Did you know that all success in life is based on conservative principles?
Well, it’s true. As I explain in my book, How to Be Right: the Art of Being Persuasively Correct,
if liberals applied their no-score, no-winner, no-loser belief systems to their
hobbies or professions, they would fail miserably.
Success relies on absolute truths, on supply and demand, on work and reward, on competition,
and on achievement, not group identity. As the old saying goes, it doesn't matter if
the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice. Conservatives catch mice.
Liberals buy them cheese -- with your money.
It's interesting that people who participate in professions that require conservative values
are so often on the Left. Here are three examples you might not have thought of.
Example One: The Musician
You'd think all of them are liberals in their personal lives, but only a few can actually afford to be.
Smart musicians are often the most conservative people on the planet.
Someone has to pay for the gas, the guitar strings, and the antibiotics. When you see your favorite
metal band, you can bet that the whole tour is mapped out not as some hippy-dippy road trip,
but as a meticulously planned endeavor to wring every penny of profit out of it.
Maybe it’s not surprising then that the most successful rock band in history is headed
by someone who studied finance and accounting at the London School of Economics
-- Mick Jagger. (And, yes, it’s true "Satisfaction" was about the joy of capital gains).
Example Two: Fitness
As a former editor of a health magazine, I can attest: the government cannot give you
six-pack abs (unless you get them to pay for the implants).
Exercise is perhaps the best example of conservative thinking at your disposal.
For the amount of effort you put in, you reap the reward you deserve. If you pump iron for two hours,
three times a week, your body will change as a direct result.
Fitness is one bank where you deposit effort and you build a portfolio of reward.
There is no affirmative action in exercise. One muscle doesn’t get special dispensation
because it’s smaller or weaker. There is no minimum wage safety net, or unemployed
bennies for your glutes -- you’re either in shape or you’re not. No one is gonna
redistribute my awesome pecs. As President Barack Obama famously once said,
“You didn’t build that.” Sorry, but I did.
Example Three: Cooking
There are boatloads of cooking shows these days, populated by spiky-haired women and
tattooed love-patched beardos from Brooklyn. They all look so Occupy Wall Street
-- but when they enter the kitchen they become the Wolves of Wall Street. There are no feelings
behind that butcher block; there’s no room for “if it feels good, do it.”
Restaurants that require reservations weeks or months in advance got that way because
of reliance on a diligent work ethic. Every body involved from the chef to the wait staff
to dishwashers strive night in, night out to make great food and produce a great experience.
You cannot reach that pinnacle without being intensely competitive and results-oriented,
in other words, a capitalist. In the end, cooking is really just building a successful
enterprise, with food. And it must taste good, not fulfill a greater good.
All success in life is based on conservative principles. Ponder that the next time you
hear a great piece of music, hit the gym or eat a tasty meal. If you do, you might realize
you’re not as liberal as you think.
I’m Greg Gutfeld.