Now this is going to sound like a flame, but this is an honest report of thoughts. I can't help but find most conservative arguments just don't work for me. There are many conservative views like:
-Age of consent should be raised up high -Welfare is bad -Abortion is wrong -Regime change is OK -Massive defense budget is important -Abstinence is the best way to deal with sex -Harsh punishments for criminals -Marriage defined as man and a woman
and many others. But they are justified by reasoning I simply cannot stomach. For example, most of the sexual stuff seems to be justified by biblical reasoning. Massive defense spending is reasoned by fear-mongering. Welfare is opposed because of an excessive focus "lazy, drug-dealing black men" instead of the people that it really helps. Favoring harsh punishments seem motivated by vengeance more than by anything else. I'm hopelessly biased against conservatism. The only views I can understand are the economic views and that's mostly thanks to Friedman and Hayek. The typical conservative just talks about how taxing the rich is socialism.
Where can I find intelligent reasoning behind social conservatism and militaristic foreign policy? Maybe there are certain perfectly reasonable political theories underlying this stuff? Seriously, I don't know where to look for this stuff. I want to understand the stuff on a level where I can make arguments in favor of it without stereotyping, or appealing to people's fears and religious beliefs.
1. I just had a blog entry like this closed. I've made an effort to rephrase is to be less inflammatory. This is really an honest blog, I've absolutely no intention to troll anyone, seriously. I know TL has a huge influx of kids since SC2 came out, but I've been around longer than that. Not the trolling type, me.
2. In fact, I'm making a promise right that every reply I make will just be clarification. If I engage in a political argument with anyone, you can go ahead an ban me for however long you want.
I can find you places if you change your views on large defense budgets (That's not a real Republican stance). Also, if you drop the harsh punishment for criminals (Real Republicans believe in personal liberties and are anti large imprisonment).
What I mean by 'real republicans' is more so the modern Libertarian/Independent parties. It used to be natural for Republicans to be against war (Even as recently as Raegan). I don't consider George W. Bush, McCain, Palin, Pawlenty, etc... to be real Republicans (As defined in earlier eras)...but since that's the way the party is going I no longer classify myself as a Republican.
I highly doubt you can find any rational reasoning behind US foreign policy. If you can be open minded on foreign policy I would recommend watching some Ron Paul videos. Especially if you are concerned about the current deficits and the federal reserve banking system. Judge Napolitano is also a good resource if you like the Constitution.
Well I'm pretty much with you on this. However, lately I've been thinking about the age of consent. Here in Sweden, the age of consent is 15. After working as a tutor for kids this I now think that 15 might be a bit too low.
There's a large difference between the definition of conservatism, and the batshit Christian fundamentalism displayed by the TEA party, Glenn Beck, etc.
If you want to find rational thought given to things like economic deregulation etc. check out some of the works of Ron Paul and other Libertarians as they tend to be some of the only people not pulling their policy straight out of fear mongering and the bible.
Ah, thank you for the references. Well I know about Ron Paul since he's pretty famous. But I actually 'get' the conservative reasoning behind economics thanks to other literature I've read. Haven't heard of Judge Napolitano, though, he might be interesting.
I'd like to clarify, though, that my intention is not to join the Republican party. Rather, i want to understand conservatism in a language I speak. Thus, social conservatism and interventionist foreign policy are things I would like to see defended on an intellectual level. I want to see the best case people can make for these ideas.
Look up the military industrial complex. something usa been locked in since end of WW2. Really any "realist" theory of international relations will explain why a country needs an army. The rest of mostly based off of religious fundamentalism but no politician in their right mind would use any of that stuff in their campaign.
So with military being necessary (i'm not saying they can't cut defense, everyone knows they can) and "the sex stuff" religious (remember usa has "official" seperation of church and state, lol), you are left with your point about socialism.
I live in Canada and American's would prolly cause us a socialist country. I'm fine with that and happy here.
Yeah, it looks like you're really looking for Libertarianism. Libertarians will agree with you on pretty much every point except your second one, and sometimes your first. They're all about small government and individual freedom, period.
