| I'm assuming your still checking up on this...
I grew up in Alabama and I lived fairly close to the major population centers in the state. Birmingham, Montgomery, and Mobile. Mostly in smaller communities 10-20 minutes out of town. Most of my family and neighbors were usually liberal Democrats and during that time period I would have been too, if I could have voted. (The way that is written, it sounds like I'm talking about a time 50-60 years ago. I'm not. I'm only talking about the late eightys/early ninetys.) Living in AL, I was under the impression that Democrats were good, Christian people who were concerned about defending our communites against those out to harm it: dishonest corporations, out of control police officers, drug dealers, and the old, misognyist, racist, corrupt, rich elites who wanted to defund education and youth programs and abandon America's youth to minimum wage jobs or street gangs. In a word: Republicans.
My thinking started to shift about 6 or 7 years ago while I was in high school. The classes I was taking were considered advanced for my grade level (although the information in them weren't by any means difficult to understand). My teachers were constantly preaching about personal responsibility and how the students that had self-control and thought beyond tomorrow would be more successful in life that those who didn't. All of my teachers were like that whether they were Democrat or Republican, liberal or conservative.
But the ones that had the biggest effect on me were a conservative Democrat--my history teacher, and a conservative Republican--the JROTC instructor. The first day I met the history teacher, he handed me a BIG textbook and a list of things to memorize over summer break because we would have a test on them the first day of the next school year. During class, we would have an exam on the things that were in the book, or he'd answer questions about those things, then we'd spend the rest of the time discussing mostly current events. The JROTC instructor was even stricter and, because the tasks where more often dangerous (You want me to jump out of what?!?!), being successful in the class was even more rewarding.
Being a conservative is about taking and accepting responsibility for your own actions. Aside from a one month adventure as a libertarian (I'm fairly embarrassed it took me that long to spot the flaws in libertarianism), I haven't found a convincing arguement against conservatism. |