A while ago, I referred to a study on the propensity for conservatives to display qualities of deceit, delusion and lack of empathy here. This morning I watched an interesting video on TED here Jonathan Haidt 'On the Moral Mind'. This then got me thinking.
UPDATE: Now this has to be thrown into the mix. So if you're rich you're less likely to show empathy. Is there any reason now why we don't arrest rich conservatives as a potential danger to society?
In a nutshell, Haidt offer 5 areas of basic ingrained thought that affect our value judgements. He cites Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect and Purity/Sanctity. He goes onto mention that in his own study, small 'L' liberals (or progressives to use a term that won't confuse Australian audiences) score high on the first two, and low on the other three as deeply held values, while conservatives score more broadly on all five.
The previous study I'd referred to also points out that conservatives tend to delusions of grandeur, deceit and a lack of empathy.
I don't think these two theories are contradictory, and I'll try and explain why.
Right and the right to be right
We have a curious linguistic feature in English, which is that the word right has a good couple of meanings, which are not necessarily equivalent. Right can describe one end of the political spectrum - 'that politician is right wing', it can also describe an inalienable legal claim or general observance of the basic needs of a human being - 'this is a violation of my rights!' and it can also connote certainty on a topic - 'I'm right, and you're wrong'. This tends to create a lopsided view of opposition. The opposite of right wing is left wing, the opposite of a right is a privilege, the opposite of being right is being wrong. The alignment of language creates a dualism where the Right have a right to be right, and the Left are privileged and wrong.
This creates a kind of moral turmoil, where human beings will fight tooth and nail over what is good and what is not good, even evil.
Degrees of value
Haidt's study showed that progressives value the ideas of Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity higher than conservatives, but that conservatives share all five values at around more or less the same level, although Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity were slightly diluted.
I don't disagree with Haidt's assessment, what I do disagree with however is how these areas are defined, and how respondents may have answered them.
Harm/Care and lack of empathy
No-one would say they do not care for people at all. You would have to be surveyed on a day when you are in a particularly bleak mood to say that you have no care for other people at all. Progressives will always respond to such a question in an exaggerated way - 'I think care and compassion for all people is important'. This will be an exaggeration. Breaking the question down issue by issue will reveal a complex picture, of uplifting idealism in one area, and the same old prejudice in another. Indeed, this is the constant argument progressives have among themselves - 'I support animal rights, but I won't support a union strike by meat workers because they eat meat' versus 'I support union strikes, but I won't support animal rights activists because they'll put me out of a job'. We support one issue but nit-pick over another. The leftist sense of care is often - but not always - fragmented across dozens of issues.
The one thing the left may grudgingly admire on occasion from conservatives is their ability to pull together on issues - a higher sense of loyalty which we'll get to in a moment - but what if the concept of Harm/Care is an affectation for conservatives? Marcus Arvan's study on the 'Dark Triad' indicated a strong propensity for lack of empathy among conservatives and also a high propensity for deceit.
Conservatives did not score low on Haidt's study for Harm/Care, maybe lower than progressives, but certainly not low enough to be alarming. So what if that is deceit to cover a lack of empathy? How many times have we seen a conservative politician wringing his hands with anguish over some issue and kissing babies to look friendly while simultaneously passing draconian legislation? The conservative mind is deceitful enough to evoke the notion of care, but lacks sufficient empathy to ally word with deed.
Progressives see this disparity - the notion of Harm/Care is always stronger and more forceful with progressives - and call on it as hypocrisy. Thus progressives come to 'own' the notion of care and use it as a distancing tactic from conservatives.
In short, progressives say they care more than they might, and conservatives do as well, but for radically different reasons.
Fairness/Reciprocity
The area of Fairness/Reciprocity also scored high among progressives and low among conservatives, and I would argue that the approach from these political counterparts is much the same as it would be for the area of Harm/Care. Progressives will champion fairness until it reaches a sticking point with a personal pet issue. Conservatives may believe in the concept but can't empathise with it. The self always comes first. The notion of reciprocity must seem alien to a person with a lack of empathy, but the idea that it must be championed to belong to society is enabled by the high propensity for deceit.
