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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 23, 2024

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What do you want my response to be to "American conservatism just doesn’t appeal to me because I’m not scared of everything"? Can you write us a sample response to that claim, if it's not a waste of time?

I mean, I could try. Something like:

While an American liberal or progressive might feel like an American conservative is coming from a place of fear, this is a misleading impression. First, it is worth pointing out that wanting things like lower immigration, more barriers to trans care for children and fewer government hand outs doesn't have to come from a place of 'fear.' Just as liberals/progressives believe that their policies come from a high-minded place of concern for their fellow man, so too a conservative can genuinely believe that the best thing for all peoples is to adopt those policies.

In the case of immigration, a conservative might believe that brain-draining poor countries is bad for the stability and well-being of those cultures, and that migration might serve as a release valve for pressure that would rightfully lead to successful rebellions that might actually make those countries better off in the long run.

In the case of trans care, it doesn't have to be fear of the "other" at all, but a genuine conviction that the evidence in favor was actually substantially weaker than often claimed, that it originated in a different country with different background information that doesn't seem to apply to the anglo-sphere. Add in the replication crisis (which also affects medicine), and the evidence that the WPATH is an activist organization that seems to go beyond the remit of evidence, and you have a recipe to truly believe that trans healthcare for minors is a net negative for most children, and society as a whole. This is not about "fear", but a genuine disagreement on the merits of the evidence and an approach to epistemology.

Even aside from all of this, it is worth pointing out that liberals and progressives seem to be afraid of their own side's bugbears, in a way that is out of proportion with the statistics. They fear hate crimes, rape, and discrimination to a far greater degree than the statistics would seem to justify. It is wrong-headed to think that what makes conservatism unique is "fear", as opposed to the positive values they do espouse.

Exactly, that's four paragraphs wasted responding to a mindless one sentence smear. And then Trollbot5000 responds with "lol ur weird for being so invested in justifying ur bigotry, bonus transphobia yikes, have a normal one weirdo," 40 other identical replies instantly appear to ratio you, and you are reported to bluesky for hate speech.

Your thoughtful reply didn't help because there wasn't any communication happening in the first place, just a DDoS attack on your brain to bully and deflect from people asking "huh, has anyone else noticed more people on fire in the subway than usual?"

If you don't think there's anything worth responding to here, you can just not respond. We're not on Twitter, or Bluesky so the kinds of responses you get there are irrelevant.

That's what I'm talking about