There are very few people who take neoconservative foreign policy seriously, for good reason. It's the complete opposite of rationality, for starters.
Finding well written literature advocating neocon foreign policy views is difficult, simply because most of it is a hodge-podge of attempts to justify enormous military spending on dangerously irrational grounds, fails to correctly analyze the history of American foreign policy by falsely projecting contemporary ideas and conceptions back in time, and rarely, if ever, offers a concrete set of policies designed with the realities of international politics in mind. It's essentially the naive approach to doing things and attempts to provide a continuity of thought that is inherently dangerous and fundamentally unusable as a basic premise of constructing a foreign policy, at least for a powerful nation with unparalleled power projection.
I'll dig up a few of the better articles I've got lying around and see if they are online, probably will forget though.
On April 13 2011 23:18 meaculpa wrote: Ah, thank you for the references. Well I know about Ron Paul since he's pretty famous. But I actually 'get' the conservative reasoning behind economics thanks to other literature I've read. Haven't heard of Judge Napolitano, though, he might be interesting.
I'd like to clarify, though, that my intention is not to join the Republican party. Rather, i want to understand conservatism in a language I speak. Thus, social conservatism and interventionist foreign policy are things I would like to see defended on an intellectual level. I want to see the best case people can make for these ideas.
The Republican party today is different than the Republican party most people consider parallel with views of small government. The old Republican party has similar views as modern day Libertarians (Small Government, Pro Constitution, Pro Liberties, etc...)
Modern day Republicans don't mind huge deficits, huge foreign policy, torture in wars, destroying the freedoms of Americans (see: Patriot Act). Conservatism lies more in third parties, like the independent and libertarian party. Republicans are becoming like Democrats, except they like war (high spending) and low taxes (huge deficits). Libertarians and independents want low spending and low taxes, to balance the deficit.
I hope that helps with some of the confusion regarding how the Republican Party has evolved lately away from ideas of small government.
On April 13 2011 23:11 Belano wrote: Well I'm pretty much with you on this. However, lately I've been thinking about the age of consent. Here in Sweden, the age of consent is 15. After working as a tutor for kids this I now think that 15 might be a bit too low.
I think 15 is a pretty reasonable age, at that age you are ready to have sex and it won't matter whether it's legal or not. As RFSU recently reported, most of the first-timers in Sweden have very nice, very safe sex in stable relationships. The average age of debut is somewhat over 16 years old.
Really, It's not like sex is a traumatic experience that you can only handle of you are 18.
Sorry to digress. Anyway, most conservatives are batshit insane, at least with the definition of conservatism we have today. There are a number of thinkers that are pretty rational though, spearheaded by the libertarians. I do not agree with them but at least they know how to make a point.
On April 13 2011 23:53 Elegy wrote: There are very few people who take neoconservative foreign policy seriously, for good reason. It's the complete opposite of rationality, for starters.
Finding well written literature advocating neocon foreign policy views is difficult, simply because most of it is a hodge-podge of attempts to justify enormous military spending on dangerously irrational grounds, fails to correctly analyze the history of American foreign policy by falsely projecting contemporary ideas and conceptions back in time, and rarely, if ever, offers a concrete set of policies designed with the realities of international politics in mind. It's essentially the naive approach to doing things and attempts to provide a continuity of thought that is inherently dangerous and fundamentally unusable as a basic premise of constructing a foreign policy, at least for a powerful nation with unparalleled power projection.
I'll dig up a few of the better articles I've got lying around and see if they are online, probably will forget though.
That's fine. So long as the content isn't aimed at people's amygdalas and no belief is justified by god's will. I don't expect this exploration to turn me conservative so I'm not too concerned with the ultimate correctness of these arguments. In my mind, a bad argument that's trying to convince you is loads better than a highly effective argument that mainly works by playing on people's fears.
Sorry to digress. Anyway, most conservatives are batshit insane, at least with the definition of conservatism we have today. There are a number of thinkers that are pretty rational though, spearheaded by the libertarians. I do not agree with them but at least they know how to make a point.
