to the taproot of the tree he is hacking.

          4. Prudence


          Fourth, conservatives are guided by their principle of prudence. Burke agrees with Plato that in the statesman, prudence is chief among virtues. Any public measure ought to be judged by its probable long-run consequences, not merely by temporary advantage or popularity. Liberals and radicals, the conservative holds, are imprudent: for they dash at their objectives without giving much heed to the risk of new abuses worse than the evils they hope to sweep away. Human society being complex, remedies cannot be simple if they are to be effective. The conservative declares that he acts only after sufficient reflection, having weighed the consequences. Sudden and slashing reforms are perilous as sudden and slashing surgery. The march of providence is slow; it is the devil who always hurries.

          5. Variety


          Fifth, conservatives pay attention to the principle of variety. They feel affection for the proliferating intricacy of long-established social institutions and modes of life, as distinguished from the narrowing uniformity and deadening egalitarianism of radical systems. For the preservation of a healthy diversity in any civilization, there must survive orders and classes, differences in material condition, and many sorts of inequality. The only true forms of equality are equality in the Last Judgment and equality before a just court of law; all other attempts at leveling lead, at best, to social stagnation. Society longs for honest and able leadership; and if natural and institutional differences among people are destroyed, presently some tyrant or host of squalid oligarchs will create new forms of inequality. Similarly, conservatives uphold the institution of private property as productive of human variety: without private property, liberty is reduced and culture is impoverished.

          6. Imperfection


          Sixth, conservatives are chastened by their principle of imperfectibility. Human nature suffers irremediably from certain faults, the conservatives know. Man being imperfect, no perfect social order ever can be created. Because of human restlessness, mankind would grow rebellious under any utopian domination, and would break out once more in violent discontent—or else expire of boredom. To aim for utopia is to end in disaster, the conservative says: we are not made for perfect things. All that we reasonably can expect is a tolerably ordered, just, and free society, in which some evils, maladjustments, and suffering continue to lurk. By proper attention to prudent reform, we may preserve and improve this tolerable order. But if the old institutional and moral safeguards of a nation are forgotten, then the anarchic impulses in man break loose: “the ceremony of innocence is drowned.”
          The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
            I think it's a fair question
            Thank you.

            Comment


            • #7
              Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
              Thank you.
              He's always a well-balanced solid good guy.
              The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
                What are they?

                It's a simple question, open to everyone. Looking for real answers/opinions.
                That the principles found in the Declaration concerning human rights and the protection of those rights as found in the Constitution is the best possible way to organize a society and government. That is a start.
                Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by seer View Post
                  That the principles found in the Declaration concerning human rights and the protection of those rights as found in the Constitution is the best possible way to organize a society and government. That is a start.
                  Liberals would say the same thing, though.

                  I'm not saying you're wrong, per se. It's just that those values/principles aren't specifically conservative; they're American. I'm looking for conservative values/principles; things which identify a person as a conservative.
                  Last edited by Whateverman; 07-11-2020, 02:57 PM.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
                    Liberals would say the same thing, though.

                    I'm not saying you're wrong, per se. It's just that those values/principles aren't specifically conservative; they're American. I'm looking for conservative values/principles; things which identify a person as a conservative.
                    Actually I don't think today's liberal do. They don't believe in free speech, the second amendment with socialism increasingly undermining property rights. Or generally believe that rights are God given. Conservatives have a reverence for the Founders that you don't find on the left, and a higher regard for law and order. And of course we are largely pro life...
                    Last edited by seer; 07-11-2020, 03:42 PM.
                    Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by seer View Post
                      Actually I don't think today's liberal do.
                      They do. All Americans do.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
                        They do. All Americans do.
                        Ya know, that's one of them thar things where we only have to find ONE American as the exception.
                        The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
                          They do. All Americans do.
                          Then you are wrong. Cancel culture, campus speech codes, microaggressions, gender neutral language, hate speech for instance all are aimed at undermining speech, and it is the left that is driving those.
                          Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by seer View Post
                            Then you are wrong.
                            no, you are.

                            Try sticking to the topic of the thread without insulting people. Or is that too much to ask?

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Whateverman View Post
                              no, you are.

                              Try sticking to the topic of the thread without insulting people. Or is that too much to ask?
                              Seer never insulted you once. He just showed you specifically where you're wrong. The left hates free speech when they disagree with it and this has been abundantly demonstrated. But instead of a factual rebuttal, you omit that part of his post (like the slimy dishonest way you always do), hand wave what he said and just pull OP rank over him.

                              Comment

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