this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2023
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I think the word 'conservative' in your post isn't the best one you could have chosen. 'Entrenched' fits better. Bureaucracies will always fight anyone who tries to change anything. That is why bureaucracies are so dangerous and should be defenestrated regularly, so creative minds can inject fresh thinking.
But that's what conservative means. It means adhering to traditional values and hierarchies for their own sake.
These professional organizations that refuse to accept criticism, refuse to change practice in light of evidence of in this case poor workmanship, and refused to let the state of the art grow are the very definition of conservative. Especially when they yield their power to crush critics pushing for equity, progress, or rights.
I'm not sure if there is a more conservative stance than the one where you refuse to accept any criticism and then lash out at the critics.
That isn't at all what 'conservative' means. And 'entrenchment' is not synonymous with tradition. Tradition is a recognition of lessons we learned over a long stretch of time. It is more closely related to 'if it ain't broke don't fix it' than 'entrenched'. We are certainly floating among fine distinctions here, but they are important. I think you would find it incredibly difficult to defend all "organizations" that"refuse to change practice in light of evidence". Like, say, Union organizations. Talk about lashing out!!
It is literally exactly what conservative means. There is no other coherent definition of conservative. Conservative means valuing tradition and the preservation of tradition more highly than other aspects of governance. And there's no difference between your "entrenchment" and my "tradition'. Both mean the same thing -- 'we've always done it this way and so don't want to change'.
If someone's highest values are around and improvement of efficacy and efficiency of their government body, they would identify themselves as a progressive. If the values were protecting individual liberties, they would identify themselves as a liberal. If their values were to promote the fairest and most equitable society, they'd identify as socialist.
People can be many things at once. Most reasonable people are. But the word conservative still has meaning and the meaning is to cleave to tradition and traditional hierarchies. It's what the word means.
I would find it incredibly difficult to defend any organizations that refuse to change practice in light of evidence. I tend to be very progressive-minded and mostly not at all conservative, so I do not think tradition is a very good reason to refuse to change practice.
The problem with using words like "individual liberties", "improvement of efficiency", or "fairest and most equitable" is that they are either WILDLY subjective, trojan horses for the most evil political ideologies (anything neo-marxist comes to mind) out there, or the definitions change on the whim of whatever group has the most power today.
But you are right; people can be more than one thing. And luckily for us, we have a few hundred years of Western growth and evolution that have codified a small number of useful traditions that have promoted the development of the most powerful and enlightened nation the planet has ever seen. We continue to grow and learn, hopefully abandoning bad ideas like sexual libertinism and anything related to marxism, and learned from the hard lessons of our past.
Being a Conservative does not mean a refusal to even allow change. It means respect for the hard lessons already learned and an insistence that we have a damn good reason to change those valuable existing traditions. I wish labor unions would learn from their many mistakes over the past hundred-plus years they have been around.
You have not spelled out a counterargument here.
When someone identifies as conservative, it means they have a strong preference for no change happening (and even undoing more "recent" change, although what qualifies as "recent" usually is viewed through the lens of personal preferences). That's what it means. You don't seem to even dispute it. It's what the word means.
And when a conservative tells you all the other things they AREN'T -- as the modern conservative usually jumps to do -- believe that those are the values. If they say they aren't liberal, it means they don't care about preserving individual liberties. If they say they aren't progressive, it means they do not want to see progress. If they say they aren't a socialist, it means they do not care about an egalitarian and pro-social society. And when they say they aren't a "neo-marxist"... well, that one really is meaningless gibberish, pay it no mind at all.
I feel like you keep bringing up labor unions because you think it's going to be some kind of gotcha for me, but it super duper isn't. One of the major reasons we saw such a profound weakening and collapse of labor unions in this country that only (maybe) reversed recently is because the older unions were seen as swinging way too conservative. That they became more concerned with maintaining power and status quo than doing the job of unions. Whether or not that criticism is fair is, I'm sure, a topic of much argument -- I definitely think this view was part of a very serious disinformation campaign run by capitalist and ruling class-types to fight back against the working class -- but this is certainly what your typical boomer/anti-labor-type will cite as the reason they don't care for labor unions.
Let's not forget who "the right" originally was: the conservatives who wanted to preserve the monarchy and stop the french revolution. They didn't want to change from the old way to a new one. They thought the transition would be too chaotic. They were certainly correct that it would end up being quite chaotic indeed, but if they'd had their way there may still be a fucking divine right king prancing about in court while the people staved.
Fair point.
However at this time in both Wisconsin and North Carolina, those entrenched powers are conservative.
Modern society would quickly devolve into chaos without bureaucracy. Just because it's been misused before, does not mean we can do without it. They aren't "fighting" anything, they are rigorously reviewing and modifying plans and specifications of (often massive) public infrastructure.
The entire concept of a Professional Engineer exists due to bureaucracy. Without it, there would be no liability whatsoever for faulty designs in public putting millions (billions?) of people in danger regularly.
Entrenchment is an innately conservative attitude, though, and politically conservative people are a lot more likely to punish you for speaking truth to power.