People shit on religion, but it’s rarely a problem until it’s conservative.
You’ve hit the nail on the head.
Conservatism is the mistake of assuming outright that people are evil, and therefore need to be punished and conquered into being good, or at least restricted. Where the reality is people aren’t quite good or evil, they’re more marbled, and if you buy the conservative misunderstanding, the punishing and the conquering are morally good, whereas stopping them is bad. What conservatism won’t acknowledge or doesn’t see is that when you grow, encourage, support, and develop the good parts, you can safely drop a large portion of the punishment and conquering stuff.
Most of what conservatism is defending itself against is its own way of doing things.
Conservatism is “outgroups to bind, in groups to protect”. It’s pretty bad.
And conservatism is fundamentally hostile to democracy, as well. It gravitates naturally to oligopolies, monopolies, autocracies, dictatorships, and despotism.
I mean, just look at Trump and Project 2025, to say nothing of past conservative behaviour involving gerrymandering and other shenanigans.
Conservatives think freedom is protecting their way of life by eliminating anything that threatens their world view. That includes democracy.
Trump is demonstratively extolling fascist ideas such as rejection of the rule of law, rage against the elites, nationalism and race superiority, heroic strength through force, attacking the week, and disdain for women and gender minorities.
