This is a conundrum whose unwinding has been attempted by people much smarter than I. However, that will not stop my attempt at the same:
Personal freedom and economic equality; it seems that Conservatives and Liberals want both, however much in differing quantities.
Liberals are enthralled with “communitarianism”; this is a warm-and-fuzzy buzzword among Liberal-Elitists that means ‘community over individualism’. This concept is evident in such literary mole-hills as Hillary Clinton’s “It Takes a Village”, in which she muses that the ‘community’ is better suited to raising children that the individual family. This philosophy has turned our public schools and institutions of higher learning into social laboratories of liberal indoctrination over the last half-century.
Liberals are very keen on individual freedoms when it comes to sexuality and related social matters, but will sacrifice the individual when it comes to economic equality and seem to want the government to ensure both. On the other hand, Conservatives strive for a balance between freedom and social conscience with an emphasis on personal freedom and responsibility.
This dichotomy would seem to be the difference in whether you believe that human actions are primarily dictated by the “system”, or whether the way the system works is due to how the people within the system act. Is society a thing in and of itself, or is it the sum of human interactions? It is, of course, a little of both but most people tend to think of it as primarily one or the other.
Alexis de Tocqueville, a French political thinker and historian of the mid-1800’s, pointed out that equality and liberty (freedom) are two inherently opposite goals. Since men are not all equal in abilities, liberty will allow the better to outstrip the less talented, and give a head start to their offspring, resulting in greater and greater inequality. Therefore, Liberals, being loathe to admit that those who do better are more talented, will increasingly tend to restrict liberty in favor of equality. It is this contradiction that is behind dictatorial “equality,” such as Communism and Socialism. How odd it is that Liberals, as a whole, will espouse support of Darwinism (survival of the fittest) in the development of the species, but shun the same concept when it comes to socio-economic development.
Liberals tend to want heavy doses of both equality and freedom, without much thought to how the two can co-exist while Conservatives try to balance the two, with an emphasis on liberty and personal responsibility over socialist equality. This difference in evidenced by the belief of Liberals in the malleability of human nature. They believe that if they can manipulate society in the right way, they can have both near-absolute freedom (a lack of personal responsibility) and near-absolute equality (economic and social). Whereas Conservatives believe in the relatively fixed state of human nature and are more willing to accept compromise in certain areas, realizing a modicum of freedom must be given up for the good of the community in terms of national defense but do not wish to give up liberty when it comes to such things as economics and child-raising.
So, the battle continues. Gird well; fight bravely; return victorious!
