Why Some Youth Are Conservative

Local Republican advocates explained to me the dark side of Ron Paul-style libertarianism.

They recognized a latent narcissism, within the ranks of younger voters, all of which coalesced around the older Congressman from Texas, like an anti-hero.

There is something wrong with young people rallying around one man as a solution to their problems. Where's the libertarian principles if men and women, no matter what their age, are looking toward an individual for freedom.

Good point, I responded. Liberty requires maturity, which requires security, a sure identity.

Most young people, I fear, do not have this, either because they did not have strong parents at home, or they never knew their parents (one or both).

A culture of entitlement in adults has passed on to their children. Life is not easy for the person who learns that everything is handed to him or her from the world. There is nothing kind of loving about parents who give material things to their children without first honoring their greater need for peace, security, safety in spite of circumstances, even material lack.

Some youth have joined the conservative cause not out of recognition of eternal principles, but a reaction based on entitlement.

One young person shared his disgust with two other students in a college lecture hall, who were getting students aid to attend school, yet they were doing nothing with the time and money besides wasting it.

He became a conservative, according to his account, because these students were taking state money and wasting it, and he wanted to be able to get a good job.

A lot of judging, a lot of arrogance, and a great degree of assumption defined his conservatism. Is this the legacy which we want to encourage in our youth?

A better example should grant hope for those who want the next generation to wake up to the empty folly of unrepentant liberalism.

Another young person acknowledged that he became a conservative when he noticed that the state Assembly Speaker, John Perez, declared that he would provide funding for college students, in spite of the rising tuition and fewer classes.

"How is he going to get the money, when the state is going broke?" the young person wisely asked.

Most liberals in their minds become conservatives at heart when they recognize the basic economic principle: scarcity.

Conservatism based on self is not conservatism, but a latent narcissism. Conservatism based on a healthy respect for the natural world's material limits is an established conservatism.