Until a few years ago, I identified as politically conservative. This is hardly surprising, considering that I was born and raised in Central Texas in a Roman Catholic family. Most of my family is conservative, as was most of my high school. Although I was never super conservative socially, I still had my hang-ups: for quite a while I was homophobic, and I was egalitarian, not feminist, thank you very much. When it came to the market and government spending I was definitely on the Right side of the spectrum. In short, I was exactly what you’d expect from a Texas boy. However, as I started broadening my horizons, reading more and learning more, I started to fall away from conservatism, especially socially. Fast forward to the present, and you have an angry progressive who has disavowed the conservative party altogether. There are several reasons that I have turned my back on what I now believe to be a broken, ideologically possessed party.

First, the necessary disclaimer. The ideology I am referring to is obviously not held by all conservatives, much like what I believe in is not the belief of all liberals. However, these are ideas that keep cropping up over and over again, especially in reference to Republicans in power, and they must be adressed.

I will admit that, when dealing with the economy, certain right wing ideas make sense, in small scale and when implemented appropriately. This is the key, which has been utterly lost in our increasingly radicalized, black and white nation. The GOP’s brand of capitalism is a vicious Ayn Rand-esque beast who devours the unfortunate and fattens the already corpulent on top. What started off as party for the working man has been utterly bought out by the oil companies and others like them- no different from the current Democrat party. However, this is not my main source of anger.

The GOP has utterly sold its soul to appease the far right. In doing so, they have become a party of hatred and anti-progression. They are quite pleased to keep their heads stuck in the sand, provided that the sand comes from an idealized 1950’s America. They firmly dismiss the idea that institutional inequality exists, falling back on a worn out, broken “bootstraps” ideology: “You can pull yourself up by your bootstraps, this is the good ole’ United States!” And they’re correct, providing that you are a heteronormative Anglo-Saxon Christian cis male. Those bootstraps are a little harder to grasp when, as a black American, you are 2.5 times more likely to be shot by the police then a white American, when as a Muslim or Jewish American you are most likely to be attacked for your religion, when as a non-heterosexual American you can be legally fired in 31 states for not being straight, when as a trans* American you are almost four times more likely to live in poverty, and when as a woman in America you are outranked almost 5 to 1 in congressional positions. For these individuals, whether they fall in one group or many, are utterly scorned by the Right’s rhetoric. Even then, if you are a WASP cis male, there’s still a chance that they will stomp you into the ground if you happen to be on the financial lower half.

Perhaps most troublesome is how the GOP argues for America’s greatness (or imminent return to greatness) and promotes their bootstrap rhetoric while simultaneously working to keep down the disenfranchised. It is the GOP who protests marriage equality, trans* bathroom rights, and the ideas of institutionalized inequality that works against women and the POC communities. The GOP, more than ever, actively fosters hostility against those who aren’t straight white Americans while swearing up and down that these communities don’t have it that bad or simply don’t exist. While I’m sure that for a majority of Republican voters this is due to honest ignorance on the issues, there are certainly more than a few in power who help to perpetuate this ignorance due to fear and greed. After all, if wealth is more evenly spread, that could mean less for them. And considering that so many top Republicans are elderly white men, I’m sure that there is a good amount of fear in regards to those different from them, i.e. most of the world.

I was a conservative based on what I had been told and became a liberal based on what I learned. I urge everyone on both sides of the aisle to expand your horizons. It is better to be a black sheep for good reasons than to fit in due to ignorance. As to those Republicans who know all too well what kind of hate they are spreading: it will not work. Love will always overcome. So when you sneer and call me a “bleeding heart,” I’ll say thank you, because I’d much rather my heart bleed than be missing entirely.