Yeah, you've summarized my view quite well. I wouldn't go so far as to call conservatives insane, but there are definitely some who know how to make a point and they really stand out from many who don't know how to make a point. Such people aren't hard to find for free market capitalism, but I'm having the hardest time finding some for social conservatism. I'd like to see an argument against homosexuality that isn't based on "eww, it's gross", "they'll rape my children!!", or "god hates homos". I'd really like to see the best argument one can make against homosexuality, even if I know I'll disagree with it.
I do not think the above posters are answering your questions. What you are describing is not conversatism, but neo-conservatism, which is a left ideology. There are two main figures who started the movement, namely, Leo Strauss and Irving Kristol. They are the intellectualism behind the movement. I would recommend reading them to understand where they come from (liberals 'mugged' by reality). Both Irving and Bill have written extensively and a few google searches will pull up all you need to know.
Now, the flipside to this are the paleoconservatives. Pat Buchanan, Thomas Fleming, and Paul Gottfried are the three most prominent members in this group. They started to come into being as an anti-neo-conservative dominant strain in the late 70s and 80s. Usually this set of people have much in common with libertarians, however, differ significantly in many areas.
The last group to which I belong -- libertarianism, is perhaps the oldest ideological strain in America dating back to the colonial era (Classical Liberalism). We differ from both of the above groups, and even within our ranks we are divided between the anarchists (Voluntaryists/An-Caps), and the night-watchmen (Nozick's) republicans (form of government, not the party). We hold generally to the Anti-Federalist tradition and differ significantly from both paleoconservatism and neo-conservatism. The most well-known modern day proponents would be Ron Paul, Lew Rockwell, Judge Andrew Napolitano. and Stefan Molyneux. The best short pieces to read would be The Law by Frederic Bastiat, Anatomy of the State by Murray Rothbard, and Our Enemy, the State by Albert Jay Nock.
The Republican Party has always been the party of Big-Government. Lincoln was the 'Great Centralizer'. Besides, the parties switch ideologies too often to mention, though, in the last 70 years there isn't nought to distinguish them. I mean you have Grover Cleveland a Democrat in the 1890s and Calvin Coolidge a Republican in the 1920s share basically the same ideology. The switch came because the Progressives purged the Classical Liberals out of the Democrat Party around the turn of the century. At the same time this is when America began to dramatically change into its current Statist self (repudiating the basic tenents of Classical Liberalism).
Also, to tryummmm libertarianism is not 'low spending low taxes'. If you could describe it more accurately it would be 'no taxes no spending', or at the very least to the minimalist-night watchmen 'no internal taxes, spending only on courts & constables'. Almost to a tee libertarians are against any form of property or income taxes. Why? Because our basic ideology rest on the Classical Liberal ideal of self-ownership and Natural Law. No person, or group of persons has a right to violate your natural liberties (life, liberty, property, and property arising from Locke's non-proviso homesteading). (There are of course the utilitarians in the bunch like David Friedman)
On April 13 2011 23:53 Elegy wrote: There are very few people who take neoconservative foreign policy seriously, for good reason. It's the complete opposite of rationality, for starters.
Finding well written literature advocating neocon foreign policy views is difficult, simply because most of it is a hodge-podge of attempts to justify enormous military spending on dangerously irrational grounds, fails to correctly analyze the history of American foreign policy by falsely projecting contemporary ideas and conceptions back in time, and rarely, if ever, offers a concrete set of policies designed with the realities of international politics in mind. It's essentially the naive approach to doing things and attempts to provide a continuity of thought that is inherently dangerous and fundamentally unusable as a basic premise of constructing a foreign policy, at least for a powerful nation with unparalleled power projection.
I'll dig up a few of the better articles I've got lying around and see if they are online, probably will forget though.
That's fine. So long as the content isn't aimed at people's amygdalas and no belief is justified by god's will. I don't expect this exploration to turn me conservative so I'm not too concerned with the ultimate correctness of these arguments. In my mind, a bad argument that's trying to convince you is loads better than a highly effective argument that mainly works by playing on people's fears.
