An insight that made me empathize with conservatives a little bit more

[BeHereNow]

By doctor's orders, I have to quit weed with immediate effect. I get withdrawals real bad so I go on long walks to help ease the worst it.

I decided to go down memory lane and walk by my old highschool, what amazed me was seeing how different everything was. The cheap outdated buildings I was so used to seeing for a good chunk of my childhood were gone, replaced by a more modern and slick complex. I wouldn't be surprised if all the teachers and staff I once was familiar with are gone too. Even the name is different. The place and time that I now hold with nostalgia no longer really exists, only after 9 years. I will admit it's a very sad feeling I wasn't expecting to have.

Then I took that sentiment and placed my shoes in a elderly conservative, someone like Jordan Peterson or even my grandparents. Their childhoods, hometowns, friends, schooling, struggles, triumphs, music that would have been new to them and other things they thought were normal... Not only its all gone but the world is rapidly changing before their eyes. It must be a sadness more intense than mine, probably existentially terrifying too.

I always say to myself, "I'll never be a conservative, I'll always make sure I'll educate myself throughout myself and not become ignorant like my boomer grandparents." But having this insight changed my understanding of the issue as I get older and the world rapidly changes even further, I might be even more scared and confused as them. I probably wouldn't want to understand by that age.

Conservatives can be horribly bigoted and cruel at times, but I understand (even if it's just a little taste) why their concerns should be taken more seriously.

It's a very humbling experience.

[Leo Gura]

Yes, that's the core of it.

Basically it's fear of change, because change is death of things you love. Hence conservatism is about Love.

Edited November 13, 2022 by Leo Gura

[Lila9]

It's hard for every human. For some less, others more.

This makes you understand better not only elderly conservative but old people in general and how lonely they feel.

 

 

[Gidiot]

Reality is bittersweet, it can’t change fast enough for the liberals and it can’t stay the same enough for the conservatives

[Ulax]

Ye man that's real.

I think of it sometimes being like a future generation condemning previous generations as completely sick and twisted for eating any meat at all. For us it might be something we understand as worthy of debate but would seem generally pretty rare for someone to think a meat eater was absolutely sick and twisted for doing it.

Dealing with aging is one of the key motivators i have for pursuing consciousness work. I imagine aging is pretty tough for the average person.

[axiom]

Honestly, the behaviour that troubles me the most is from the far left. They’re like the new Red Guards.

That which is considered these days to be far right is very rarely genuinely far right. It’s just that the Overton Window has shifted so much.

Churchill once said that if you’re not left wing when you’re young, you lack passion. And if you’re not right wing when you get older, you lack intelligence. Leaving the extremes of far left and far right aside, there is some truth to this. 

[Danioover9000]

@BeHereNow

On 2022-11-12 at 8:35 PM, BeHereNow said:

By doctor's orders, I have to quit weed with immediate effect. I get withdrawals real bad so I go on long walks to help ease the worst it.

I decided to go down memory lane and walk by my old highschool, what amazed me was seeing how different everything was. The cheap outdated buildings I was so used to seeing for a good chunk of my childhood were gone, replaced by a more modern and slick complex. I wouldn't be surprised if all the teachers and staff I once was familiar with are gone too. Even the name is different. The place and time that I now hold with nostalgia no longer really exists, only after 9 years. I will admit it's a very sad feeling I wasn't expecting to have.

Then I took that sentiment and placed my shoes in a elderly conservative, someone like Jordan Peterson or even my grandparents. Their childhoods, hometowns, friends, schooling, struggles, triumphs, music that would have been new to them and other things they thought were normal... Not only its all gone but the world is rapidly changing before their eyes. It must be a sadness more intense than mine, probably existentially terrifying too.

I always say to myself, "I'll never be a conservative, I'll always make sure I'll educate myself throughout myself and not become ignorant like my boomer grandparents." But having this insight changed my understanding of the issue as I get older and the world rapidly changes even further, I might be even more scared and confused as them. I probably wouldn't want to understand by that age.

Conservatives can be horribly bigoted and cruel at times, but I understand (even if it's just a little taste) why their concerns should be taken more seriously.

It's a very humbling experience.

   I can relate, that kind of nostalgia is very hard to let go, as you really have had a direct experience of those places, kinda like a shared experience with a person, and so many years later you come back to that place and it's all changed, or it's all bulldozed down, and the people you've shared your friendship with or intimacy back then, have moved on or are dead. Those are no mere mind games, if you lost someone or something of value to you in the past, it'll feel.

[Mohammad]

I think its hard to pinpoint the exact definition of philosophies behind "conservative" thinking and "progressive" thinking. For example you could be very progressive and left leaning person, but at the same time believe that we should not change every aspects of our lives and society, because somethings are there for a reason, somethings are done in a specific way for a reason.

Change is ever present, it's part of nature and life, but sometimes it would wise to at least try to keep something as it always has been.

[Gidiot]

@axiom it’s moot to argue which extreme is worse imo, they obviously aren’t the same, you need to wings to fly and all that but to say that all older people should be right wing is insane, what if I don’t care about the family unit, fiscal money saving, having a strong economy, national pride, stage blue values and I value in my life more compassion, cohesiveness, selflessness, joy and doing things on purpose rather than just doing things for the sake of it, most conservative traditional positions don’t appeal to me, not to say I can’t change, but what is so dumb about favoring left wing agendas? It’s such a big mistake to think that the younger generation wants to put people in a gulag it’s not even worth addressing. They want the socialism of Scandinavia not soviet Russia and communist China