Are You an Active or a Passive Conservative?
It can seem like our entire life is lived in the shadow of Liberalism. How often we turn on the news to instead hear some Liberal announcement of how racist something is, or how wonderful it is that a random women has done something. To hear how diversity is promoted and how things once heard every other day are now regarded as politically incorrect. You go to work or school, to a family function and you hear the same clap trap and it wears on you. You think to yourself I wish I could escape from all this and then you wonder why isn't someone fighting back?
Unfortunately this isn't something new, us Conservatives have been struggling with this issue for a very long time. One answer has been to ignore it to just let it flow over us and not let it concern us. Sure it might be concerning someone else but if it isn't concerning me I'll just let it pass. That way I don't have to fight and struggle, that way I can get on with my life and enjoy my family and friends. That way I don't have others thinking bad things about me and I can concentrate on the important things in life.
Certainly family and friends are important, without question, so is your job and your relationships with others. It's too hard to fight the world all by yourself. Time and time again Conservatives have been passive, we have retreated into our private life, we give up the public arena to concentrate on our family. We can protect them we think. But our passivity does not protect them, too many Conservative parents find they have Liberal children, why? In good part because they always see the Liberal side, it was right in front of them, in school, on TV and in the cinema and their favourite celebrity told them so. When did they hear an alternative? Most parents bring up their children to be good people and our society tells them that good people are Liberal. You and I know thats not true, but let me ask you, did you always know that or did you learn it the hard way?
When we are passive and retreat into our family and jobs, we are not left alone. Liberalism follows us, it lectures us on the news, it instructs us while it says it's only entertaining us. We are not left alone and in time Liberalism catches up with us. It demands more from us, it always wants more. Maybe it's when your child comes home from school and tells you of what they learnt that you don't approve of, it might be your neighbours behavour that everyone expects you'll be cool with because it's the tolerant thing to do, even though you wonder why you must be tolerant but they do not. It might be that you have to train the foreign worker who's taking your job (as an old boss of mine had to do). It is only a matter of time until it taps you on the shoulder and demands more.
The temptation to be passive is alluring, it seems sensible and safe. But as I look around I wonder why wasn't more done to stop the rot we see all around us. Why didn't Conservatives organise, why when I was ready to do more wasn't there already something there to join? Because of the passive Conservative, so much has gone unfought. I'm guilty, or at least I have been. We must do more to meet other Conservatives, to build networks and support. We must not let the next generation, or the one after that be left with the same level of support we have now. We need more and it is up to us to do more. It would be great to change the world but it might be enough to simply change from being a passive Conservative to being an active Conservative.
Upon Hope Blog - A Traditional Conservative Future
While enjoying a pleasant dinner at a friend's house recently, his nine year-old niece informed me that Justin Bieber was the cutest and best singer ever! Her judgement is immature, myopic and more than slightly naive, but what was I to do? Reduce her to tears in front of her family? Burst her little bubble of comfort? That would be to show appalling manners and I would gain nothing.
ReplyDeleteThis is how traditionalists feel when in the presence of liberals. We hear what they have to say, understand them clearly but our reaction is a mixture of amusement and sympathy. It's difficult to take them seriously because they may as well be extolling the musical genius of Justin Bieber rather than discussing politics, morality or social welfare.
It is not in the make-up of the conservative to be recklessly attacking his enemies, losing his cool in the heat of battle or resorting to dirty tricks. This is the modus operandi of the weak, whose argument is built on a foundation of sand. At an anti-abortion rally before Christmas, protestors against this shameful practice exercised their democratic rights by showing their disapproval. There was no shouting, being aggressive or belligerent. They were met with childish bullying, being shoved, threatened and abused by ferals with their "it's my body and I will abuse it if I want to" farce. The traditionalists kept their heads up and refused to be cowed into silence by the rabble. From what I could tell, the group was merely trying to discourage the use of abortion rather than calling for its prohibition.Conservatives must encourage healthy decision making rather than making more criminals.
Despite their holier-than-thou persona and calls for peace and love, liberals want conflict. They are the little guy at the pub, itching for a fight with the big guy minding his own business. This is evident with their desire to silence debate rather than seek logic. With their exclusion of particular members of society due to their "beliefs" and their constant invention of new terminology designed to create discomfort and ambiguity. For the traditionalist, it is not in their nature to encourage fracture or to cut off one's nose to spite the face.
The reason why traditionalists are struggling to gain traction on the culture wars is that they are too busy doing real work that benefits society, raising their families and with whatever time is spare, giving back to the community. Truth be told, this is the majority of Australians. The vast majority are traditionalist. The vocal minority are the under-employed by choice, the ratbag trouble-makers, the moonbats, losers and the socially isolated and insecure who refuse to take responsibility for their own actions. They have the time to cause a fuss over issues that most people would shrug off as inconsequential and just asking for trouble.
Dear Mr. Simmonds
ReplyDeleteI would like to agree with you but I don't think I do. If Liberalism is only for the dysfunctional how come nearly all our politicians are Liberals of one shade or another?
A few months ago I changed radio stations because I was sick of them telling how wonderful same sex marriage was, only to turn off my new radio station when they started to lecture me on global warming.
Our Politicians, our Media and our Education system are all Liberal, to say ordinary people can just ignore it is wrong.
Maybe your right to say ordinary people are traditional, but it's not enough to rely on that.
Mark Moncrieff
Why didn't Conservatives organise?
ReplyDeleteConservatives have an extraordinary ability to fight the wrong battles at the wrong time against the wrong enemy. Conservatives in the 1960s and 1970s were still focused on the external enemies, the Soviet Union and Communist China. Which was fair enough, they were real enemies. But conservatives failed to notice that the most deadly enemy was the enemy within. It wasn't the communists in the Kremlin they should have been worrying about - it was the communists in our own universities, in our own schools, in the US State Department, in the BBC, in the ABC, in the New York Times. The danger was conquest from within, not conquest from without.
And conservatives are by nature reasonable people. When the Left says it wants just one teeney little concession conservatives are inclined to think that the best thing to do is to negotiate with the Left on the assumption that leftists are reasonable people as well. When leftists get their one teeney little concession they immediately demand more and conservatives are always surprised. Our civilisation has been undermined so gradually that conservatives didn't even notice it happening. Most mainstream conservatives still don't realise it has happened. Neocons still think the culture wars don't matter.