Sorry to digress. Anyway, most conservatives are batshit insane, at least with the definition of conservatism we have today. There are a number of thinkers that are pretty rational though, spearheaded by the libertarians. I do not agree with them but at least they know how to make a point.
Yeah, you've summarized my view quite well. I wouldn't go so far as to call conservatives insane, but there are definitely some who know how to make a point and they really stand out from many who don't know how to make a point. Such people aren't hard to find for free market capitalism, but I'm having the hardest time finding some for social conservatism. I'd like to see an argument against homosexuality that isn't based on "eww, it's gross", "they'll rape my children!!", or "god hates homos". I'd really like to see the best argument one can make against homosexuality, even if I know I'll disagree with it.
Like most people in our modern era, social conservatives want to impose their personal values on the entire society through Government. Most are personally against it because of their religion. Some though use the tax argument (same-sex couples are naturally unable to have children thus should not receive tax benefits from the State for being married..). To be honest there isn't a lick of difference between social conservatives and social liberals. Both want to use the same mechanism to fulfill the same purpose. To use Government to force onto all individuals their personal preferences. Libertarians differ in that we view the use of Government force as an abridgement of our natural liberties and no different than an individual coming to my house pointing a gun in my face and telling me what to do, or what I cannot do. I think Larken Rose puts it best:
how can you know so many names and terms and claim that neo-conservatism is a left ideology? I mean even disregarding the fact that dividing anything into "left" and "right" is pretty dumb as attempting to divide political opinions into two or three different spectrums means you inaccurately define something like 99.5% of opinions held..
defining neo-conservatism as a "left ideology" basically just means one thing; you define yourself as "right", yet you vehemently disagree with neo-conservatism, thus they must be left.
On April 14 2011 00:39 Liquid`Drone wrote: how can you know so many names and terms and claim that neo-conservatism is a left ideology? I mean even disregarding the fact that dividing anything into "left" and "right" is pretty dumb as attempting to divide political opinions into two or three different spectrums means you inaccurately define something like 99.5% of opinions held..
defining neo-conservatism as a "left ideology" basically just means one thing; you define yourself as "right", yet you vehemently disagree with neo-conservatism, thus they must be left.
I agree left-right is a horrible way to distinguish political ideologies. I should define my terms before I use them to avoid confusion. Neo-Conservatism is authoritarian-Statist, which I find many socialists/social democrats likewise. I would argue that the tenents of Leo Strauss borrow heavily from Russian counter-revolutionaries like Leninists and Trostkyites. Whenever I use left and right my crude definitions are on the left end: total statism and on the right: anarchy without adjectives. I do not classify personal preferences in a political label since the only thing that matters in politics is the State so anarcho-communist/syndicalists/capitalists/pacifists(christianity) etc. all are anti-statist (at least the ones who follow their tenents).
I also have a problem with people justifying real-world issues and platforms with faith-based reasoning, and would definitely be interested in finding secularist, fact-based, and well-researched defenses.
I don't know if a place like that exists on the internet. I wouldn't recommend Facebook or TeamLiquid though, as you run the risk of getting trolled Countless threads that start off nice enough just get taken over by bigoted conversations.
-Age of consent is fine as is -Welfare is bad -Abortion is (insert views about whether or not an embryo is a human being or not) -Regime change is not our job -Massive defense budget is not good, but we should focus on protecting our borders and bring the troops home. -Abstinence is the best way to deal with not having babies (It's true) -No death penalty. Support force servitude of criminals (kinda contraversial) -Marriage is a contract, it cannot be defined by the government.
The majority of "conservatives" only stick to 2 issues: Abortion and gay marriage. Gay marriage is going to happen and conservatives will stop caring. Abortion is here to stay. The rest of the time, conservatives are actually closet libertarians that don't know about libertarianism. Neo-conservatives are the real problem. People like bush, clinton, cheney, etc but I believe that era is starting to fade into the corporatist era.
On April 14 2011 01:17 darmousseh wrote: How bout the libertarian perspective?
