Why is the US so conservative?

[Antonio the Sixth]

It's a country founded on what you may call conservative ideas. I'm guessing that's really much of the explanation.

I also think it has something to do with how US society was created and even more with how Americans have idealized that process.

But the US were far less conservative until the 1980s (or even the 1990s). While that's true to some extent for most of developed countries, in USA this shift has taken epic proportions.

[Username MechaRFK]

It's a country founded on what you may call conservative ideas. I'm guessing that's really much of the explanation.

I also think it has something to do with how US society was created and even more with how Americans have idealized that process.

But the US were far less conservative until the 1980s (or even the 1990s). While that's true to some extent for most of developed countries, in USA this shift has taken epic proportions.

The 1990's were pretty conservative if you think about it.

[MyRescueKittehRocks]

'Liberal' gun laws is a conservative position.

Guns are heavily restricted in most of the rest of the world. And wrongfully so.

[Landslide Lyndon]

'Liberal' gun laws is a conservative position.

Guns are heavily restricted in most of the rest of the world. And wrongfully so.

Says a guy who lives in the country with the highest number of gun related deaths per capita among developed countries.

[Gustaf]

It's a country founded on what you may call conservative ideas. I'm guessing that's really much of the explanation.

I also think it has something to do with how US society was created and even more with how Americans have idealized that process.

But the US were far less conservative until the 1980s (or even the 1990s). While that's true to some extent for most of developed countries, in USA this shift has taken epic proportions.

That really depends on how you define conservative. Certain extremely stupid left-winged policies have been removed and certain, rather disgusting, leftist ideological positions have been largely abandoned.

Overall, I'm not convinced you can say that the world is epically more conservative today than it was 30 years ago.

Perhaps I should clarify that I think the different roots I'm referring to might have taken effect rather late, like now.

[fezzyfestoon]

'Liberal' gun laws is a conservative position.

Guns are heavily restricted in most of the rest of the world. And wrongfully so.

Why should guns be unrestricted?

[Mercenary]

The argument shouldn't be why something should be allowed, it should be why it shouldn't be. The default position should be that freedom reigns unless there is a compelling reason not to allow it.

I'd prefer guns not existing, but I don't trust the cop to have one any more than a random thug. Yet if you make them outlawed, it is the cop and random thug that still have them, and not the law abiding citizen. Sure, you'll decrease gun violence as random rage acts and accidents with guns would decline. But I like to at least have the option to have one if I want while cops and other thugs can have them.

[fezzyfestoon]

I absolutely disagree that everything should be legal first, I think in the extreme opposite direction.  Things shouldn't be legal unless we fully understand the repercussions of that on society.  That's the basis of so many problems in the US, we wait until it becomes a problem to act.  How about we just relax for a second instead of acting like 3-year-olds saying "gimme, gimme, I want it NOW".  The same goes for economics, not just social things.

And so your argument is that it's too late and we should just all have guns since some bad guys already do?  How about we take measures to make sure no more bad guys get guns instead of making it infinitely easier.  Don't you think moving in the direction of no guns makes more sense than exacerbating the issue by making more guns available?  I agree you should have the option to have one as a law-abiding, peaceful citizen.  But you do not under any circumstances need assault weapons or multiple weapons.  Nor do you need them immediately or without a check to make sure you are indeed a peaceful law-abiding citizen.  I don't know very many people who want all out bans on guns, just measured to make it much more difficult to buy one.  Guns are meant to cause extreme bodily harm or kill, that's not something you should just be able to stroll to the corner store and buy.  We as a country have proven that we can't handle that.

[Mercenary]

Well we're going to remain at odds in how we think about legality in general then.
However, you could still use your own argument even from my point of reference and still arrive at your conclusion regarding gun ownership.

I agree with you in that we need to move in the direction of no guns. I don't really have a problem with banning assault weapons, but I must say I don't know a lot about different types of firearms so I don't know what these kind of guns really are. I don't have a problem with reasonable checks either. I'd prefer that cops and the like didn't have access to specific weaponry as well then. And in general we need to clean up the massive corruption in law enforcement.

