Devil’s advocate positions are nothing more than useless mental masturbation and are the type of thing done most often done in classroom situations or to deliberately provoke someone. This is not a debating society here, and I personally detest argument merely for the sake of argument.
As I see it, this site is devoted to adults seeking real-life solutions and answers based on the way the world works and the way human nature works, and not how we wish it would work, as is the case with leftists.
I think most here believe in obtaining wealth via hard and honest work, and abhor those who seek a free lunch, ala the moochers and leaches in Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”. You can add to that particularl book as a reading list “Animal Farm”, “1984”, “Harrison Bergeron”, “First Circle”, “Cancer Ward”, and “The Gulag Archipelago” as starters. Then read everything by Jack London. If these books don’t ring your bell, then you’re not a conservative.
We also believe in limited government, limited taxes, and the supremacy of the individual rather than the collective.
There are areas of disagreement here, primarily in religion and morality. These are primarily matters of faith and not reason, and its pointless to engage in argument.
I rarely disagree with someone unless I think they’ve presented incorrect facts or patently misrepresented something generally accepted as being true. If I’m going to disagree or correct, I try to do so in a gentle and helpful manner, unless I’m chastising the rare troll here.
I generally prefer to add to posts in a positive manner, agreeing or amplifying or posting additional relevant information.
You end with:
“I’m asking because IMO there’s a fundamental difference between arguing a point of POLICY (which requires a sense of pragmatism as well as ideology) and arguing over IDEOLOGY (where it’s appropriate to maintain an absolute position).”
Right here you revealed what you are all about, namely arguing, rather than seeking the truth. Furthermore, you wish to argue about useless academic garbage like pointless distinctions between POLICY vs. IDEOLOGY, in caps no less, which no doubt is how you think of “ideas”.
If you’re looking for a debating society, I recommend you go elsewhere. Actually, if you had any sense at all, which seems doubtful, you would have read the posts here for a few days or weeks before making any post at all, much less one that reveals your total ignorance of this site. Basically, you’ve started off exactly like a troll would!
Agree 100%.
Outside the world of politics I'd agree. Inside the world of politics... I'm not so convinced.
Labour put in place lots of anti-terror legislation that IN PRINCIPLE I completely agree with, but they also allowed that legislation to be misused to boot hecklers out from their own Party conference, ban people from reading out lists of our war dead, and so on. and that I must condemn.
A little bit of the "devil's advocate" when that Bill was going through Parliament, might well have prevented such atrocious abuse of public trust.
Orwell's books are definitely on my shelf, as is Jack London, but can't say as I've read all of the books you've listed. I've got a well stacked library Call of the Wild and White Fang along with many other "rip roaring adventures" by many other authors - RL Stevenson for example. Also got all the early Biggles short stories, the ones set in WW1, from when I were a lad.
Swiss Family Robinson (Wyss) and The Coral Island (Ballantyne) are two books that I think haven't really been given the attention they deserve as they advocate strong moral values. Most people I've spoken to know very little about The Coral Island, apart from a vague idea that Lord of the Flies (Golding) presents the horrifying picture of how Jack, Ralph and Peterkin might've ended up if they had found themselves devoid of moral guidance.
Well said.