-Age of consent is fine as is -Welfare is bad -Abortion is (insert views about whether or not an embryo is a human being or not) -Regime change is not our job -Massive defense budget is not good, but we should focus on protecting our borders and bring the troops home. -Abstinence is the best way to deal with not having babies (It's true) -No death penalty. Support force servitude of criminals (kinda contraversial) -Marriage is a contract, it cannot be defined by the government.
The majority of "conservatives" only stick to 2 issues: Abortion and gay marriage. Gay marriage is going to happen and conservatives will stop caring. Abortion is here to stay. The rest of the time, conservatives are actually closet libertarians that don't know about libertarianism. Neo-conservatives are the real problem. People like bush, clinton, cheney, etc but I believe that era is starting to fade into the corporatist era.
You have a few libertarian points, but also some paleoconservative. This is what I meant earlier that paleoconservatism and libertarianism overlaps a bit.
Age of consent is statist nomenclature. Most libertarians adhere to natural rights by our humanity, not by age, therefore age of consent is based on the individuals mental status. We use the same procedure when it comes to those of an older age. We do not say all persons over 80 rights are reserved to their guardians (children) or next of kin. Why do we do that with those of younger age? Each case should be heard on its own merit. Most libertarians are against consent age laws (drinking, drugs, labor, etc.).
Libertarians are against welfare because it is a violation of your right to property and self.
Abortion is about 50/50 in the libertarian community.
We oppose foreign intervention for the same reason we oppose domestic intervention. We do not however oppose individuals voluntarily choosing to help others on their own accord. Such as Von Steuben coming to help our Revolution we do not oppose anyone choosing to help others fight for their freedoms and liberties, but you have no right to either force another individual through theft or conscription to do likewise.
Libertarians are against standing armies. We favor voluntary militia's and private defense agencies (like mall security, private detectives, etc.). Blackwater/XE, etc. are not private as they derive their income from Government. They are fascist entities.
Personal preference -- libertarians do not care about how others educate their children on sex.
Yes, most libertarians are against the Death Penalty. However, most libertarians are against the current judicial system. We favor a remunerative judicial system; as such we are against prisons. We see it as punishing innocent people for the crimes of others. We also favor ostracizing instead of imprisonment.
Yes, we believe marriage should be divorced from the State. It should be treated as a contract, and individuals should be allowed to give Next of Kin, Power of Attorney, and all other delegations of rights to whomever they want.
Most conservatives are more closet paleoconservatives than libertarians, though there are a significant number of conservatives who are libertarian, but have not been introduced to it.
Ah, I'm getting a bit too many responses that, while well-intentioned, don't help me much. I'd like to be clear on one thing: I'm not politically clueless or ignorant. I know all about libertarians and what they believe and I've no interest in signing up with those beliefs. I know exactly where I stand on my beliefs and I'm pretty sure they aren't going to change significantly anytime soon.
I am completely at ease with libertarianism because I understand the arguments behind it. Libertarians pride themselves on rationality and, while I may disagree with the assumptions they make and some of the leaps of logic they make, I can totally see the bigger theory behind libertarianism.
The problem is when it comes to aggressive foreign policy and social conservatism, I'm at a loss for any rational defense of these things. But I'd like to know if anyone can find good secular arguments for these things. I'm even interested in a good argument for why religious beliefs might be an acceptable justification for social policy. I've read some pretty clean and effective arguments in favor of nationalism, btw, which surprised me.
Anyway, thank you for the info so far. I'm putting the names you're giving me on my reading list. This is just a time for me to familiarize myself with things I disagree with. I remember at one time I was completely against all forms of anarchism. Because I had the misfortune of meeting anarchists who really were just complete creeps, I formed a bad impression of it. I kept on ignorantly believing that anarchism really did imply total chaos and crime. But then I read some academic literature on anarchism and my view of it completely changed. I still disagree with anarchism, but I gained a lot of respect for it as a point of view. I hope I could achieve a similar kind of change of perspective toward the parts of conservatism that currently make little sense to me.
On April 14 2011 01:17 darmousseh wrote: How bout the libertarian perspective?