Ingroup/Loyalty and delusion
Before I mentioned the occasional envy of progressives for the united front conservatives can present. Loyalty is a strong value of conservatives, much more than shown by progressives in Haidt's study. I would argue however that loyalty is affected by how each group perceives it. To a conservative, there is a much stronger notion of group or national identity - 'my country, love it or leave it' as the old saying goes. But what is the group that the conservative has loyalty to? At smaller, more focused levels it is easier to define - the family, social clubs, church groups. These smaller groups are easier to show loyalty to because they are more or less unified, and small enough to influence. As groups get larger, the loyalty becomes defined in an ever more abstract way. By time it reaches a nationhood, loyalty is increasingly defined into a 'my country' vs 'dissidents and traitors' way. The loyalty is to an idea of the group that is inhabited, but not the reality of it. The idea of loyalty is valued and powerful, but the organisation or grouping that loyalty is given to is not so simplistic as would be hoped.
Progressives view loyalty as a trap, something to be valued less - 'Look around, we're all people, who needs countries anyway?' as Jello Biafra once sung. Just as conservatives cling to an ideal to give loyalty to, progressives back away from loyalty because of that ideal. As progressives have 'owned' care and fairness, so have conservatives 'owned' loyalty. I would argue that rather than conservatives showing great group loyalty and progressives showing little, the notion of group loyalty has been distorted by the very attitudes that are supposed to respond to the notion.
It is facile to say that a person's group loyalty will waver depending on their political viewpoint. At heart, we all find groups to be loyal to - whether friends, family, a social club, a political party, a sports team, or even which major publisher of comic books you prefer. We display loyalty where we find it. The political notion of loyalty is alienating to progressives. Citizenship tests, pledges, notions of pulling together to support something - right or wrong - is seen as sinister. This does not mean that a progressive feels little loyalty, but rather a loyalty to a different definition of a grouping. The progressive that derides nationalism and patriotism, may feel intensely loyal to a progressive movement, or political party, or even to the more abstract notion of a valued law or code of behaviour. It is just that the notion of loyalty to specific organisations is seen as sinister, as well as the nature of that loyalty.
Progressives see loyalty as voluntary, much more precious because you give it freely to a grouping you believe in and value, while much of the language of loyalty from conservatives seems to be coloured by obligation - 'You must support the troops at war because it is patriotic', 'You must obey the tenets of this faith because God asks for your loyalty'. Obligating yourself is no different from volunteering yourself at heart. Both require the decision to take up a burden of support that meshes with your values.
I think the sticking point comes with the notion of obliged group loyalty, and the willingness to overlook flaws in the group to take on that loyalty. Progressives will deride patriotism as blind - 'How can we be patriotic to a country that killed civilians in that war?' or 'How can we be loyal to a country that treats its citizens so badly?' Conservatives reply with denial or distraction. 'Those civilians were killed by insurgents!' or 'Those citizens were breaking the law!' Both are delusions, with one slightly more serious than the other.
To point out shortcomings in a group, shows that it is in some way disappointing for the group to fail. It is out of a loyalty to that group that it's failures are disappointing. Progressives confuse their frustration and anger with a group's failings for being distanced from it, when the reverse is true. It is loyalty that prompts the angry reaction. The failing becomes an act of disloyalty in an intimate bond. The rejection of loyalty is born out of a rejection by the group itself - 'How could you do that?' we ask, aghast.
Conservatives cling to the loyalty as a concept that gives themselves value. The Arvan study listed delusions, particularly of grandeur, as a key makeup of those whose views are conservative. By showing loyalty, and being vocal and proud of it, the individual is uplifted to a champion of this value. It is aggrandising, it makes the individual into a hero of the story, rather than a bit player. Hence the 'my country, love it or leave it' cliché. It's not your country, but the country you are loyal to.
Authority/Respect, lack of empathy and deceit
Authority/Respect scored quite low for progressives and quite high for conservatives, which I find surprising. Again, I think that it may be contextual. I imagine that if progressives score low in valuing Authority/Respect, it is due to how we define it, as Authority and Respect should be something everyone values highly, when seen in a neutral way.
More than the other areas, Authority/Respect is interdependent on the other values. If we lived under an enlightened authority that valued the Harm/Care area and the Fairness/Reciprocity area much higher, than you may very well see an inversion, where progressives value it higher than conservatives. Conversely, if you asked a Tea Partier or the editorship of The Australian newspaper, what they thought of President Obama or Julia Gillard as an authority, you would likely find them to be quite dismissive of that authority.
Respect is either demanded or earned based on viewpoint. The stereotype would seem to be that a conservative believes the office of authority can demand respect, even if the individual in the office of that authority has earned no respect, while the progressive believes the opposite, that the office of authority cannot demand respect, but the individual in that office can earn it.
The devaluation of authority for progressives is, I believe, innately tied to how little that authority upholds their two core values of Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity. Conservatives meanwhile hold the authority paramount over other concerns. This is where Arvan's lack of empathy comes into play. The progressive demands a respectful relationship with authority. An authority that does not care for its subect is no authority at all.
