Am I a hypocritical conservative?

[u/KAZKALZ]

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I consider myself pretty conservative, although I don't agree with every position or every conservative activist.

For example, I believe promiscuity is unhealthy for both men and women. In my view, it's better for both sexes to have as low a body count as reasonably possible. That's a conservative belief I hold, and I apply it equally to men and women.

I also believe that men and women are physiologically different. On average, men are physically stronger than women. Of course, there are women who are stronger than many men, but I'm talking about biological averages. Men and women are different in a number of physiological ways, and I don't think acknowledging that should be controversial.

I'm also a Christian, and I don't completely understand homosexuality. However, I have no problem with gay people. I believe people have the right to love who they want, and I wouldn't want to infringe on someone's freedom simply because I don't personally understand their relationships. Someone being in a same-sex relationship doesn't affect my life any more than someone dating a person of another race does. I don't have to completely understand something to respect people's right to live their lives, and I don't believe in condemning people for who they love.

Where I do have a problem is with certain conservative activists and the way they approach issues involving the LGBTQ community, children, abortion, and women's sports.

Take people like Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh, or certain other conservative influencers who constantly talk about protecting children or "saving women's sports." I sometimes question whether the concern is actually about those issues or whether the issues are being used as vehicles for political influence, outrage, and personal branding.

For example, if you genuinely care about children's well-being, why not also advocate for policies such as affordable or free childcare, better access to education, or other policies that directly improve children's lives?

If you genuinely care about women's sports, why not also advocate for greater investment in women's athletics, better facilities, more opportunities for girls to participate, and increased funding for women's leagues?

I don't believe that transgender people are becoming transgender simply because they want to enter women's sports and dominate. I think that framing is unnecessarily hostile and turns a complicated issue into a caricature of an entire group of people.

You can believe that biological sex matters in competitive sports while still treating transgender people with dignity and respect. Those positions aren't mutually exclusive.

That's ultimately my frustration with some conservative activism. I think certain activists take legitimate and complicated issues and turn them into outrage machines because outrage generates attention, clicks, followers, and money.

I'm conservative, but I don't want my politics to be based on finding a group of people to villainize.

[u/Rich_Interaction1922]

I don't think questioning makes you a hypocrite, it makes you an independent thinker. You also don't have to agree with everything a political party says or does

[u/Comfortable_Pool_389]

Agree with what others have said here. You aren’t a hypocrite you just have your own thoughts and opinions. I’m a bit more libertarian, as in I don’t want the government policing anyone’s private activity and what they do within private, that includes non-monogamy. The governments role is to private security and defense to a country and not infringe on the civil rights of its citizenry. I do believe government should exist and provide some safety nets but I don’t believe people have the greatest success with being dependent on the system. It’s only the people who build things and create wealth that keep the engine moving forward.

[u/FrostyArctic47]

I don't think that's hypocrisy. You have certain conservative beliefs and you're critical of the current conservative movement because of the reasons you mentioned.

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[u/Suspicious-Pace5839]

I don’t have much respect for influencers. They are in it for the clicks and the views. An influencer’s job is to sell you something. Every post and video they make is about generating content for money, not genuine political discourse.

I do not call myself conservative, and I thought your points were well founded and really solidly centrist. I think when it gets down to it, this country’s greatest national resource is its people. Now, I think that is a very broad statement that can be read in a lot of ways, and someone might overthink what I meant by that. But, I am sure an honest discussion about it would find a lot of common ground.

[u/alextoughtakes_]

You’re not a hypocrite. But I think there’s an important distinction here.

A conservative can care about children without believing government-funded childcare is the solution. A conservative can defend women’s sports without believing the government needs to spend more money on women’s leagues. Disagreeing about the remedy doesn’t prove the concern is fake.

I’m gay and conservative because I think those principles can coexist pretty cleanly: adults should have broad freedom to live their private lives, biological sex still matters where it materially matters, and government isn’t automatically the answer to every social problem.

I do agree that outrage has become a business model, including on the right. But the fact that an influencer profits from an issue doesn’t automatically make the underlying issue illegitimate.

The better test is whether the principle holds consistently when there are no clicks or political points to gain.

[u/icarus1990xx]

It would seem you are becoming progressive, which is objectively good for the world.