The Rights fatal Christ-complex
One of the fundamental problems within the modern right is it’s bizarre view of morality in politics. There is a consensus among a distinct type of conservatives – one best described as “cuckservatives” (as much as I cringe every time I utter the term I simply cannot think of a better one), that one should never do anything that can be perceived as wrong.
Never behave in a way that feels rude, never ever ever respond in kind, hell, never take any action whatsoever, and always force your fellow right wingers (but never leftists) to uphold your standard. Whether they want to or not.
The most telling example of this in recent memory would have to be the GOP backlash to the Floridian ban on vaccine mandates during the pandemic. As they argued that Desantis was just creating “big government authoritarianism of another variety“ and thus taking away the rights of corporations. Ignoring completely that said right was the corporations ability to take away the freedoms of the average citizen.
I have yet to meet a cuckservative who is willing to respond to this dilemma at all.
Instead I have consistently been met with some variation of “we will just have to make sure we never end up in a position where we’d have to make such a choice”, revealing an utter refusal to even consider that reality is more complex than their moral system.
While it is unclear why this tendency exists – whether it is some sort of leftover from Christianity or simply a byproduct of the kinds of personalities attracted to conservative thought, this mindset has grown to a dangerous and yes, fatal extreme.
As a moral system it can best be categorized as a form of Christ complex (hence the speculation on Christianity’s role in the previous paragraph).
To explain why we first need a quick and dirty summation of the new testament, in a few words, what is the pop cultural surface level understanding of what Jesus did, roughly speaking?
He maintained a strict set of values that he wandered around Judea and preached at the commoners.
This brought a great many evil men to loathe him, but in the end, he never betrayed his moral code.
Even when offered all the world and its riches he refused to give an inch on his morals.
Even as the Romans came, he refused to struggle against them, he simply went along of his own free will and allowed them to crucify him.
And in the end, god himself reached down to save his soul and three days later he was reincarnated.
By doing nothing but following his superior moral values he won in the long run.
The cuckservatives not only believe fully in this low resolution interpretation of Christ, but imitate it with fanatical zeal and ardor.
Even as they acknowledge the current state of politics as one of extreme partisanship, with ever increasing degrees of leftist radicalization they “refuse to compromise their morals”.
No matter how much more frequent political violence, censorship and repression of the right becomes, the cuckservatives seems to become ever more adamant in their unwillingness to do anything about it.
Instead, their argument goes, we should never attempt activism, we should never attempt proper practical politics, and we should always turn the other cheek. It does not matter how many skulls will be caved in – and I mean this literally, we must never even speculate on ways to fight back. If we do, we have sunk down to the level of the vile pharisees, the cruel Romans and have given in to Satan as he offers us the world and all its lands.
Or, as these new would be Christs would be it, we’d be no better than the left.
The good way – the only good way forward is to “keep the conversation constructive” as one cuckservative put it to me. Because surely by displaying our good principles nonstop some metaphysical principle will ensure that we will win in the long run.
While it would be interesting to rebuke this worldview through a biblical lens, it would, in my eyes be a waste of effort. Simply because they appear to have come to this position from various different origins: Some are products of a christian-conservative upbringing, yes, but a great many of them are militant atheists, raised on Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris.
In addition, many of them are not even coming from a conservative background in the traditional sense, but are rather disappointed former leftists, as I have indirectly pointed out in a previous article of mine on this topic.
I’d here like to point out I don’t think these are separate groups, it feels more like you are seeing the same exact mindset in all of them, but justified differently depending on the subgroup.
Much like it is an instinctual gut reaction that is merely passed through different filters.
Regardless, the different backgrounds of various cuckservative groups still means there can be no silver bullet.
That said, I will remind atheistic cuckservatives of one of their own dearly held beliefs: namely that there is no god and that even if there was, he’d probably not do as much to help your cause as he would his own son’s. Nor is there some metaphysical principle, some moral law of nature in existence, that ensures that good moral values will always win out at the end.
This obsession with perfect consistency is enough at odds with reality to be labeled revolutionary. It is an attempt at making reality fit a man-made moral system, not so much square peg round hole, but more like grabbing the box with the round hole, turning it on its head and smashing it into an upright standing square peg to try to make it fit.
In addition, it is quite detrimental to the cause of restoring sanity to the west, serving as a form of mental straitjacket that locks the cuckservative into an almost always exceptionally self-destructive modus operandi.
As a result should you take anything away from this article, other than an understanding of the harm cuckservatives bring to the right, it should be these questions:
How much adherence to a self-imposed morality is too much? When it is wise and when it is foolish to adhere to it? How many checks and balances enough? Are they ever enough? If it's only observed by one side, does it really matter? These are hard questions to address before getting to the response. And the spoiler is that the answer changes, multiple times. And no matter how complex your moral system might be, reality is even more complex.