In previous CTA posts, I have talked about my recovery from a brand of far left DBT therapy. I’ve also shared opinions on the intersection of feminism, disability, and relationships and work-worship.
My mental health has vastly improved since abandoning liberalism. No day is perfect, and I do still have some bad ones, but they become fewer each year. Yet, one enduring theme of mental health support has gnawed at my brain. Why are virtually all people I meet in support groups liberal? Lots of people more qualified than I am have suggested answers to this question, so I am not going to discuss the psychology of liberals here. My take is more personal.
I once believed that liberals were more willing to accept differences, and so they were friendlier toward the mentally ill than whatever I thought a conservative was. I once associated conservatism with authoritarianism, inflexibility, and coldness, similar to the kinds of abuses that create mental illness. Yet, conservatives are more likely to engage in charitable giving of time and money than liberals. Conservative principles of compassion are also misunderstood by liberals.
A user in a support forum I used to frequent characterized it perfectly here..
“I dunno, they would just tell me to pull myself up by my bootstraps, try to understand what the market demands of me and if I’m not succeeding then the market has decided I’m not worth it or something.”
It basically sums up what I used to think, too – that conservatism was full of flippant “just-so” advice stemming from an assumption that mental illness is a choice, a character flaw, or a spiritual problem, and that it could be solved with some combination of grit, prayer, and capitalism.
Some conservatives probably do believe this. But I would venture a guess that it is a caricature. I have found most of the conservatives I met in the last few years to be much more compassionate than most of my former liberal friends, who remained willfully ignorant of the reality of my situation because it was incompatible with their view of life and relationships.
I’m going to use The Kirk Center’s 10 Conservative Principles as my working definition of conservatism, which I collapsed into four main ideas, to show you why the “cold, unfeeling conservative” is a fallacy. It is not hard to see with a little effort that conservatism can be easily interpreted as favorable to mental health.
Tradition is grounding
I’m not a pure conservative in that I believe moral truths are permanent and absolute, but importantly they are also not completely relative. Some ideas are worse than others. This list gets refined over time, and ethical techniques within and outside of religion allow us to think through these cases. Yet, it helps to be grounded in a set of values, and for that set of values to be rooted in a cohesive community of people who are generally happy with their lives. Moral systems that have stood the test of time have done so for a reason.
Most of my liberal friends struggled with knowing their values. Their morality was easy to sway with the slightest breeze of popular opinion because of a commitment to moral and cultural relativism. Most of them had a somewhat nihilist view of the future and confronted their anxieties about life through avoidance such as overworking, excessive alcohol consumption, and social media or entertainment binges. My chronic anxiety was easier to control when I knew what I believed and what grounding thoughts I could return to. My vices eventually became less appealing.
Another way that I am not a pure conservative is that I don’t necessarily assume the old way of doing this is inherently better, as the Kirk Center describes as “the devil I do know versus the devil I don’t know.” However, there’s something to be said for familiarity. When depressed, sometimes the familiar is all you can find the energy to do. It is a way to connect with past generations of humans and feel less alone. There’s a very good chance, at some point in history, someone has walked the same path you are on and might have something wise to say about it. Some of this wisdom can be found in the Bible, but also in many other texts. You don’t have to believe in God to read them.
Importantly, many moral decisions – the really difficult ones that will make you anxious or depressed if you don’t have the right tools – can’t fully be made rationally. Data and logic help, but the last step of every choice is best made with wisdom. Time tested wisdom is usually more reliable than trendy wisdom.
Prudence and personal restraint is helpful
The value of prudence and personal restraint does not have to be a source of scrupulosity. If you have a personality disorder with impulsive behavior as a core symptom, valuing prudence might help. Teaching yourself to stop and think before acting and consider the long term consequences of a choice is often superior to achieving instant gratification. I often learned in therapy ways to “survive the moment” when every survival impulse in my body is screaming for me to do something unhealthy and I resist by riding out the wave and delaying immediate action.
Furthermore, it is not good for anyone’s mental health to overvalue material possessions or engage in risky so-called “liberating” behavior such as promiscuous sex and drug use. You may think I am being overly prudish here, but if I am honest I have never known a single person in my life for whom those behaviors did not eventually catch up to them. Many conservatives are against these things for religious reasons, but it is fully possible to be against them for purely utilitarian reasons as well.
Liberty and equity are opposites
The Kirk Center article says, “For the preservation of a healthy diversity in any civilization, there must survive orders and classes, differences in material condition, and many sorts of inequality.” The mental health boost I gained from accepting the permanence of inequality cannot be understated.
Accepting that inequality exists doesn’t mean to become complacent with suffering. I probably do more to help others now than I did when I was a depressed, anxious liberal feeling hopeless about the world. Accepting “inequality” means acknowledging that we are not all the same, and we never will be. It was freeing to not feel envy, longing for what could have been, lamenting various “isms” and power structures, and ruminating about equity. To me this is a great worldview for weirdos because it embraces deep diversity, rather than superficial, forced diversity.
Conservatives also don’t believe humans are perfectible. A belief in the possibility of a perfect society is common among young liberals with anxiety and depression. A perfect society is not possible. Bad things sometimes happen to good people, despite our best efforts. Frantically seeking a revolution kept me unable to participate in the world that actually exists right now.
The balance of liberty and responsibility
Conservatives believe in preserving property. An abuse survivor should want nothing more than the autonomy of freedom of personal property. Longing for autonomy was a wish I often saw expressed on mental health forums, but for some reason many of them saw some form of socialism as the pathway there. To me, this seems backwards. It makes me wonder what they think socialism is.
Property does not have to mean a home in a nice suburb. It can mean your own business, even if that business is you and a computer. It can mean financial means to rent your own apartment and choose to move to another one if you don’t like that one. It can mean the freedom to quit your job for reasons of your choice and find another. Your labor, time, and body are also your property. And with that property, there is also the conservative idea of duty toward the good. Responsibility produces competent adults that feel good about themselves because they are capable in the world. Individual freedom without duty becomes narcissism.
Conservatism can be quite compatible with recovery. I hope that this personal reflection is helpful to anyone who hangs on to liberal ideas simply because of a belief that becoming more conservative means that you no longer believe your mental illness is valid or deserving of compassion. I also hope this helps conservatives understand how to better support their friends with mental health issues, knowing which values might be the most helpful.
By Velma Olden
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