This is not a manifesto preceding a violent act. Rather, think of it simply as a higher quality than usual post from me. I wish to explain the logic underpinning modern conservatism, namely from a US-centric perspective but also corresponding to how it tends to manifest around the world. Everything I'm about to write will not be popular. I expect accusations of "bigot", which is modernity's equivalent to "heretic", to be flung around liberally. But for the record, I do not care. I intend to describe the world as an intellectually honest person can see that it is.
First, I ought to begin with the question: what is conservatism?
Some would say it's synonymous with "right-wing". Others say the conservative is doggedly pro-status quo. In that sense, a Soviet hardliner in 1991 who opposed the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. in favor of preserving communism might've been labeled a conservative. Same for a jungle savage who offers his children as sacrifices to the sun god and resists calls by a Christian missionary to stop doing so.
But I'd tender another definition. Conservatism is that which, in pre-modern times, before the advent of progressivism, was the was the core engine of human progress. It was the progressive ideology of its time, which was for many thousands of years. It was independently invented in many times and places, and indeed never stopped being continuously reinvented.
When we imagine progress, we're susceptible to what's called the just world fallacy. The 1950s were, compared to the 2020s, a materially backward time. We are much wealthier today than they were back then, and things like Jim Crow have since been abolished. Thus, the abolition of Jim Crow must also constitute progress.
Now, I don't disagree with this one. Jim Crow was obviously bad. But you could leap to the same conclusion about other things where unwarranted. Society is less religious today than it was 60 years ago, so less religion must be progress. The sexual revolution happened, so that must be progress too. We have a lavish welfare state that we didn't have 70 years ago, so the lavish welfare state must be progress, even when it's driven us $30 trillion into debt. And so on.
The other problem with this thinking is that, for the vast bulk of history, it was the opposite. From the Iron Age to the early stretches of the Industrial Revolution, that which accompanied material progress (e.g. more wealth) was decidedly not irreligion and libertinism. Instead, successful societies grew more pious, more austere in their lifestyles, and so on.
See, man in his natural state is a savage. Man here is a gender neutral term; neolithic adult males had no qualms about killing males from a rival kinship group ("tribe") and taking its women as concubines, while neolithic adult females had no qualms about committing infanticide. The respects in which males and females are savage usually tend to differ, but both are in desperate need of civilizing. It is the role of society to civilize the next generation just as it had the generation before it. Each person must learn to restrain his/her self from doing what he/she ought not to be doing, and each person must learn the discipline to make his/her self do what he/she ought to be doing. This is what enables our race to pull itself from the muck and realize its high potential. It is the difference between the Stone Age and a 21st century paradise. Or, more modestly, the difference between a cyberpunk dystopia and a cyberpunk utopia. Civilized people can build a better future, while uncivilized people can only help tear down what's been built.
First, I ought to begin with the question: what is conservatism?
Some would say it's synonymous with "right-wing". Others say the conservative is doggedly pro-status quo. In that sense, a Soviet hardliner in 1991 who opposed the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. in favor of preserving communism might've been labeled a conservative. Same for a jungle savage who offers his children as sacrifices to the sun god and resists calls by a Christian missionary to stop doing so.
But I'd tender another definition. Conservatism is that which, in pre-modern times, before the advent of progressivism, was the was the core engine of human progress. It was the progressive ideology of its time, which was for many thousands of years. It was independently invented in many times and places, and indeed never stopped being continuously reinvented.
When we imagine progress, we're susceptible to what's called the just world fallacy. The 1950s were, compared to the 2020s, a materially backward time. We are much wealthier today than they were back then, and things like Jim Crow have since been abolished. Thus, the abolition of Jim Crow must also constitute progress.
Now, I don't disagree with this one. Jim Crow was obviously bad. But you could leap to the same conclusion about other things where unwarranted. Society is less religious today than it was 60 years ago, so less religion must be progress. The sexual revolution happened, so that must be progress too. We have a lavish welfare state that we didn't have 70 years ago, so the lavish welfare state must be progress, even when it's driven us $30 trillion into debt. And so on.
