Maybe, but I don’t think that’s the underlying motivator. I think down at the bottom, conservatives are driven by fear.
Fear of the other.
Fear of progress.
Fear of being left behind by that progress.
Fear of new ideas.
Fear of looking weak.
It’s all fear. Right now, I’m leaning towards fear of looking weak as the biggest one. It motivates all the virtue signaling on the right, and causes them to treat safety precautions in multiple situations as signs of weakness, from refusing to wear helmets on bikes to refusing to vaccinate against deadly diseases. They have to prove they’re “stronger” than anything that could hurt them.
It also explains why they’re resistant to accepting expert advice, but easily fall for “strongmen.” If some effete scientist manages to get them to do what he asks, why, that’s just showing that they’re weak. But if a strongman does it, then falling in line isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of how gloriously strong the strongman is.
Although we have good reason to be fearful, lefties are afraid of r’s, the supreme court letting trump win even though he didn’t again, lgbt+ people being persecuted, the racism from people who do things about it and so on. Fear doesn’t make you a shitty person.
Maybe, but I don’t think that’s the underlying motivator. I think down at the bottom, conservatives are driven by fear.
It’s all fear. Right now, I’m leaning towards fear of looking weak as the biggest one. It motivates all the virtue signaling on the right, and causes them to treat safety precautions in multiple situations as signs of weakness, from refusing to wear helmets on bikes to refusing to vaccinate against deadly diseases. They have to prove they’re “stronger” than anything that could hurt them.
It also explains why they’re resistant to accepting expert advice, but easily fall for “strongmen.” If some effete scientist manages to get them to do what he asks, why, that’s just showing that they’re weak. But if a strongman does it, then falling in line isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of how gloriously strong the strongman is.
Although we have good reason to be fearful, lefties are afraid of r’s, the supreme court letting trump win even though he didn’t again, lgbt+ people being persecuted, the racism from people who do things about it and so on. Fear doesn’t make you a shitty person.
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” — Yoda