To the conservative with a lack of empathy, the authority's relationship with its subject is irrelevant. This is why you see such vitriolic exchanges over the current Occupy protests. To use a local example, when Occupy Melbourne's camp in the city centre was broken up by the police under orders from Robert Doyle, it was clear what the Lord Mayor thought of authority. He is the authority, if he says move, you move. All other concerns are irrelevant. He derided the injuries of those harmed by police as 'bleating'. This is the conservative view on authority and respect in a nutshell. The authority ordered them to move, failing to do so showed no respect for that authority, ergo no empathy could or should be shown to the protestors. The progressive view is simply the opposite. Doyle's authority was dubious, failing to derive as it did from the respect of the protestors. With no respect, and particularly no empathy, he had no authority.
Authority is, therefore highly contextual.
Deceit also plays a large part in undermining respect for authority. We live in the first half of the 21st century. We have lived through scandals, lies and misrepresentations from our authorities. We have gone to war over the pretext of imaginary WMD's, we have used bare-faced euphemism to enable torture, we have seen organisations like Wikileaks tell us in plain, unvarnished terms exactly how our authorities have lied to us. Deceit, being a part of the psych makeup of some conservatives, will naturally alienate progressives. Needless to say conservative authorities have used deceit to get their way - 'Saddam Hussein has WMD's', 'We're winning the war on terror', 'anti-drug laws are stopping drug use', 'we do not practice or condone torture', 'we are an open democracy' and so on.
How does the conservative mind reconcile this? To openly lie, but demand respect due to a virtuous authority? Perhaps it's like Christopher Monckton, the notorious climate denialist fraud. He's often known to make an allegation against a climate scientist at one talk, and then present it as evidence at another. Perhaps the propensity for deceit is unable to differentiate lies of convenience from a doctrine of truth.
Purity/Sanctity
Purity and Sanctity represent a drive for humans to value something untouched, unsullied, with a reputation of innocence or perfection. This scored low for progressives, and I'd hazard a guess that maybe it is because of the perception of what Purity/Sanctity entails rather than what it represents. Haidt used an example of Purity/Sanctity in relation to food. Progressives value the concept of Purity and Sanctity in food, that progressives are against GM food, or unhealthy additives and the like. You could also draw a comparison with environmental concerns. When it comes to environmental protection, we use terms like 'untouched', 'pristine', 'virgin' and so on. We revere the purity of nature, untouched and unsullied.
To use terms like Purity and Sanctity raise unhealthy spectres of racism or fascism and religious extremism respectively. Purity draws the mind to loathsome doctrines of 'racial purity' espoused by neonazis and groups like the KKK, while sanctity cannot help but evoke the tirades of the religious right on the 'sanctity of marriage' to deny rights to gays or the 'sanctity of the fetus' to run roughshod over women's control of reproduction.
So, in purely neutral terms, purity and sanctity are simply idealised notions of something nebulously 'better'. No matter the political persuasion, all of us probably hold dear some notion that accords with this simple interpretation - 'I only eat organic food', 'I like to do yoga', 'Do not touch my first edition copy of Alan Moore's 'The Killing Joke' without gloves on'. It is not the notion of Purity/Sanctity that causes it to be dismissed by progressives, but it's present cultural connotations.
In closing
At the start of his TED presentation Haidt referred to 'openness to new ideas' as the fundamental difference between progressives and conservatives. Progressives are, by their very nature, open to considering new ideas, while conservatives will always judge everything within a hidebound framework of tradition. Haidt went on to say, at the end of his presentation, that both views need each other. While this makes intellectual sense, the reality is always going to be more problematic.
I cannot ever picture a protestor saying to a police officer in full riot armour - 'Please bash my skull repeatedly with your baton. While it will hurt, and likely give me an acquired brain injury that will debilitate me for life, I see it as essential to the ongoing dialogue between progressive and conservative politics, and a necessary step to attain a fusion of belief where we draw a new demarcation between law enforcement and public concerns.' I am more likely to believe the protestor would shout 'Stop hitting me you fascist pig!'
I think the real question is not 'who values which of these five areas the most?', and 'how valuable is this interaction?', but rather 'how are these five values approached?', 'how can we approach them honestly?' and 'how do we talk about them to each other?'
More importantly, I think we need to ask how the negative aspects of conservatism impact on their ability to hold and engage these values at all, and how progressives can realise that some of these values are a lot more important than they admit.
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