Conservatism is a serious dysfunction that is destroying the fabric of society in this country and undermining its economy. It can never be eradicated completely, but must be contained and made publicly unpalatable to the point it never can infect policy overtly.
We label conservatives as dumb, knuckle-dragging troglodytes, mean-spirited ignoramuses, and many other negatives. One or the other of these may very well be true in most cases, but few conservatives exhibit all these traits. In fact, there are many educated or relatively high-IQ conservatives, and there used to be some kind and gentle ones, although they become harder to find as the movement sheds more and more disgusted followers and radicalizes.
My point of view is that these traits are just manifestations of the same dysfunction which is part mental, part social:
A conservative invariably craves a social order based on inequalities. Everything else follows from that.
Follow me below the fold for a brief, completely reversible journey into a mind like that.
A conservative invariably craves a social order that consecrates inequality in order to feel at ease with his or her environment. The most bizarre thing is that, thanks to all the brainwashing and twisting, a typical conservatives isn't even aware of what he himself is all about. In fact, the reason why conservatism has its name, is that most conservatives believe that such a social order is still in place and must be preserved, when in reality it has been on the way out gradually since the turn of the previous century (what I call the post-1911 mindset). This is why impartial observers would more appropriately define these self-described 'conservatives' as in fact reactionaries, or regressives, my favorite.
Let's examine the various types of inequality a regressive 'conservative' depends on, and we begin to understand the many perverse manifestations of the conservative movement in society:
Social inequality. A regressive's ideal society looks like a huge passenger steamship around 1911. There is a first class of very few super-rich in their suites, surrounded by their sycophantic entourage, plus uniformed delegates in charge keeping the discipline. There is a second class, a rump salaried middle class, which supplies all the limited ingenuity and intellectual work that a purely capitalist enterprise needs to enrich its owner (there will be more about that). And dead last, steerage: an endless supply of unskilled, uneducated neo-slaves uprooted from among the poorest and most desperate in order to perform a multitude of menial, hazardous production and service tasks.
Conservatives have different social standards for these groups, but the greatest gap is between the first class and steerage. To the conservative, government handouts make steerage people lazier and first-class people more socially responsible. To the regressive, military service instills discipline into the children of the steerage passengers, and distracts the children from the first class from nobler priorities. To the regressive, the steerage should be punished harshly for the slightest offense, first-class offenders should get a pass in light of their 'contribution' to society. To the regressive, unrestrained sexual activity and promiscuity make the steerage passengers more lazy, while drugs weaken the steerage passenger's willingness to go die for the interests of others. On the other hand, to the regressive, all these things make the first-class people who experience them more mature, wiser and better leaders.
Legal inequality. there are no rights, only privileges. Whether you have a fair trial depends on your social status and how much you can afford to devote to your defense. The nature and seriousness of your crime depends on your status, so that poor offenders should be booked with offenses that relegate them to the prison slave pool for their entire productive life, and wealthy ones given probation, suspended sentences, if not presidential pardons, so that they can go back to the noble pursuit of more money. Poor people are clubbed or tasered to death by goons long before the chance to get a habeas corpus, while first-class people are invited to testify without taking an oath, and if they don't show up, it's no big deal. Right of free speech? Buy your own damn TV network.
Political inequality. the fewer of the lower classes vote, the better the regressive feels. The more arcane the system, the better the chance that a busy working class person trying to make ends meet will skip, and even not be interested enough. The regressive feels that it is not appropriate for people of limited means to discuss politics, as that would encourage awareness of rights and responsibilities by people who do not deserve inclusion in the process of governance. Sadly, most people in the United States have come to believe that bringing up politics in polite company is as socially unacceptable as lighting up a cigar at dinner. Of course, members of the elite do talk about politics, as they recognize that it is highly relevant to their interests, and secondly they tend to be on much closer terms with the actors on the political scene. And regressives are exempted from the rule of politeness with their periodic paranoid rants against 'liberals'. Let's not forget also that a unitary leader with unrestrained powers can be relied much more to maintain social immobility, and therefore a much better source of authority to a regressive, than a government which guarantees the citizen's rights through the separation of powers and checks and balances.
Racial inequality. The racial double standard is unfortunately glaring, especially when viewed through the lens of history, even very recent history. It's becoming more subtle recently, in response to increased assertiveness of African Americans for the past several decades. But whether it's expressive or reflective, the racial double standard is always a solid feature of conservatism/regressivsm, and it's there to stay. Examples: John McCain is statesmanlike, Barack Obama is presumptious. Midwestern farmers pile sandbags, while urban Mississippi dwellers loot large-screen TV sets. Ann coulter is outspoken and irreverent, while Al Sharpton is an angry, bigoted, money-grubbing agitator. Just about everything that comes out of the mouth of pat buchanan or bill 0.reilly is an example of that. The double standard is also shifing to try to find other 'inferiors', such as recent immigrants and muslims, that may be more willing to accept subordination.
National inequality. The best guarantee of inequality is a superpower surrounded by a small number of relatively powerful vassals, and a vast majority of weak and submissive nations on which the will of the superpower (largely, of its first class) is imposed.
Sexual Inequality. There is one type of violent crime that the conservatives systematically downplay. It is RAPE. (except by an inferior, of course) It is well known that rape is overwhelmingly an expression of power of a man over a woman and by extension, all women. It is a very barbaric and damaging, but for that reason also very effective, way to assert dominance over the female sex and indirectly, over whole ethnicities. (see the systematic rape of african slaves, bosnians, etc.) Whether in Latin America, in the United States, in the Arab world or anywehere else, machismo and regressivism go hand in hand. When abortion, contraception, and certain types of reproductive therapy become illegal or not covered by medical benefits, power shifts from the woman to a male-dominated legal and clerical establishment.
Species Inequality. Man and only Man is the ruler of the planet. He alone imposes its will on the other natural species, animal or vegetal, by torturing, butchering, and violating them, arguably for adventure, science, or in deference to tradition, but fundamentally, just to reassert his dominance. To the regressive, being kind to polar bears and redwoods is an expression not of connectedness of nature and creation, but of weakness.
There are other inequalities, but this trip into the conservative mind has been already literally awfully long. Please add them to the Comments. These may not be all the biggest inequalities, but I hope they at least give the idea.
What matters is that intelligent and informed people are well aware that a system based on inequalities such as regressives crave is a recurrent feature of history, in different times and in different levels. But they also know that, when it's considered respectable it quickly becomes unrestrained, it leads to instability eventually, and the vast majority of the people never prosper under it for long, even compared to their previous condition. This is why tolerated conservatism or tolerated regressivism is a menace to just about every individual, not only the weakest.
Future diary: why I'm not a 'Communist' or a 'Socialist', and I may not even be a 'Librul', but I'm certainly NOT a Capitalist, either.