Based on the moronic stuff I hear from my family, the general trailer park view is that both parties screw the little guy but at least the pubs don't luv teh gays.

No. They bitch, but their tendency to be less capable of understanding how those rascally computing machines work means their words only travel so far.

The few that are capable of advanced skills, such as "typing" and "logging onto a website" can barely last more than a week before spouting about how the world is ****ing them.

Religiosity is external locus of control incarnate!!!

So, they are conservative because they are the very definition of external locus of control?

You have the history a bit wrong (or are being simplistic for the sake of brevity). See Reverend Fifield.

This isn't correct. It's actually the reverse. "True conservatives" don't give a crap about gay marriage. In their ideology the government should never be dictating what happens in someone's personal life. The real conservatives are catering to the religious right, so they cave on this particular issue.

George Bush himself accepted it as a natural thing, and he came off as the biggest gay basher. He was catering to his base. I remember reading a story about a a gay staffer of his, and privately he was indifferent about the issue.

Republicans right now are in a strange position. They can't win elections by catering to their base only, but they can't even get nominated without catering to their base. So they get stuck with ridiculous candidates with stupid ass views who have to act super conservative to win the nomination then swing left to capture the middle. It's a joke.

Ummmm. "Conservatism" includes social conservatism.

Can I define "True SMPer" to include only the SMPers who agree with me on everything?

This may be related to the differences in the speed people adapt to new information and knowledge.

An example of this is the concept of bodily identity. Liberals tend to accept the newer idea that a person's gender is defined by more than or beyond their body's sex.

Conservatives tend reject this newer idea for a pre-existing idea that the body's sex always defines personal gender identity.

Ahh, I should have been a bit more careful with my words, you're correct. Conservatives years ago are a different animal than they are today. I think many conservatives used to view social issues as a private matter where government should have no say. I think that isn't so much the case today.

The link between traditionalism and other forms of conservative thinking seems to hold across all cultures. See works of Haidt on this.

You might be thinking of classic liberalism, which has been subsumed under libertarianism.

Conservatives believe that government is the problem. Liberals believe government is the solution.

AND

Conservatives believe in equal opportunities for all (with the exception that some conservatives dislike gays). Liberals believe in equal results for all.

AND

If a conservative thinks a liberal is wrong she believes it is because the liberal isn't intelligent enough to look at the consequences of his actions. If a liberal thinks a conservative is wrong he believes it is because the conservative is racist.

Predictably, all those are false

.

seem solid

+1 metaname2

Conservatives have the propensity to mold their political views on social issues around their religious views.

1st level of thinking goes to tax-cut anti-abortion bible republicans
2nd level of thinking goes to democrats
3rd level of thinking goes to conservative republicans
4th level and higher generally goes to Republicans but people like Soros and Bloomberg might be 6th level.

Coming from the UK I'm speaking more in general terms than those who are addressing the dichotomy in the US specifically. However, in my eyes it largely goes right the way back to consequentialism vs deontology.

Liberals see 'the good' as maximising happiness and equality for everyone as an end goal, and are happy to make sacrifices in order to achieve that (high taxation, forceful opposition to things like 'hate speech', 'positive' discrimination in order to balance out demographic discrepancies in positions of power, being economical with the truth in the event that widespread knowledge of said truth could have negative consequences etc).

Conservatives see 'the good' as rooted in principles rather than the end result (the big one in America being of course 'freedom' and all the painful inequality that it might entail).

Of course, in a pragmatic sense, this manifests itself in diverging beliefs of what the role of government should be (and just how capable it is of being effective).

Not necessarily. There's a lot of very authoritarian conservatives in Europe who think that we should tighten up on immigration, be harder on criminals, bring back the death penalty, strengthen the police etc.

Conservative doesn't automatically translate to libertarian in much of the world outside the US.

Roughly yeah.

Or because they believe that the liberal is really a self-serving person trying to appear as 'nice' as possible whilst nevertheless suffering no unfortunate consequences themselves. We had this in the UK where Labour politicians called for the abolition of private schools whilst sending their kids to them or calling for increased immigration whilst living in very wealthy, exclusively white areas.

Slightly harsh. A fairer way would be to say that a liberal would tend to disagree with the conservative's values themselves rather than their methods as being ineffective.

e.g. a liberal is more likely to look at a conservative's valuing of 'freedom' and say words to the effect of "well, tough ****, but freedom should rank below making sure everyone has a decent standard of living on our list of priorities".

Most conservatives in the U.S. love that **** too. The small government thing is a talking point not to be confused with their actual policy positions.

That is the "in-group loyalty" thing that conservatives feel, according to Haidt's theory. Most liberals translate "in-group loyalty" as "racist, xenophobic, ethnocentric, nationalistic" (correctly so).

Grunching: Did anyone mention the extra lung thing?

I won't mess with the terms, just the pols. The terms are subjective. Their actions are not.

So called conservative politicians provide right cover for major initiatives that the elite on the so called left want. Like increased spending, increased size and scope of government, support of the federal dept of education (no child left behind), and precedent for executive action.

So called liberal politicians provide left cover for major initiatives that the elite on the so called right want. Like ending of Glass-Steagall, escalation of conflict with Russia, increased troops in war zones (Nam, Afghanistan), and increased targeting of individuals (Americans too!)with drone strikes.

when liberals disagree its because the other side is bad and mean. when conservatives disagree with liberals its because they think they are stupid.

lol @ at the constant use of "true conservatives"

You are confused about your labels. The Religious Right are the true conservatives in the eyes of 95% of the country. You might want to tell your people to slowly back away from them.

Each of these statements regarding conservatives is totally false. The liberal ones are closer, but still not great.