The other problem with this thinking is that, for the vast bulk of history, it was the opposite. From the Iron Age to the early stretches of the Industrial Revolution, that which accompanied material progress (e.g. more wealth) was decidedly not irreligion and libertinism. Instead, successful societies grew more pious, more austere in their lifestyles, and so on.
See, man in his natural state is a savage. Man here is a gender neutral term; neolithic adult males had no qualms about killing males from a rival kinship group ("tribe") and taking its women as concubines, while neolithic adult females had no qualms about committing infanticide. The respects in which males and females are savage usually tend to differ, but both are in desperate need of civilizing. It is the role of society to civilize the next generation just as it had the generation before it. Each person must learn to restrain his/her self from doing what he/she ought not to be doing, and each person must learn the discipline to make his/her self do what he/she ought to be doing. This is what enables our race to pull itself from the muck and realize its high potential. It is the difference between the Stone Age and a 21st century paradise. Or, more modestly, the difference between a cyberpunk dystopia and a cyberpunk utopia. Civilized people can build a better future, while uncivilized people can only help tear down what's been built.
There is, of course, not just one human society. People were geographically distributed wherever they could eke out a living.
All of them started out knowing little to nothing, so those which moved out of the Stone Age developed culture and underwent cultural evolution. Some, like China, India, Sumer, and the Mesoamericans (who to be fair weren't just one civilization), gradually built sophisticated cultures without having to borrow much from the outside world. But for most, the process entailed borrowing and at times being borrowed from. To name a minor example, Alexander the Great adopted court etiquette practices from the Persians who he'd conquered. The Carolingians and their successor states at times did the same with the Byzantine court. This is, of course, to say nothing about things like literature. Likewise, cultures rose and fell; for example, the complicated and stratified society that the Zoroastrians had built in Iran was washed away with the Islamic conquests, which imposed its own (in some respects superior) structure but retained a few native Iranian elements.
By the year 1500, there were distinct civilizational blocs in Afro-Eurasia. Western Christianity, Eastern/Oriental Christianity, the Islamic world (Sunni and Shia), India, China and the sinosphere, the Buddhist world, and perhaps Japan. Excluded was northern Eurasia where nobody but nomads lived, much of Sub-Saharan Africa, most Pacific islands, and of course the Americas.
All of these blocs had imposed rules governing everyday life, justified by powerful religious myths (a broad term I use regardless of their objective truth value). There were religious and secular hierarchies. Complicated wasn't better by default, but you couldn't have well-organized without complexity.
Over time, progress was made not just in passing rules but in enforcing them. For example, Catholic clergy were ordered to be celibate early on, but it wasn't until the High Middle Ages that this rule was widely obeyed. There were many centuries during which this rule only existed in the books and not in practice. There was never such a requirement in the Eastern/Oriental Orthodox world. At least in Russia, the title of parish priest was often hereditary; a father would teach his son how to do the job, and then hand the reins to him upon retiring, and this practice continued well into the 19th century. A non-hereditary priesthood had its advantages, such as a more cosmopolitan-minded, well-educated, and meritocratic leadership. (And yes, Protestants eventually did away with celibate priests, but the societies in which Protestantism took hold were already well developed even by European standards so they could afford to do it). Another reason why the Catholic bloc fared better is because the Vatican imposed a uniform liturgical language, thus literary lingua franca, across a vast area, whereas the Eastern/Oriental Orthodox intellectual scene was fragmented among Greek, Church Slavonic, Aramaic, Armenian, Coptic, and Ge'ez speakers. Especially before the invention of the printing press this made a huge difference in developmental outcomes.
To give another example about enforcing rules, polygamy was outlawed by Christianity from the start but it didn't die out in Christian Europe until about the High Middle Ages. Thus, it couldn't be taken for granted that the mere fact of a religion existing led to this kind of progress. It was a continuous battle by the "saints" against the "sinners". Sometimes the moral muscle would atrophy and things would slide backwards, such as in the Ottoman Empire, which became notorious for how common homosexuality and male pederasty was, and in Afghanistan and Pakistan to the point where they're still grappling with bacha bazi today.
