High School Boys Are Trending Conservative

[Dill]

(08-01-2023, 01:47 PM)pally Wrote: Conservatives oppose the development of those critical thinking skills that challenging one's position provide

They used to not so much. Though that sort of thing was reserved for "higher" higher ed. where (before 1965)
the best universities could be trusted to do that safely. (E.g., thinking of Allan Bloom here.) 

But those traditional conservatives have been undermined by the internet soundbite culture too. No George Wills
on Fox news anymore, and they were never on Newsmax or OANN. 

Seems to me now that what passes for conservatism has certainly lost that deference to learning that was still there when
Buckley jr. was guiding the National Review.  That's why people calling themselves "conservatives" seem to be leading
all these astroturf school protests but appear quite uniformed about the history of public education or those 
critical thinking skills you mention. You can't get them by preserving parents religious/gender views from question.
Or without accurate and challenging history.

Some contemporary conservative politicians seem to be edging more openly towards the Alt-right, though they huffily protest
that cannot be true. I've come to prefer "the right" as a designation for most of these groups, reserving "conservative"
for people who actually know something of the history of that tradition and directly engage it.  By this measure
Trump is not a conservative, but is certainly a right wing politician.