Cool Conservatism

Oscar Wilde once said:

"As long as war is regarded as wicked it will always have its fascinations. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular."

His point was that if you want to change behavior, you have to change perception. And he was right. The 60's "counter-culture" won the day by defining their view as free, hip, cool, and progressive.

Kids in the 60's bought into that world view, forced it down everyone's throats and toppled the old order without firing a shot (or winning an election).

One of the problems with the Conservative movement is that we have not recognized the fundamental reality that

1) Kids are the future

2) Kids want to be cool

When we present ourselves as conservators of "tradition", we mean the bold traditions of liberty, self-determination, responsibility, autonomy, equality and justice; the American experience that fought for independence, tamed the wilderness, filled a continent, produced heroes, showmen, inventors, pioneers; excelled at business, science and the arts; a wide open, opportunity-filled bonanza for anyone willing to work hard.

The true traditions of America are wild, free, crazy, dangerous...and definitely, cool!

But an 18-year-old kid has not only never been exposed to them...he's never HEARD of them. When he hears "tradition" all he has to go on is his own experience, and it translates to an even more restricted world than the one he's grown up in: MORE rules, MORE regulations, MORE limitations, MORE rigid control of thought and speech; FEWER options, LESS freedom, LESS opportunity for expression, movement, opinion, LESS allowable deviation from the dogma...and let's face it, LESS sex, drugs, and rock 'n roll.

...and why would he think otherwise? He's been taught the lie by his parents, his school teachers, newspapers, movies, television, radio...even computer games...that Conservativism is uptight, restrictive, anti-sex, anti-fun, anti-freedom and uncool.

Conservatives don't help the cause by allowing the Christian Right to be seen as the "face of Conservatism". Most Liberals I know assume that all Conservatives are Christian Fundementalists. And they believe that Conservatives are mostly concerned with sex, homosexuality, abortion and, well, sex.

I have nothing against the "family-values" argument. But it is not one that resonates with kids. We need to explain that Conservatism is also much cooler, more free, more fun and more fulfilling than the choking, stranglehold Liberalism wants over every facet of their lives.

Why aren't we getting that message across? Because too many of us ARE uncool. That's ok. It's a big tent. But let's not forget there's room in here for serious hipness too. And until we craft a message, and deliver it with confidence...that Liberalism is fearful, restrictive, unmanly, regimented, resentful, angry, impotent and lame...and that Conservatism is a freewheeling craziness of ideas, expresssion, competition, winners and losers, heroes and fuckups, virgins and whores, smokers and gamblers, priests and martyrs, saints and sinners, Marilyn Manson and Mozart, Christian Fundamentalists and Libertarians, we won't make a dent in the demographic we need, and who desperately needs us, the most.

The Gunslinger