To start off, I must clarify and explain that young is relative. Go back 100 years and I'm not going to be talking about 18-25 year old people. I'll be more looking at 30-40 with 60+ being the old ones. It's only recently (as far as history goes) that us younguns became active voters and started smoking pot and dropping acid and yelling about peace while listening to what to sober ears is terrible music. Also I must confess that I don't use any drugs, I'm not a fan of yelling. Maybe this means I'm actually a young social conservative destroying America.
I must also emphasize the social part. Fiscal conservatives are badly needed at all age levels, since it seems that currently there are none.
As we all know, today's revolutionary is tomorrow's conservative. He's made the world into what he wants and now he wants to keep it that way. This applies to society as well. It creates a cycle of discontent and change, moderated by yesterday's revolutionaries, which has made the Western world way better than everywhere else.
Here's how it goes: Young person matures enough to start seeing that the world can be different than it current is and therefore it can be better. He then plays a part in changing society and law. Meanwhile people 40 years older yell at him and block everything he does. After 40 years they die and he takes their place. The result is gradual improvement of society.
Demographics are critical to this process. The old people cannot be reform-minded, or else society will move too fast and destabilize. Just as importantly, the young cannot be conservative or there will be no progress.
Fortunately the old are unlikely to be progressives. They know the world they're in, for the most part they have made it into what they want, and they're not eager to change everything and confuse themselves.
But the young, they can be conservatives. Sometimes they are. And when they are, the country goes to shit, both at the time and inevitably, 40 years down the line.
In light of this, I urge you to explain to any young conservatives you meet that they are unpatriotic and un-American and should feel bad.
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3 comments:
flateSometimes I can't tell when you're joking or if the opinions are real. Whether it's your real opinion or not I think it's a bit arrogant.
True, young people have a lot of ideas on how to fix the world, and older people are generally set in their ways. But I'm uncomfortable at the blanket definition of a conservative. It sounds as if it's a bad word, a person who both accepts and enjoys all the crap that occurs in this country and is completely unwilling to change to better society. That's pretty damming.
People use classifications such as these far too often. Conservative, liberal, closed-minded, open-minded progressive. The truth is if someone doesn't agree with you they are closed-minded, and if they do then they are a progressive, like you, and hope for a better future reigns.
We classify others and ourselvs too often and too quickly. This behavior is what created political parties, and worse, Party Platforms...ideals that all in the party members need to embrace if they have any hope to receive party funds for their election campaigns.
It's all a bunch of crap, really. I'm older and have much life experience (compared to the 18-25 crowd) and my life has taught me that segregation is alive and well in this country, except it's taken on a different face. When we set out to not only point out the differenes in each other but do it in a way that condems the "other side" without consideration of any kind, it's no better than sticking your young butt (or my older one) in the back of the bus and telling me to shut up because I'm stupid and I enjoy watching the country crap on itself.
Progress would be if people of all ages first accepted the belief that they might be wrong, then be patient enough to listen. We all won't be the same, old or young, rich or poor, etc, but I think we should stop trying to separate ourselves so much and strive more to find what we have in common and go from there. It won't be perfect, it won't be easy, but it will be progress.
I am mostly joking.
I believe that what makes America so great is that through our political system we can have competing ideologies co-exist. They fight tooth and nail against each other in this direction and that and from this we get gradual movement towards a better society. It is slow, but it is also stable. That is how we are free and prosperous.
I don't think it is perfect; we have far too much politics and not enough debate and discussion, but it's a hell of a lot better than 90% of what other countries have; which is voting through civil war.
I agree, the founders of this country set up the government to make it DIFFICULT to get laws passed. The gridlock is part of the process. And ultimately, it's a good thing.
I think I was just saying that the namecalling and "pegging" of people and ideas slows down the process further and is not good. Clashing ideals is something we'll never escape, but as a country we need to be more civil about it and stop classifying people to satisfy some inner psychological desire to fit into the world ourselves.
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