I'm sorry to keep harping on this, but frankly, I'm fascinated by the origin and development of your views on this. You freely admit that what we'll agree to call for the time being "liberal" opinions are not masterminded by some kind of central authority or control. But you do recognize these attitudes as being very powerful, and that they have experienced great growth and an increase in influence. This is what I can't understand; if they're not deliberately being spread, then they must be arising spontaneously from the culture itself, and spreading by acquiring new recruits by appealing to them in some profound way.

In other words, these social attitudes and political views must meet some social or psychological need that allows them to be embraced and communicated among the most influential, well-educated and affluent members of the society. They, in turn, propagate these attitudes through the community in general. If this is actually happening, and if this process is accellerating unopposed (or at least until the origins of the conservative movement in the early 60s) there must be a reason for it. You yourself have ruled out a deliberate conspiracy, so you must recognize this as a spontaneous social movement.

This is no big deal, social movements are being created and propagating all the time, they are no doubt related to economic or political conditions, new communications technologies, and heaven knows what else, but this one seems to be different. It appears to growing without any leadership or direction, and it has become very appealing to the population and powerful enough to challenge traditional values and attitudes and established centers of societal power such as the church and the business sector. And it does all this while promoting policies which (in your opinion) undermine the society's survival and even the self-interest of those spreading the meme.

For example, Marxist ideology postulates historical and economic processes operating through social classes defined by self-interest which are in conflict with one another. These evolve over time, in (according to them) a predictable fashion. Conservatives don't see a process like this, but they do recognize an opposition. What they're not clear about is what caused it, why it came about, and why it persists.

This is extraordinary, surely you must have given this some thought and have some views as to how this situation arose. I'm not baiting you on this TB, I'm really curious about how your opinions were formed and the reasoning behind them. To a great extent, conservatives seem to characterize themselves as a reaction to these liberal attitudes and in conflict with those who hold them. How do you feel this situation came about? Surely, you don't believe that a large portion of society throughout the world (because this is certainly not a solely American phenomenon) suddenly adopted a suicidal and defeatest philosophy, yet one strong enough to be self-sustaining and growing, perhaps irresistable?

By now, you've probably guessed that I have thought about the origins and development of what for the time being we'll call "conservative" views.Show me your views and I'll show you mine.