But yes, general safety can be the starting argument towards disallowing gun ownership. The default is it is legal, but then one sees that there is a problem with it being legal, that a legitimate reason to make it illegal is because gun crime is less in areas that ban it. So even if I disagree with you on illegality being the default, we could potentially arrive at the same conclusion. I just feel there needs to be a compelling reason for the state to intervene in something.

I don't know what degree of regulation would be effective though, especially since pro-gun culture has been a part of things for so long. I'm a bit wish washy on this issue...

[All Along The Watchtower]

The two-party, winner-take all partisan political system is a big part of why America is "more conservative" than other countries.

Another big part is the religious element, but that's a whole 'nother question in itself. Tied to this is the sheer physical and numerical size of the US, the disproportionate influence of the South (which was an agrarian slave society that lagged in economic development, and still does in many ways), the role of slavery, racism, and immigrant tensions in politics, the diversity in America that belies the fact that there is an established hierarchy in America in terms of power and economics...


All of these are factors.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't a rather unpleasant far-right party hold 15 seats in the Greek parliament?

A rather unpleasant far-right party (albeit one that also has saner if not necessarily more moderate any more factions) holds 240 seats in our lower house, though.

[Gustaf]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't a rather unpleasant far-right party hold 15 seats in the Greek parliament?

When I said I didn't know much about Greek politics, I'd forgot about that guy. I have heard of him.

Some charming quotes from the leader of the 4th biggest party in Greece:

"Hitler was a mere college-boy compared to the Jews".

"The New World Order means that we are a puppet at the hands of the Jews. Razing. Protocols of Zion. The Global government has taken place in Europe. The common currency too. They are dancing it to their tune. Do you know what kind of money the Jews are profiteering with these ups and downs? We are being led to the fulfilment of targets set 200 years ago."

In 2001, Karatzaferis stated that "the Jews have no right to provoke, because they have filled the world with crimes". "The Jews have no legitimacy to speak in Greece and provoke the political world. Their impudence is crass". In the same tirade, Karatzaferis challenged the Israeli ambassador to come and debate "the Holocaust, the Auschwitz and Dahau myth". Karatzaferis finished by asking "mister Jew ambassador" to "be a bit careful" and warning "the Jews" that if they continued their "insolent behaviour" they were "not going to have a pleasant time". The "insolent behaviour" in question was the Greek Jewish community's response to Karatzaferis's earlier claims that "the Jews" were responsible for 9/11.

Clearly, there is no racism in Greece. At least not at the level of the US...

[Gustaf]

And the guy described as their leading candidate in the 2004 elections by Wikipedia goes even further:

In the book, Plevris describes himself as a "Nazi, fascist, racist, anti-democrat, anti-Semite" (p. 600), subscribes to the myth of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (which he presents as authentic and valid evidence against the Jews), characterizes Jewish children in the concentration camps as "very fat" and "well-fed", claims that Jews are "subhuman" (p. 583) "mortal enemies", and criticizes the Nazis for "not ridding Europe of Jewish Zionism". In the same book, he characterizes former UN secretary Kofi Annan as "cannibal" and "descendant of cannibals" and states that Jews need to be "rounded-up and executed within 24 hours", which is "the only way they understand" (p. 742).

He has apparently also written a "vehement polemic against homosexuals".

Even though I'm aware of it I'm always surprised by the level of racism that exists in Europe.

[Antonio the Sixth]

That's pretty disgusting even for the standards of European far-right.

[Mechaman]

That's pretty disgusting even for the standards of European far-right.

Hell, if somebody was sprouting out that sh*t in f***ing Idaho they wouldn't survive a month into the primaries!

[Zarn]

That's pretty disgusting even for the standards of European far-right.

Hell, if somebody was sprouting out that sh*t in f***ing Idaho they wouldn't survive a month into the primaries!

Are you having a rare moment of pride in Idaho?

[Mechaman]

That's pretty disgusting even for the standards of European far-right.

Hell, if somebody was sprouting out that sh*t in f***ing Idaho they wouldn't survive a month into the primaries!

Are you having a rare moment of pride in Idaho?

