We all know they are kinda racist. Deeply so in many cases.

But last time I was high, turned off the higher functioning parts of my brain I had a deep revelation about their views.

They think that minority XYZ suffers from worse outcomes because they are inferior.

Duh, you might say. They are bigoted, they are racist. But you aren't really thinking yet. They literally are unable to come to any other conclusion. It's not that they don't see the same world as we do, that they don't see the same data. Many of us try to convince them by explaining to them how certain biases lead to certain outcomes.

But the conservative brain is literally unable to do that. So go on a journey into the conservative mind with me. Turn off your higher thinking skills.

Imagine a world where your success truly boils down to how hard you apply yourself. Where the only thing that stands between you and success isn't luck, or the generational wealth of your parents. Just about the effort you put in. In this world the only difference between you, and the person next to you are the genes you inherited. You are able to get better grades in school? Must be your superior genes. You manage to have a better work ethic/be less prone to burnout? It must be your genes, because you believe everything else to be fair!

So if you notice group XYZ doing worse than the average, what is the only explaination left in a fair and equal world? It must be something genetic, because if it was sheef luck, it would average out. Everybody is treated fairly and is only judged by their merit. So if minority XYZ does worse it must be because there is something inherently wrong with them. And what encapsulates that better genetics?

Eugenics is not a bug in the liberal/conservative mind. It is a feature. It is an inevitable position if your assumptions are that the success of an individual person overwhelming rests on the qualities of that individual, of the work they put in.

I'm not making excuses for them, quite the opposite. I'm pointing out that they are not just believing terrible things, I'm pointing out that those terrible things are perfectly reasonable conclusion in their framework of understanding the world. Their base assumptions are so wrong that they are literally unable to come to reasonable conclusion.

Anyways. I needed to shut down my braincells with weed and booze to sink to that level and have that realisation. So roast me for it I guess.

  • axont [she/her, comrade/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

    The average conservative will deny accusations of racism precisely because they can't understand racism as structural. They view racism as entirely around certain performances, like wearing a Klan hood or saying slurs. Nothing else. That is if you can even convince them racism is a word that has a valid meaning.

    They don't view it as anything beyond a personal animosity, but one that encompasses an entire person's existence. They have a black friend? Not racist. Unless they're a cartoon character screeching slurs all the time, how can it be racism?

    Also, there are more cynical conservatives who know what the game is. The really rich ones I mean. They're racists insofar for their own practical class concerns. They know they've been born at a particular point in history that benefits from exploitation of most of the world, so they learn into it. They're probably high on their own supply too though, ideology is a fuck, but I really think they know what they're doing too. They've looked at their options, which are losing their class position in a more equal society, or maintaining their class position while also perpetrating genocide. They chose genocide.