-Age of consent is fine as is -Welfare is bad -Abortion is (insert views about whether or not an embryo is a human being or not) -Regime change is not our job -Massive defense budget is not good, but we should focus on protecting our borders and bring the troops home. -Abstinence is the best way to deal with not having babies (It's true) -No death penalty. Support force servitude of criminals (kinda contraversial) -Marriage is a contract, it cannot be defined by the government.
The majority of "conservatives" only stick to 2 issues: Abortion and gay marriage. Gay marriage is going to happen and conservatives will stop caring. Abortion is here to stay. The rest of the time, conservatives are actually closet libertarians that don't know about libertarianism. Neo-conservatives are the real problem. People like bush, clinton, cheney, etc but I believe that era is starting to fade into the corporatist era.
You have a few libertarian points, but also some paleoconservative. This is what I meant earlier that paleoconservatism and libertarianism overlaps a bit.
Age of consent is statist nomenclature. Most libertarians adhere to natural rights by our humanity, not by age, therefore age of consent is based on the individuals mental status. We use the same procedure when it comes to those of an older age. We do not say all persons over 80 rights are reserved to their guardians (children) or next of kin. Why do we do that with those of younger age? Each case should be heard on its own merit. Most libertarians are against consent age laws (drinking, drugs, labor, etc.).
Libertarians are against welfare because it is a violation of your right to property and self.
Abortion is about 50/50 in the libertarian community.
We oppose foreign intervention for the same reason we oppose domestic intervention. We do not however oppose individuals voluntarily choosing to help others on their own accord. Such as Von Steuben coming to help our Revolution we do not oppose anyone choosing to help others fight for their freedoms and liberties, but you have no right to either force another individual through theft or conscription to do likewise.
Libertarians are against standing armies. We favor voluntary militia's and private defense agencies (like mall security, private detectives, etc.). Blackwater/XE, etc. are not private as they derive their income from Government. They are fascist entities.
Personal preference -- libertarians do not care about how others educate their children on sex.
Yes, most libertarians are against the Death Penalty. However, most libertarians are against the current judicial system. We favor a remunerative judicial system; as such we are against prisons. We see it as punishing innocent people for the crimes of others. We also favor ostracizing instead of imprisonment.
Yes, we believe marriage should be divorced from the State. It should be treated as a contract, and individuals should be allowed to give Next of Kin, Power of Attorney, and all other delegations of rights to whomever they want.
Most conservatives are more closet paleoconservatives than libertarians, though there are a significant number of conservatives who are libertarian, but have not been introduced to it.
Yeah, I know and understand the TRUE libertarian views and they would be excellent, but that is a looooong ways away. I tend to favor a little bit less extreme version because the good version tends to confuse people and make them resentful towards libertarians. The age of consent thing I believe is important though as I think it is important to define the age at which human beings can enter into contracts without the permission of a guardian. I think it's important for contract law and thus I think it should be defined at somewhere that the society agrees that a person is fully capable of making decisions. It should probably be around 16, but 18 is fine. If the kid gets consent from the parents to engage in an activity, then that's fine by me. If all people were born adults this wouldn't be a problem, but children often times act in a manner that they wouldn't do as an adult. It's a special part of law meant to protect children from entering into bad contracts.
Otherwise yeah, i agree on everything else for those reasons you provided.
On April 14 2011 01:53 meaculpa wrote: Ah, I'm getting a bit too many responses that, while well-intentioned, don't help me much. I'd like to be clear on one thing: I'm not politically clueless or ignorant. I know all about libertarians and what they believe and I've no interest in signing up with those beliefs. I know exactly where I stand on my beliefs and I'm pretty sure they aren't going to change significantly anytime soon.
I am completely at ease with libertarianism because I understand the arguments behind it. Libertarians pride themselves on rationality and, while I may disagree with the assumptions they make and some of the leaps of logic they make, I can totally see the bigger theory behind libertarianism.
The problem is when it comes to aggressive foreign policy and social conservatism, I'm at a loss for any rational defense of these things. But I'd like to know if anyone can find good secular arguments for these things. I'm even interested in a good argument for why religious beliefs might be an acceptable justification for social policy. I've read some pretty clean and effective arguments in favor of nationalism, btw, which surprised me.