Nah, just making a point about cultural differences.

[Verily]

To be fair to Greece, LAOS would stand no chance in a "conservative voters" primary, either. There's a reason their leader was kicked out of New Democracy back in the 90s. I think their approximately 5% of the vote nationally is not an unreasonable estimate of what they'd get in the US on a proportional system. (After all, their platform isn't mostly about Jews, even though their leader occasionally goes on anti-Semitic rants--and it would probably be modified to be anti-black or anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim ranting if it were in the US.)

[Mechaman]

To be fair to Greece, LAOS would stand no chance in a "conservative voters" primary, either. There's a reason their leader was kicked out of New Democracy back in the 90s. I think their approximately 5% of the vote nationally is not an unreasonable estimate of what they'd get in the US on a proportional system. (After all, their platform isn't mostly about Jews, even though their leader occasionally goes on anti-Semitic rants--and it would probably be modified to be anti-black or anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim ranting if it were in the US.)

Meh, good point.
I could see a viruently anti-Hispanic party get 10% of the vote in the States.  After all, this is the same country that had the Know Nothing Movement.  And unlike slavery it really hasn't gone away in parts of the country.  Hell we got politicians pushing forth a repeal of birth right citizenship.  Nativism is a pretty ugly beast.

[Devilman88]

Because the church has so much influence in the US, unlike other nations.

[Gustaf]

To be fair to Greece, LAOS would stand no chance in a "conservative voters" primary, either. There's a reason their leader was kicked out of New Democracy back in the 90s. I think their approximately 5% of the vote nationally is not an unreasonable estimate of what they'd get in the US on a proportional system. (After all, their platform isn't mostly about Jews, even though their leader occasionally goes on anti-Semitic rants--and it would probably be modified to be anti-black or anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim ranting if it were in the US.)

Meh, good point.
I could see a viruently anti-Hispanic party get 10% of the vote in the States.  After all, this is the same country that had the Know Nothing Movement.  And unlike slavery it really hasn't gone away in parts of the country.  Hell we got politicians pushing forth a repeal of birth right citizenship.  Nativism is a pretty ugly beast.

I don't think there is any comparable anti-Hispanic figure to Hitler...but if someone literally wanted to execute all Hispanics because they're subhuman...I sort of doubt that could get 10% (or even 5%) in the US. If we're talking about "throwing out the darkies becaues they're stealing the jobs and committing crimes (not that I'm racist or anything)" that position regularly gets 10-25% in most European countries.

[Mechaman]

To be fair to Greece, LAOS would stand no chance in a "conservative voters" primary, either. There's a reason their leader was kicked out of New Democracy back in the 90s. I think their approximately 5% of the vote nationally is not an unreasonable estimate of what they'd get in the US on a proportional system. (After all, their platform isn't mostly about Jews, even though their leader occasionally goes on anti-Semitic rants--and it would probably be modified to be anti-black or anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim ranting if it were in the US.)

Meh, good point.
I could see a viruently anti-Hispanic party get 10% of the vote in the States.  After all, this is the same country that had the Know Nothing Movement.  And unlike slavery it really hasn't gone away in parts of the country.  Hell we got politicians pushing forth a repeal of birth right citizenship.  Nativism is a pretty ugly beast.

I don't think there is any comparable anti-Hispanic figure to Hitler...but if someone literally wanted to execute all Hispanics because they're subhuman...I sort of doubt that could get 10% (or even 5%) in the US. If we're talking about "throwing out the darkies becaues they're stealing the jobs and committing crimes (not that I'm racist or anything)" that position regularly gets 10-25% in most European countries.

Yeah I was talking more about the latter view.
Likewise I think Hitlerian views wouldn't get more than 1% popularity (considering how many people there are in the US).

[useful idiot]

Because the church has so much influence in the US, unlike other nations.

Larger church attendance figures are a reflection of conservatism, not the other way around, imo.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Because the church has so much influence in the US, unlike other nations.

I don't think so. Hell, even Italy legalized abortion through referendum, and not by a court ruling.

[Lief 🗽]

Did Hitler actually campaign on exterminating all the Jews?