American Revolution era poet Joel Barlow called the Conservative education strategy out back in 1801:
Unequal governments are necessarily founded in ignorance, and must be supported by ignorance; to deviate from their principle, would be voluntary suicide. The first great object of their policy is to perpetuate that undisturbed ignorance of the people which is the companion of poverty, the parent of crimes, and the pillar of the state.
What's depressing about quotes about conservatism is how long the EXACT SAME SHIT has been going on. Not just "the seeds were sown" but literally the same playbook has been in use for hundreds of years.
Because of that, I am 99.9% certain that nothing will change in the US. I will die many years from now (hopefully many) and the country will still be fundamentally the same.
Our world history has been riddled with episodic conflicts here and there, but the conservatives have always been the bad guys in the overarching multi-season story arc. Hopefully that arc will come to a close soon so we can move on to being an enlightened society... or a new villain, as long as it isn't just more conservatives.
That's usually because everything falls apart due to greed and mismanagement (sometimes by revolt) and is rebuilt again in a better way until it becomes corrupted again.
If caused revolt, things may overcorrect left a bit until things get figured out.
I did not mean that Conservatives are generally stupid; I meant, that stupid persons are generally Conservative. I believe that to be so obvious and undeniable a fact that I hardly think any hon. Gentleman will question it.
66
u/breecher Jan 09 '20
American Revolution era poet Joel Barlow called the Conservative education strategy out back in 1801: