this post was submitted on 28 Aug 2023
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As I get older I realize how much shittier of a world we are leaving for our kids. I’m 52 and much more cognizant of my more liberal views and how much more “correct” they are now than I was was in my early 20s. My age and wisdom have taught me this.
The entire premise of conservatism is that the way things are now (or how they recently were), and the projection of this into the future, is the best possible way for things to be. How absolutely stupid do you have to be to believe that?
"Let's just stop here, things are as good as they're going to get. No improvements can be made."
You can look at it too for looking at what causes people to be conservative.
Conservatism at its core psychological roots is fear of change. In a vacuum, people who are well served by the status quo are the ones least likely to want change. The historical adage of people becoming more conservative as they age was basically a result of that: when you're young you don't have much to lose from change. As you age you gain the opportunity to buy a house, to get married, to have kids, to get promoted at work and see your income go up significantly, to develop some meaningful job security. And so on. Thus, as people age they gained things, status, accomplishments, all the various life goals being accomplished. Even if change would probably make things better for them, they didn't want to risk it. Things were OK.
The reason we see that adage breakdown is because we've seen the core causes breakdown too. Buying a home five years ago was a struggle compared to how it was historically. Buying a home today costs so much that it makes buying a home five years ago look trivial. Many couples are now intentionally delaying or forgoing becoming parents because children cost so much: just giving birth can cost tens of thousands of dollars, and that's just to get them to day 1 of existence. Education costs keep going up. Job security is down. Wage increases are seen as something that even the "professional class" has to fight for, requiring a job hop to get a raise instead of getting one as par for the course from staying at an employer.
In light of that breakdown... far fewer people are afraid of the risk of change. The 30-something of today has a lot less at risk from change. Even much of the lower half of the upper middle class of today is far more able to stomach the risk of change.
It's really not a surprise at all.
It's actually simpler than that. Conservatism does not actually express any positive philosophy at all. Its premise is entirely reactionary.