Reply #75: Do I get to make my own definitions of "conservative"? [View All]

I'm in favor of a society that is organically rooted in families and communities, with most higher-order functions being handled by ad hoc networking among communities, rather than by permanent governmental bodies.

I'm in favor of community control of local resources and sources of livelihood. I think that people should be intimately involved with the places they live and the work they do.

I'm in favor of gradual organic evolution of social structures as new needs become apparent, rather than sweeping theoretical systems imposed from above.

I believe that the more social transactions that can be handled by mutual trust and personal knowledge of the other participants, the better. I see online communities like this one as a way of extending that sort of mutuality beyond one's own local community. I believe that many of the impersonal and depersonalizing social institutions we now suffer under can be eliminated as the network of mutual trust is extended.

I'm in favor of religion that is rooted in the inner voice within each individual, and in an attentiveness to the "voices" of the beings and objects around us. I think that the concept of a transcendent deity, while mildly intriguing in a philosophical way, is best kept well away from daily life, since it tends to make people narrow-minded and intolerant.

Those are my core political beliefs. They are based on my best understanding of human nature and of what worked well for human beings during the first 200,000 or so years of their existence. That is my definition of a conservative philosophy.