OMG! 'I'm A Conservative' - Given Enough Time And A Little Push, All Progressives End Up Right

The political aphorist Lowell Frampton once famously said, 'Give a liberal long enough, and he will become a conservative', and while of course this is not completely true - there are those for whom liberalism has so defined their character, their persona, and their very being, that no dose of reality will cure them of the hopeless idealism which has been their calling card for decades - it is generally true. 

Even the most hardened liberal will take a deep breath, open a history book, look around him, and say, 'Phooey'. 

Addison Taylor was one of these committed progressives who never thought that he would ever change from a profound commitment to social justice, the environment, and the black man.  That would simply be unthinkable.  After all, he reasoned, there are such a thing as absolute truth.  The black man, descendant of the forest and legatee of tribal wisdom, sentience, and native intelligence would always be fit for the top of the human pyramid.  Heterosexuality would always be a bad choice, an outdated, crippling imposition of white straight males.  The climate was warming due to man's obtuse ignorance, etc. etc. 

The life he lived was an immersion into liberal values, liberal thought, and liberal friends.  He had no patience nor time for anyone who did not espouse the canon - those political troglodytes who refused to see the truth or even having seen it, retreat into a defensive ignorance. 

Addison was the Chairman and CEO of Scientists For Humanity, a small liberal advocacy group which had been on the front lines of every liberal cause since the first notice of melting Antarctic ice.  He had marched on the National Mall, delivered fiery speeches on college campuses, written op-ed pieces for The Nation, was a member of every women's organization in Washington, and a fierce champion of black rights. 

'Not this year, Addie', said Artemis Phipps, new President of the Radical Women's Caucus. 'Maybe another time', referring to his taken-for-granted speaking engagements before this group of radical feminists.  His presence had been considered important, for his view - the accommodating, respectful, understanding liberal male view - was needed to complete the inner circle, and show the nation that the fight for women's equality was also a men's affairs. 

Phipps, an imposing woman from Bernal Heights, chosen to lead the Caucus because of her dyke righteousness, high-toned bitchiness, and relentless, virulent, outspoken hatred of white straight men who, she said, were responsible for forcing women to spread their legs while they went off philandering, raping, and sucking the lifeblood out of them. 

 

Understandable, thought Addison, an expected evolution, a necessary radical turn; but at the same time he felt, for the first time in his life, left out.  He was in perfect solidarity with lesbian women, with women in general, and in consonance with their suspicions of men like him; but he had shown them that he was as much of a woman as they, as militant, and as committed. 

He was allowed to attend the annual Caucus conference in Washington, but during Phipps' tenure, the whole atmosphere had changed.  Not that he wanted protest to return to the days of Martin and Ralph, black-and-white, ebony-and-ivory solidarity, but this was a slugfest.  It had turned from a reasonable colloquy of thinking women to a riot.  'Cunts For Castration'...'Twats Forever'...'Bull Dagger Power' were just a few of the signs he saw. 

Now, the women's movement had always been palatable - girls he knew at Yale from Smith, Vassar, and Holyoke refusing patriarchy while marrying well; girls from fine families endorsing the harshest penalties for discrimination in the workplace while remaining caring, thoughtful, and loving wives and mothers. 'Our kind', Addie often said, proud of his and their ancestral tradition of reason and leadership. 

This...this mosh pit, this offensive freak show, was beyond the pale; and it had happened without him realizing the change.  Overnight, it seemed, feminism had gone from propriety and discipline to gang warfare.  

It was that scene that first disturbed Addie's convictions, and when the image of Heather Morgan, blonde, demure, and loving came back to him after many years.  She was a perfect, charming, quiet, intelligent Smith girl who adored him.  Their future - a home on the North Shore, children, an extended family, wealth and privilege within a solidly liberal worldview - was real, possible, and only awaiting graduation. 

 

'You women don't want pricks up inside you, do you?', shouted Artemis Phipps from the podium.  'You want cunts, pussies, hot, slathering FEMALE juices!!!' 

The crowd roared. Women ripped off their shirts, fondled each other, kissed, and shouted, 'No pricks...No pricks....No pricks!!!' until the rafters shook. 

Addie, nonplussed, taken aback, revolted and disgusted, left by the fire door, sat on a bench in Lafayette Park and wondered what the political world was coming to. 

The final loose hinge on what had been a solidly constructed and maintained political framework, came off when his political aide and advisor suggested a trip to Anacostia, the heart of the Washington inner city where he would see first hand the vibrant street life of the black man so limned and championed in Addie's speeches.  In Anacostia he would see first hand the virility, the community, the vital street life that was so absent in white, uptight, hidebound, racist neighborhoods of the city.  He would hear a carnival of music, dance, and effusion. 

Addie readily agreed but rolled the windows up as they crossed the Anacostia River into a potholed, rutted, trash-strewn neighborhood.  The outskirts of any community are always sketchy, he knew, whether tacky strip malls or yet-to-be-developed modern neighborhoods; but as he drove further south, down MLK Avenue to Fernwood Circle, there was nothing vibrant, soulful, or uplifting.  There were only derelicts, Fentanyl addicts, shirtless men with Uzis, and stoops where men smoking dope and drinking Colt45s sat and shouted at his car. 

This was he famous inner city?  This was the community of the prized, cherished, New Man? Where had he been all his life?

If all this wasn't bad enough, Washington had its coldest winter in fifty years - feet of snow, pummeling north winds, and brutal below-zero temperatures...and worst of all the polar ice caps were gaining ice.  For the first time in decades, the Ross Ice Shelf was increasing by a kilometer per year.  

Why was this such a surprise? If he had listened to anyone but the Armageddon cabal of the progressive Left, he would have heard compelling arguments about the cyclical warming and cooling of the planet, the modest if not indifferent effect of human activity on environmental temperatures, and he would have at least been apprised of another view. 

With that the ball of yarn began to unravel quickly.  Suddenly, everything became clear - the militant COVID response was nothing but government presumption and political chicanery; the open door immigrant policy was tantamount to the rapid dissolution of polity and ethos; the gender spectrum was an illogical, twisted, distorted fantasy; capitalism was the engine of remarkable growth everywhere and had raised hundreds of millions out of poverty in China and India.  Africa was nothing but a continental shithole run by corrupt big men, dominated by Paleolithic tribalism, and mired in abject  underdevelopment. 

He was much happier now that he had jettisoned all that worthless progressive baggage, stopped listening to the portentous claptrap mouthed by his former colleagues, and for once in his life said a great big 'Fuck you!' to anyone within earshot. 

Ol' Lowell Frampton, the political aphorist was right as rain when he said that all progressives become conservatives if given enough time.  Some take longer than others to see the light; but they all eventually come around.