Conservatives are Made, not Born.

Conservatism is not what it used to be. The conservatism of Barry Goldwater died with him and has been replaced by a faction that has no interest in the commonweal.

Why do angry American conservatives look like angry former slave-owners? Courtesy: 1.bp.blogspot.com

(CALGARY, Alberta) - In The Federalist No. 10, James Madison defined a political faction as a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.

This fits the modern conservative definition of itself. Law professor John O. McGinnis once wrote in The National Review that:

“The depiction of our species that is emerging from Darwinism—as composed of individuals who are basically self-interested yet capable of altruism toward family and friends; who are unequal in their abilities yet remarkably similar in their aspirations—comports with fundamental premises of conservative thought.”

He only acknowledges “capable” of altruism, without suggesting it is a basic human trait.

But, writes Nicholas Wade in the NYT, “biologists are beginning to form a generally sunnier view of humankind.” He writes:

“The somewhat surprising answer at which some biologists have arrived is that babies are innately sociable and helpful to others. Of course every animal must to some extent be selfish to survive. But the biologists also see in humans a natural willingness to help.”

He continues:

“When infants 18 months old see an unrelated adult whose hands are full and who needs assistance opening a door or picking up a dropped clothespin, they will immediately help, Michael Tomasello writes in Why We Cooperate , a book published in October. Dr. Tomasello, a developmental psychologist, is co-director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.

“The helping behavior seems to be innate because it appears so early and before many parents start teaching children the rules of polite behavior.” -We May Be Born With an Urge to Help

If this is an accurate finding, and it seems so to me, it suggests that infants are naturally helpful but, in some family dynamics, they are taught to be unhelpful or antisocial. Intentionally so or not, this appears to me to be the psychological origin of conservatism. As Dr. Tomasello writes: “Children are altruistic by nature”. Conservatives are not.

Conservatism is not what it used to be. The conservatism of Barry Goldwater died with him and has been replaced by a faction that has no interest in the commonweal. Here are some of the basic attributes of contemporary conservatism. The below list is borrowed from “The Daily Dish” by Andrew Sullivan Leaving the Right, where he explains why he is no longer a conservative.

Here are the things he says he cannot support in the contemporary conservative movement:

“that claims to believe in limited government but backed an unlimited domestic and foreign policy presidency that assumed illegal, extra-constitutional dictatorial powers until forced by the system to return to the rule of law,

“that exploded spending and borrowing and blames its successor for the debt,

“that so abandoned government's minimal and vital role to police markets and address natural disasters that it gave us Katrina and the financial meltdown of 2008,

“that holds torture as a core value,

“holds that purely religious doctrine should govern civil political decisions and that uses the sacredness of religious faith for the pursuit of worldly power,

“that is deeply homophobic, cynically deploys fear of homosexuals to win votes, and gives off such a racist vibe that its share of the minority vote remains pitiful,

“has no real respect for the institutions of government and is prepared to use any tactic and any means to fight political warfare rather than conduct a political conversation,

“sees permanent war as compatible with liberal democratic norms and limited government,

“criminalizes private behavior in the war on drugs,

“would back a vice-presidential candidate manifestly unqualified and duplicitous because of identity politics and electoral cynicism,

“regards gay people as threats to their own families,

“does not accept evolution as a fact,

“sees climate change as a hoax and offers domestic oil exploration as the core plank of an energy policy,

“refuses ever to raise taxes, while proposing no meaningful reductions in government spending,

“refuses to distance itself from a demagogue like Rush Limbaugh or a nutjob like Glenn Beck,

“believes that the United States should be the sole global power, should sustain a permanent war machine to police the entire planet, and sees violence as the core tool for international relations.”

How many of the above points you agree with tells you how conservative you are. They’re not all equally weighted, so if you agree with 75% of them you can’t say you’re three-quarters conservative. But it tells you something about yourself.

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Daniel Johnson was born near the midpoint of the twentieth century in Calgary, Alberta. In his teens he knew he was going to be a writer, which is why he was one of only a handful of boys in his high school typing class—a skill he knew was going to be necessary. He defines himself as a social reformer, not a left winger, the latter being an ideological label which, he says, is why he is not an ideologue. From 1975 to 1981 he was reporter, photographer, then editor of the weekly Airdrie Echo. For more than ten years after that he worked with Peter C. Newman, Canada’s top business writer (notably a series of books, The Canadian Establishment). Through this period Daniel also did some national radio and TV broadcasting. He gave up journalism in the early 1980s because he had no interest in being a hack writer for the mainstream media and became a software developer and programmer. He retired from computers last year and is now back to doing what he loves—writing and trying to make the world a better place