this post was submitted on 25 Mar 2026
897 points (98.5% liked)
Not The Onion
20984 readers
1865 users here now
Welcome
We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!
The Rules
Posts must be:
- Links to news stories from...
- ...credible sources, with...
- ...their original headlines, that...
- ...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”
Please also avoid duplicates.
Comments and post content must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, ableist, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.
And that’s basically it!
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
This ties into a bigger issue where almost nothing related to sexuality can ever be healthy or normal to many conservatives.
Sex to these conservatives is inherently deviant and filthy. Making conscious life decisions related to sexuality or sexual identity will never be just a life decision. It will be equivalent to actively engaging in sexual acts.
Being trans to them is actively paedophilic because it exposes children to the concept of sexuality and gender. Sex ed will be paedophilic to them because it does the same. Each person's actions are not the sole thing that defines them, but also their position in society as dictated by "what it has always been". Men have always led households by marrying women and having kids, therefore men that don't are a threat.
Conservatism is quite black or white when it comes to things like identity or introspection. It is an ideology that very frequently wages war on self questioning and exploration in exchange for compliance and conformism. It's why many conservatives hate universities, scientists and partially why they hate immigrants. The entire ideology grows by appealing to people who do not want to be intellectually challenged. It's especially attractive to those that don't want to understand other ways of thinking.
Conservatism as an ideology always exploits the greatest potential weakness of the left wing: naivety, and presents itself as the "responsible" or "reasonable" solution to a reckless and harmful left wing. They frame things like empathy and humanitarianism as weaknesses rather than virtues.
It's why most of the conservative rhetoric revolves around "being taken advantage of" or "being scammed by" this or that group. They love stories about immigrants exploiting the system, cheating or stealing because it proves their worldview that what's foreign and unknown is out to get them. It is an ideology driven by fear.
And the biggest problem is that, unlike progressivism (which also has its ideological vices and weaknesses), conservatism never seeks to help the weak or empower the vulnerable. Instead it seeks to maintain the hierarchy and keep people in their place. In the US that translates to keeping immigrants weak, keeping black people down, keeping women in the kitchen, keeping white men ahead, keeping the US as an imperial power, and keeping its allies subservient.
Our own minds will expose us to sexuality way before the age of 18 though. This is why it's so important to have sex ed. So that kids with feelings won't go messing around (together!) and not knowing what's what. In Holland we've always had that pretty early so teenage pregnancies were super low but lately the conservative forces have also taken hold there. It's blowing over on social media. So now a lot of parents are up in arms over it especially in the mostly religious regions.
Yes but it somehow seems to resonate more than it should. I wonder if some people have an innate need for being told what to do. I absolutely don't, I'm very anti-authoritarian. But really the religious conservative life is pretty shit. You have to go to church, have all these boring life rules, you can't have sex with other consensual adults, etc etc. Being left-wing is much more free. Yet people choose to follow religion. I think the indoctrination as a child plays a role in this but I don't really think it would catch on so much if it didn't fill an innate need.
People like rules that are clearly defined.
They don't like gray areas.
Because of the cognitive work involved. People do not want to think about things. They want to know them.
It's not about authoritarianism, it's about the features of our brains and biology. Learning is literally a painful process for the brain and people avoid it. Not any different than how physical exercise is painful and people avoid it.
People who seek to learn, just like people who seek physical exercise, have re-wired their brain to enjoy those things than by default, they would not.
Hmm interesting take! I didn't think of it like that.
I do indeed enjoy learning and also chaos (and what you call gray areas), but I'm very ADHD. A bit autistic too but when it comes to rules the ADHD definitely takes the lead.