Likewise, societies that were already religious could go even further and experience a religious revival. See Geneva under John Calvin's influence, or early modern England where every other crime was punishable by the death penalty. Protestantism led to more puritanical societies than their Catholic neighbors, though Catholicism itself enjoyed a lesser revival through the Counter-Reformation. And this itself was a continuation of growing interest in the religious life that began during the High Middle Ages, such as with the Devotio Moderna movement.
All of them started out knowing little to nothing, so those which moved out of the Stone Age developed culture and underwent cultural evolution. Some, like China, India, Sumer, and the Mesoamericans (who to be fair weren't just one civilization), gradually built sophisticated cultures without having to borrow much from the outside world. But for most, the process entailed borrowing and at times being borrowed from. To name a minor example, Alexander the Great adopted court etiquette practices from the Persians who he'd conquered. The Carolingians and their successor states at times did the same with the Byzantine court. This is, of course, to say nothing about things like literature. Likewise, cultures rose and fell; for example, the complicated and stratified society that the Zoroastrians had built in Iran was washed away with the Islamic conquests, which imposed its own (in some respects superior) structure but retained a few native Iranian elements.
By the year 1500, there were distinct civilizational blocs in Afro-Eurasia. Western Christianity, Eastern/Oriental Christianity, the Islamic world (Sunni and Shia), India, China and the sinosphere, the Buddhist world, and perhaps Japan. Excluded was northern Eurasia where nobody but nomads lived, much of Sub-Saharan Africa, most Pacific islands, and of course the Americas.
All of these blocs had imposed rules governing everyday life, justified by powerful religious myths (a broad term I use regardless of their objective truth value). There were religious and secular hierarchies. Complicated wasn't better by default, but you couldn't have well-organized without complexity.
Over time, progress was made not just in passing rules but in enforcing them. For example, Catholic clergy were ordered to be celibate early on, but it wasn't until the High Middle Ages that this rule was widely obeyed. There were many centuries during which this rule only existed in the books and not in practice. There was never such a requirement in the Eastern/Oriental Orthodox world. At least in Russia, the title of parish priest was often hereditary; a father would teach his son how to do the job, and then hand the reins to him upon retiring, and this practice continued well into the 19th century. A non-hereditary priesthood had its advantages, such as a more cosmopolitan-minded, well-educated, and meritocratic leadership. (And yes, Protestants eventually did away with celibate priests, but the societies in which Protestantism took hold were already well developed even by European standards so they could afford to do it). Another reason why the Catholic bloc fared better is because the Vatican imposed a uniform liturgical language, thus literary lingua franca, across a vast area, whereas the Eastern/Oriental Orthodox intellectual scene was fragmented among Greek, Church Slavonic, Aramaic, Armenian, Coptic, and Ge'ez speakers. Especially before the invention of the printing press this made a huge difference in developmental outcomes.
To give another example about enforcing rules, polygamy was outlawed by Christianity from the start but it didn't die out in Christian Europe until about the High Middle Ages. Thus, it couldn't be taken for granted that the mere fact of a religion existing led to this kind of progress. It was a continuous battle by the "saints" against the "sinners". Sometimes the moral muscle would atrophy and things would slide backwards, such as in the Ottoman Empire, which became notorious for how common homosexuality and male pederasty was, and in Afghanistan and Pakistan to the point where they're still grappling with bacha bazi today.
Likewise, societies that were already religious could go even further and experience a religious revival. See Geneva under John Calvin's influence, or early modern England where every other crime was punishable by the death penalty. Protestantism led to more puritanical societies than their Catholic neighbors, though Catholicism itself enjoyed a lesser revival through the Counter-Reformation. And this itself was a continuation of growing interest in the religious life that began during the High Middle Ages, such as with the Devotio Moderna movement.
