Has Pragmatism Driven People Away from Conservatism?

[Daktoria]

Increasingly, I've been hearing a very common complaint among non-conservatives which is that conservatives tend to be closeminded and stubborn against creative thinking. Their rugged individualism has gotten the best of them, and people don't believe in the objective value of church, families, businesses, or private clubs. Behind the scenes, these organizations resort to pragmatism to bully individuals around for not conforming to the powerful, popular, or politically correct.

In contrast, people have looked towards government as the great liberator against this pragmatic bullying in the private sector. Non-conservatives don't necessarily have something against the private sector. What they have is something against pragmatists who have corrupted the private sector for their own special interests.

Now, conservatives are complaining about pragmatism being taken by government to expect people to conform, but non-conservatives are looking at conservatives as if they're hypocrites. This is especially when non-conservatives deny objective reason and refer to moral relativism and emotivism. Pragmatic conservatives will do the same thing in the private sector when bullying individuals around, so non-conservatives believe that conservatives are getting what's due.

To be clear, Russell Kirk, one of the most renowned conservatives ever, noticed this, and strongly suggested that conservatives reject pragmatism:

The Russell Kirk Center: Enlivening the Conservative Mind by Russell Kirk

Some years ago I remarked in the course of a speech that conservative imagination is required in our time. A man of business in the audience retorted, “We don’t need any imagination: we’re practical.” That’s what I mean...

...Ballot-box victories are undone in short order, if unsupported by the enduring art of persuasion. A political movement that fancies it can subsist by slogans and by an alleged “pragmatism” presently is tumbled over by the next political carnival, shouting fresher slogans...

...The principal demarcation among American conservative groups today, it seems to me, is the gulf fixed between (on the one side) all those conservative men and women who, taking long views, argue that intellectual activity and rousing of the imagination are required urgently; and (on the other side of the canyon) all those professedly “pragmatic” persons who think of a conservative government as one that keeps in office by serving or placating certain powerful interests—and so prevents worse from befalling those in the seats of the mighty.

I would furthermore suggest that any conservative who identifies as a pragmatist should read this book in order to change one's mind: [ame=http://www.amazon.com/Pragmatism-Progressivism-Postmodernism-David-Depew/dp/0275965244]Pragmatism: From Progressivism to Postmodernism: David Depew, Robert Hollinger: 9780275965242: Amazon.com: Books[/ame]

 

[CrusaderFrank]

 

[CrusaderFrank]

I'm at the point in my life where I find it laughable that others are still trying to convince me what I should be thinking

 

[midcan5]

The OP makes no fucking sense. Why the hell would 'rugged individualism,' whatever that may mean in the writer's mind, get the best of them? How? And the objective value of private clubs sounds a lot like discrimination last anyone ever checked. Damn, I'm hoping this is twelve year writing such total BS. So instead of pragmatism, we are to willy-nilly do what? Throw darts? Guess? You really need to clarify your biases so at the very least you make sense.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/education/226685-america-the-stupid.html

 

[Stephanie]

Standing on your principles is now called, close minded

You need to flip flop all over the place to be considered, creative thinking

 

[Daktoria]

The OP makes no fucking sense. Why the hell would 'rugged individualism,' whatever that may mean in the writer's mind, get the best of them? How? And the objective value of private clubs sounds a lot like discrimination last anyone ever checked. Damn, I'm hoping this is twelve year writing such total BS. So instead of pragmatism, we are to willy-nilly do what? Throw darts? Guess? You really need to clarify your biases so at the very least you make sense.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/education/226685-america-the-stupid.html

Nobody ever said you had to remove pragmatism from your worldview.

The point it to see that pragmatism has no place in politics. What's pragmatic is personal. What's personal isn't political.

To say what's personal is political is to advocate corrupt special interests as if they're entitled to dictate what's pragmatic upon the rest of society while denying freedom of assembly, rights to privacy, due process, meetings of the minds, offer and acceptance, and consent.

 

[Indeependent]

I know more than a few hard core Conservative lawyers, accountants and MBAs, whose jobs have recently been off shored, who are suddenly becoming not quite so hard core.
To those hard core retirees living off their Obama Inflated Investments, this is heresy.

 

[TakeAStepBack]

I think it's more likely that the liberal pragmatism of conservative actions in the face of their consservative rhetoric is what is drivbing people away from the conservative brand. YOu can only lie to people about what you will actually do, vs. what you say, for so long before people stop believing you.

If conservatives had spent the last 50 years actually acting on what they spout, things might be different now with conservative appeal. Alas, thats not what has happened.