So, I’m more conservative leaning (European wise) but everywhere I go - the communities are usually filled with so much hate. That I just avoid it.
Is there any place that I can go where there’s not so much based on hate but more on actual discussions and such?
Though, I have been told that - European wise, it is considered more leaning to left in eyes of US. So bit confused.
Note; please keep it civil.
EDIT: Thanks for the responses (even the hateful ones lol), I got the grasp of what I asked. I’ll look into the suggestions that were made.
EDIT 2: I LOVE how some of you are saying that conservatives are so hateful and yet here you are. Doing the exact same thing. Quite cute and ironic lol! That said if it makes you feel better to spew hate on Lemmy go ahead.
I always thought that the “left side” were open minded and friendly but seems I was wrong, at least here on Lemmy. I suppose, Lemmy become Reddit 2.0. In that way.
I understand what you miss. So do I.
I’m pretty liberal, but I remember when American conservatism wasn’t so extreme and cruel (not obviously, anyway). Now, open hatred is used as a selling point.
Conservatism is something I usually disagreed with, but could at least respect. When I was younger, even then I couldn’t deny that there we a lot of smart conservatives. Sure, I had different opinions than they did, but I couldn’t just write them off as idiots or lunatics. They had good reasons for thinking they way they did. I usually thought they overemphasized or understated the importance of some root causes of an issue, but I couldn’t complain about their general thought processes.
Now, it just seems like an irrational shouting match. Whoever’s the loudest and most hateful “wins”.
I miss meaningful discussions, where the quality of ideas mattered. Some of the most important, most educational discussions I’ve had were with people who disagreed with me. Now, debates are laced with extremism, religion, and (worst of all) a total rejection of logic. They’re not valuable or thought provoking. They’re just exhausting, and something I tend to avoid.
The reason why conservatives of the past seem to be more reasonable is because there’s much more evidence (and easy ways to cite it) to refute their seemingly well-reasoned arguments.
In the past a conservative might say something like, “taxes on corporations are pointless; they’re just going to be passed on to consumers” and they could make a well-reasoned argument from simplistic economic principles.
These days when someone hears that argument they can just look online and find a zillion well-researched and cited articles pointing out how it’s a flawed position based on bad assumptions. Just looking at how changes in the tax code over time (massive reductions in corporate tax rates) have impacted the economy and the price of goods. Spoiler: Reducing taxes on corporations has two effects: It reduces tax revenues (obviously) and makes the rich (owners) richer. Changes in the tax code that increased taxes on corporations also had no impact on prices. In short, the entire idea falls flat on its face even though it seems like it would make sense.
They’re the same conservatives they’ve always been; refusing to change their beliefs despite the evidence. It’s also that we now know more about their beliefs and the more we know the more extreme they seem.
Conservatism has become a political package: By “voting conservative” (making it a part of their Identity) a person is signing on to conservatism as a whole. They may not believe everything their peers do (e.g. racism, xenophobia, sexism, violence, etc) but these things they do not agree with are not game changers. They may not believe that whites are a superior race but they’re OK with those people being on their team.
That’s interesting, because most examples of reasonable conservatism I can think of come from before the internet was widespread, which applies directly to the availability of evidence and the ease of citing it. Hmm!
The conservative hate of yesteryear was so much more respectable
This is maybe the only comment here that actually answers @ModernRisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com question