I once heard an advertising slogan that caught my ear. I don't know what was being advertised, and it doesn't matter, because the slogan itself was too big for the environment in which it was being forced to live. The slogan? "If you always think what you always thought, you'll always get what you always got."
It's clever, rhythmic, sonorous, memorable, and it applies to a lot of things, not just some silly product or service that someone is trying to hype. In fact, the meaning of that almost pithy phrase, borders on the profound, but most people don't get it. It's not that they're unintelligent or stupid, it's because it describes them, so they just don't notice the phrase, or what it means.
The person being talked about is the conservative. This the person who just doesn't want change. This is the person who wants things to stay as they are. Oh, they might tell you that they embrace technology (washing machines, refrigerators, toilets, maybe even computers), but only if it doesn't change anything else. In other words, they want things to stay the same, hierarchies to remain the same. They want disadvantages to remain, and poverty, and disease, and oppression. Sound drastic? It is. Because while some very few have too much, the vast majority of humankind does not. If you are conservative, you want it to stay that way. That's just what conservatism is. And, it's sad.
Self-centered change is not change at all, it is simply an intensification of what is already. Conservatism is not a political philosophy. It is neither political or philosophical. There is no love of wisdom in this thinking, there is only love of self. Conservatives are people who don't want to share, because they think that when things change, they will have less.
Far-fetched? Over-the-top? Prejudicial? Cranky? Cynical? Not-guilty on all counts. Not wanting change is simply unnatural. Everything changes all the time. Thinking you can stop change isn't really thinking at all.
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