For the past couple of weeks I’ve been pondering why so many conservatives I know keep telling me they are always being attacked (political conversations mostly so let’s stick with that).  This has puzzled me because I have a very hard time thinking of any really good examples of liberals/progressives attacking conservatives.  If I accept what I’m being told, that they feel they are being attacked and I do, then why can’t I see it?  Well I’ve come up with a possible hypotheses, it’s not really be nearly rigoureousely worked up to be call a theory.

In a nut shell, conservatives feel attacked because of how the precieve political debate.  Conversely liberals/progressive fail to see that the conservative are feeling attacked because of how they precieve political debate. For the past few years I’ve been studying the Reseach  into political psychology.  Such as the popular work “The Republican Brain” by Chris Mooney.  What has struck me is how some people see debate as a win/loose, right/wrong, ‘zero sum’ game (situation).  The political psychology studies I’ve been reading suggest that this kind of psychology tends to collect in conservative groups.

So what does this mean?  Only that conservators have a higher chance of being people who see debate as something you need to win and if you don’t win you have to have lost.  Most people, when they find themselves in a situation of Wining or Loosing, they will feel like they are being attack.

That’s all for now…..more later as I work this idea up into a theory.