• themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    No, you couldn’t. Most political ideologies are built on fundamental principles and core values. When ideology is principled, it is consistent even when the believers are not direct beneficiaries of the policies.

    Take freedom of speech. People who value free speech will defend it even when they don’t like the speech they hear. That’s a principled belief.

    Conservatives will shift their principles when faced with a policy that does not benefit them. Conservatives demand abortions when they need them. Conservatives demand gun control when they feel threatened. Conservatives demand freedom to travel anywhere while closing their borders. They hire undocumented immigrants. They capture regulatory bodies to edge out the competition. There isn’t a single conservative value that is consistent among conservatives and applied equally to others as well as themselves.