Anyway, thank you for the info so far. I'm putting the names you're giving me on my reading list. This is just a time for me to familiarize myself with things I disagree with. I remember at one time I was completely against all forms of anarchism. Because I had the misfortune of meeting anarchists who really were just complete creeps, I formed a bad impression of it. I kept on ignorantly believing that anarchism really did imply total chaos and crime. But then I read some academic literature on anarchism and my view of it completely changed. I still disagree with anarchism, but I gained a lot of respect for it as a point of view. I hope I could achieve a similar kind of change of perspective toward the parts of conservatism that currently make little sense to me.
I've talked to a few atheist conservatives and it's a totally different way of looking at things. For these conservatives, the most important thing is providing for the general welfare of the entire world. That the ends are a justification for the means since the ends are good. A libertarian would say "Obviously marijuana is not good for you, so I won't do it but I won't force others" a conservative will respond saying "Isn't it the responsibility of humans to make sure that their neighbors also do not harm themselves?" and they will use the example of suicide as a justification. It's not an irrational viewpoint, it's just a completely different way of viewing the world.
On April 14 2011 01:53 meaculpa wrote: Ah, I'm getting a bit too many responses that, while well-intentioned, don't help me much. I'd like to be clear on one thing: I'm not politically clueless or ignorant. I know all about libertarians and what they believe and I've no interest in signing up with those beliefs. I know exactly where I stand on my beliefs and I'm pretty sure they aren't going to change significantly anytime soon.
I am completely at ease with libertarianism because I understand the arguments behind it. Libertarians pride themselves on rationality and, while I may disagree with the assumptions they make and some of the leaps of logic they make, I can totally see the bigger theory behind libertarianism.
The problem is when it comes to aggressive foreign policy and social conservatism, I'm at a loss for any rational defense of these things. But I'd like to know if anyone can find good secular arguments for these things. I'm even interested in a good argument for why religious beliefs might be an acceptable justification for social policy. I've read some pretty clean and effective arguments in favor of nationalism, btw, which surprised me.
Anyway, thank you for the info so far. I'm putting the names you're giving me on my reading list. This is just a time for me to familiarize myself with things I disagree with. I remember at one time I was completely against all forms of anarchism. Because I had the misfortune of meeting anarchists who really were just complete creeps, I formed a bad impression of it. I kept on ignorantly believing that anarchism really did imply total chaos and crime. But then I read some academic literature on anarchism and my view of it completely changed. I still disagree with anarchism, but I gained a lot of respect for it as a point of view. I hope I could achieve a similar kind of change of perspective toward the parts of conservatism that currently make little sense to me.
If you understand Plato, then you understand Neo-Conservatism. Really though, just read it straight from the mouths of those who created the movement.
I'd also recommend reading Zbigniew Brzezinski & Henry Kissinger. Foreign Policy is a mix between the moralists and the military industrial complex of domination of resources.
read john lukacs. although he is not a secular conservative,he does a really great job of demonstrating the falsehood of many ideologies still prevalent.
I shall make an effort to explain the intelligent reasoning behind these views:
On April 13 2011 22:54 meaculpa wrote: Now this is going to sound like a flame, but this is an honest report of thoughts. I can't help but find most conservative arguments just don't work for me. There are many conservative views like:
-Age of consent should be raised up high
Traditional libertarianism, from which conservatives root, suggests that the government should avoid interfering with any individual's ability to make decisions which only affect himself. However, the reasoning behind that breaks down when you start to question the ability of a person to make rational decisions.
Most people will agree that a 3 year old isn't capable of making rational decisions, or at least not sufficiently capable to be able to give reasoned consent. It becomes far more cloudy at higher ages, and generally you can have a reasoned belief that it should be higher than 16 or 18, or possibly even higher than 21 (I could see a vague argument for that but it would be pretty inconsistent with everything else).
Most of this, however, is probably a visceral reaction by parents against the thought of their children giving consent.
