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So "conservatism" = "right to bully"?
See this article about Poland pulling out of an international violence-against-women treaty
I've been trying to figure out Trumpist ideology. Trump himself, of course, probably isn't thoughtful enough to have an ideology more sophisticated than "if it feels good, do it", but he speaks for a lot of people who do have an ideology, and it appears to be "maintain stable dominance-submission hierarchies". Comfort the comfortable, and afflict the afflicted.
Men are "naturally" stronger than women, and anything that reduces their privilege or limits how they can treat women is Wrong. Rich and poor people deserve to be that way, either through hard work vs. laziness or the grace of God, and anything that reduces the gap is unnatural and against God's will.
White people are "naturally" more privileged than dark-skinned people, and anything that might reduce that gap or prevent the former from oppressing the latter is Wrong. Christians (or whatever the locally-dominant religion is) are God's chosen people, and expecting them to treat other people as people too is Wrong. Some people (all alpha-males, of course) are "naturally" born to rule, and any limit on their power over the masses of NPC sheeple is Wrong. The bully on your grade-school playground deserved to extort your lunch money, because he could; the only thing stopping him was the even-greater dominance of the Teacher.
I can see how this might be an attractive ideology if you were 100% sure you were among the ruling class, and could never be removed from the ruling class. And if membership in the ruling class is defined genetically, e.g. by light-colored skin or possession of a Y chromosome, it is a pretty clear and unchangeable dividing line. The importance of clear and unchanging dividing lines between ruling class and sheeple also explains the "conservative" movement's horror at anything that blurs the lines, such as homosexuality, transsexuality, racial miscegenation, or redistribution of wealth.
As pointed out here, the game of Prisoner's Dilemma has a stable solution which is egalitarian (everybody's following the same strategy) and mutually beneficial, while the similar game of Chicken has only one stable solution: an unchanging dominance-submission hierarchy in which the "bottom" player is consistently exploited, but is slightly better off accepting "bottom" status than fighting it. If you view the world as a game of Prisoner's Dilemma, you'll naturally be drawn to egalitarian solutions, while if you view the world as a game of Chicken, you're inevitably drawn to dominance/submission solutions.
The difference between Prisoner's Dilemma ("T > R > P > S") and Chicken ("T > R > S > P") is whether the punishment for mutual defection is better or worse than the "sucker's payoff" for cooperating while the other player defects. Ironically, the common left-wing beliefs that "we're all in this together" or "we have only one planet" boil down to "mutual defection is Really Bad", i.e. "we're in a game of Chicken" and thus encourage dominance/submission solutions. Conversely, the stereotypically right-wing (and Trumpist) belief that everything is about competition, reward, and retribution means "being a sucker is Really Bad", i.e. "we're in a game of Prisoner's Dilemma," and we may actually get an egalitarian outcome.
So there's an apparent contradiction between Trump's horror at being "suckered" and his fondness for dominance/submission hierarchies -- or, on the other side, between liberal fears of global nuclear war, global climate change, global pollution, etc. and their desire for egalitarian outcomes.
I think one can resolve the contradiction by adding to the classical games a notion of historical empowerment: if you've already won a couple of rounds, you're more able to inflict retribution on others by defecting, and if you've already lost a couple of rounds, your ability to retribute decreases. Trump makes this quite explicit: his strategy for negotiation is to have won the previous couple of rounds so he goes into this round with his opponent already intimidated and disempowered. If your opponent can't meaningfully punish you for defecting, and you both know that, both parties should assume that you're going to defect, and your opponent just has to deal with that.
In other words, we're not in a Prisoner's Dilemma game or a Chicken game, because in both of those the payoff matrix is the same for all players. In fact, we're in a game in which the payoff matrix for previous losers is either Prisoner's Dilemma ("T > R > P > S") or Chicken ("T > R > S > P") but the payoff matrix for previous winners is more like Mine ("T > P > R > S"), for which the solution is "always defect".
I've been trying to figure out Trumpist ideology. Trump himself, of course, probably isn't thoughtful enough to have an ideology more sophisticated than "if it feels good, do it", but he speaks for a lot of people who do have an ideology, and it appears to be "maintain stable dominance-submission hierarchies". Comfort the comfortable, and afflict the afflicted.
Men are "naturally" stronger than women, and anything that reduces their privilege or limits how they can treat women is Wrong. Rich and poor people deserve to be that way, either through hard work vs. laziness or the grace of God, and anything that reduces the gap is unnatural and against God's will.
White people are "naturally" more privileged than dark-skinned people, and anything that might reduce that gap or prevent the former from oppressing the latter is Wrong. Christians (or whatever the locally-dominant religion is) are God's chosen people, and expecting them to treat other people as people too is Wrong. Some people (all alpha-males, of course) are "naturally" born to rule, and any limit on their power over the masses of NPC sheeple is Wrong. The bully on your grade-school playground deserved to extort your lunch money, because he could; the only thing stopping him was the even-greater dominance of the Teacher.
I can see how this might be an attractive ideology if you were 100% sure you were among the ruling class, and could never be removed from the ruling class. And if membership in the ruling class is defined genetically, e.g. by light-colored skin or possession of a Y chromosome, it is a pretty clear and unchangeable dividing line. The importance of clear and unchanging dividing lines between ruling class and sheeple also explains the "conservative" movement's horror at anything that blurs the lines, such as homosexuality, transsexuality, racial miscegenation, or redistribution of wealth.
As pointed out here, the game of Prisoner's Dilemma has a stable solution which is egalitarian (everybody's following the same strategy) and mutually beneficial, while the similar game of Chicken has only one stable solution: an unchanging dominance-submission hierarchy in which the "bottom" player is consistently exploited, but is slightly better off accepting "bottom" status than fighting it. If you view the world as a game of Prisoner's Dilemma, you'll naturally be drawn to egalitarian solutions, while if you view the world as a game of Chicken, you're inevitably drawn to dominance/submission solutions.
The difference between Prisoner's Dilemma ("T > R > P > S") and Chicken ("T > R > S > P") is whether the punishment for mutual defection is better or worse than the "sucker's payoff" for cooperating while the other player defects. Ironically, the common left-wing beliefs that "we're all in this together" or "we have only one planet" boil down to "mutual defection is Really Bad", i.e. "we're in a game of Chicken" and thus encourage dominance/submission solutions. Conversely, the stereotypically right-wing (and Trumpist) belief that everything is about competition, reward, and retribution means "being a sucker is Really Bad", i.e. "we're in a game of Prisoner's Dilemma," and we may actually get an egalitarian outcome.
So there's an apparent contradiction between Trump's horror at being "suckered" and his fondness for dominance/submission hierarchies -- or, on the other side, between liberal fears of global nuclear war, global climate change, global pollution, etc. and their desire for egalitarian outcomes.
I think one can resolve the contradiction by adding to the classical games a notion of historical empowerment: if you've already won a couple of rounds, you're more able to inflict retribution on others by defecting, and if you've already lost a couple of rounds, your ability to retribute decreases. Trump makes this quite explicit: his strategy for negotiation is to have won the previous couple of rounds so he goes into this round with his opponent already intimidated and disempowered. If your opponent can't meaningfully punish you for defecting, and you both know that, both parties should assume that you're going to defect, and your opponent just has to deal with that.
In other words, we're not in a Prisoner's Dilemma game or a Chicken game, because in both of those the payoff matrix is the same for all players. In fact, we're in a game in which the payoff matrix for previous losers is either Prisoner's Dilemma ("T > R > P > S") or Chicken ("T > R > S > P") but the payoff matrix for previous winners is more like Mine ("T > P > R > S"), for which the solution is "always defect".