-Welfare is bad
I would not characterize the conservative position on welfare this way. It is not that the welfare itself is bad, but that the only way of funding it is bad. You can't just give people money without taking it away from someone else - and when you take it away from them, you're not giving them a choice. You are, fundamentally, interfering with their ability to make decisions that impact only themselves.
If you could provide welfare freely, I doubt anyone would object - but then again, if you could provide it freely, you'd probably have violated a couple of fundamental physics laws to do it.
-Abortion is wrong
Contrary to the massive fountain of feminist bullshit spouted on this issue most of the time, the issue does not turn on whose body it is. The fundamental point here is when life begins. We treat the killing of a 1 year old as murder, and there are now laws in certain states that treat the killing of a fetus as murder for the purposes of criminal charges.
At some point, the fetus changes from just a loose ball of cells to a human being. Where that point is depends entirely on what one views as the crucial feature of "life" or "humanity". That feature is, obviously, not a matter agreed upon by many people. Its not even a feature that could be clearly identified by reasoned argument, its simply opinion. If you think the crucial feature is electrical activity in the brain, for example, you are not in theory against abortion but you end up against it in practice because electrical activity happens so early.
And, again, a lot of this is due to evangelical christians being a huge voter base for conservatives, and they take life beginning at conception as a matter of faith, leaving no opportunity for abortion. Its still just an opinion, however, at least as long as they aren't trying to convert you.
-Regime change is OK
The neoconservative argument for this centered fundamentally on a snowball effect that has somewhat been vindicated by events in Libya. The theory was, if you force democracy into a region that was not democratic, all citizens in that region will desire democracy, and eventually topple undemocratic governments on their own.
In my view, however, regime change is acceptable purely on the basis that one cannot leave aggressive states unchecked, and the fastest way to render a state non-aggressive is to end its existence, which is effectively what you do when you force regime change.
-Massive defense budget is important
It certainly is if America is expected (as it is) to maintain its status as world policeman. Without that status, it is less clear-cut, but fundamentally the argument over defense spending has arisen because of the budget deficit, which was itself brought on by social security and other ridiculous welfare programs, which nobody wants to cut anymore because they're terrified of losing votes.
In a properly run country without a ridiculous debt problem, defense spending would never be a problem.
-Abstinence is the best way to deal with sex
This is flat out retarded and anyone who makes this claim hasn't thought things through at all. I can offer no defense of it.
-Harsh punishments for criminals
Any time you reduce the size and scope of government, you are placing more responsibility into the hands of individual citizens. It is absolutely crucial for a functioning society that you deter people from abusing this. In a system where you have, say, inspectors to ensure that nobody is polluting a stream, the punishment can be a fine or something similar. If you have no inspectors, the first time you figure out someone is polluting is when someone dies due to poisoned water, or something similar - the risk of being caught abusing your authority is inversely correlated with the amount of authority you have, and conservatives seek to give people as much authority as possible.
Thus, since people are inherently risk-averse, deterrence is the solution - but deterrence needs to be significant. If you, for instance, punish pollution of a stream by flaying the owner of the factory (or whatever) alive, he's gonna think long and hard before he decides to abuse his authority, far longer than he would if it was a fine.
-Marriage defined as man and a woman
Technically, non-religious conservatives can hold no position on this. Marriage is not a government issue. The correct response to the whole gay marriage issue is to remove marriage benefits from heterosexual marriages as well - gays can already get married in a church or wherever the fuck, the only thing they cant do is claim all the benefits that attach to heterosexual marriage at a federal level.
Heterosexual marriages shouldn't have those benefits either, really, so the issue is something of a fake issue if you aren't religious.
Have to go to class now but I can expand on most of this if necessary.
if you guys would like to hear some well researched, well defended, not batshit crazy neoconservatist thoughts, check out the channel "machosauceproductions" on youtube. i myself am an independent, not sure if i'd say libertarian, but that's ok. i'm economically conservative and socially more liberal. i found this guy's views to be logical and sane, and it was just nice to hear a rebuplican who didn't bring up religion or what god wants etc... he just logically talks about the issues. check him out.
EPT
Countless threads that start off nice enough just get taken over by bigoted conversations. 
