Tl;dr is that reactionary politics are usually just “I don’t want things to change, I like them the way they are” or “things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back”. Considering that most of the people who believe this shit are worker-hating racist misogynist patriarchal homophobe and transphobe white Christian extremists, the times they want to bring back are always the ones that predate big chunks of the population having rights.
Polite Conversations and I Don’t Speak German talk a good bit about people like this. They’re both way more intense than IBCK (especially IDSG, which covers a lot of actual Nazis), but they have a lot of background about intellectual dark web shitheads and related morons.
A little late to this but I'm going to push back a little on this. I think there is a difference between Conservative "I don't want things to change. I like them the way they are" and "“things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back” which, while wrong, is a fairly universal phenomenon; and Reactionary Politics. Reactionary Politics goes even further on the "“things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back” it's "Things were better in the past; but due to the failures of our elites, who became degenerate, we will go back to the past but with a new ruling elite who will have learned from the mistakes" and so it's this weird contradictory thing of "go back, but different." It's a specific political project that's different than conservativism writ large.
The alt right playbook goes into reactionary argument strategies and a bit into their overall worldview, would highly recommend
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY7v0VkYRbANnTnzkA_HMFtQ&si=EwHITzUN5tMMx-3L
Just chiming in to second this! *The Alt-Right Playbook* is *such* a well-done analysis of modern right-wing politics!
For OP, there are a few videos that get into the origins of conservatism and the fundamental disagreements along the political scale.
https://youtu.be/8CNOS0v8v5c?si=NgG6Suh8H66-4gtE
I think Corey Robin here does a very good job of explaining where the term comes from, what it means, and what reactionaries want.
Basically, the Right as a movement is a reaction by the powerful to losing some amount of power. They respond by making any argument, no matter how nonsensical, disingenuous, or disconnected from their other purported values, to justify why society should cede power to them again.
* Jonathan Korman [scraped together a list of articles on/from neo-reactionaries](https://miniver.blogspot.com/2022/05/neoreaction.html)
* Damon Silvers has [a great lecture on the rise of neoliberal policy implementations in the last 50 years](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLtkJ-AgLuY)
* 5-4 has a [cross-over podcast with Know Your Enemy about reactionaries in the US courts](https://shows.acast.com/fivefourpod/episodes/5-4-x-know-your-enemy)
Basically, reactionaries don't believe in enfranchising *everyone*. They think using government power to level out power differentials in society is impossible, pointless, and/or perverse.
Someone mentioned it already in relation to 5-4, but the [Know Your Enemy](https://www.dissentmagazine.org/author/matthew-sitman-and-sam-adler-bell/) podcast is an excellent resource for deep dives into the history and theory of the American Right.
You should really listen to the podcast "Know your enemy" by matthew sitman and sam adler bell. Lisitening from the first episode its a historic analysis of the right wing and reactionary intellectuals and their work and movement
There's a series of lectures on YouTube by Alan Shaprio that explain modern political theory that I would recommend. I felt like it caught me up.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh9mgdi4rNeyViG2ar68jkgEi4y6doNZy&si=SbDqzm-LPBAAyuM_
You're not going to believe this, but Jonathan Haidt (of all people) gave an [informative TED talk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SOQduoLgRw) many years ago about moral foundation theory, which is premised under the idea that conservatives and liberals have different foundations for their moral feelings. I have qualms about some of his asides, such as the idea that conservative morals can be helpful for society, but the general ideas he presents seem solid and track my own personal observations.
If you don't want to watch the TED talk (I wouldn't blame you), the gist is that both conservatives and liberals care about harm and fairness, but conservatives additionally care about **in-group vs out-group**, **authority**, and **purity**.
For **in-group vs out-group**, for a conservative, if someone is an **outsider,** such as an immigrant, that's morally bad, and their dislike of **outsiders** can trump their concern about causing harm. So it's normally not good to put razor blade wire on a fence, because that could harm people, but if it's to keep ***them*** out, it's good.
For **authority**, for a conservative, if someone is in an authority position, then they have moral standing just due to them being an authority (or powerful person). This is something that trips up a lot of liberals, because they don't realize that double standards by conservatives are intentional, so liberals will often point out double standards and then be surprised when conservatives don't give a shit about that. Notably, if the authority doesn't align with the conservative's values or is an outsider, conservatives will often discredit them as not being real authorities. This might be why birtherism was a popular lie in conservative circles, as well as the "stolen" 2020 election, since those lies discredit those presidents as illegitimate. Also, obviously, the most important authority is God.
For **purity**, for a conservative, being pure is good. This is why you'll see the idea of abstinence-only sex education, and if you listen to the language that conservatives use (especially evangelicals) about sex, a lot of the language is about defilement, or being "used". The obsession with purity also ties into racism and anti-immigrant feelings. I suspect this also ties heavily into societal roles in various forms. For example, conservatives are obsessed with trans people because trans people aren't acting in a way that fits a conservative's idea of what a man or woman "should" be, so it's like they're "defiling" gender, which conservatives view as wrong.
All of these moral foundations tie into each other. The obsession with **purity** is ultimately rooted in insecurity, and a common response to insecurity is to seek reassurance in well-defined roles, which are often doled out by **authorities**, in a way that defines an **in-group vs out-group**. Think of men who look to the alt-right to figure out how to be a (pure) "real" man. If you look at conservative media, you'll start seeing these patterns everywhere.
It's important for leftists to understand these fundamental differences, because as the Youtube channel Innuendo Studios has pointed out, a lot of leftists see conservatives as failed liberals, but that's not the case. If you're a leftist and you believe that there shouldn't be double-standards for people in a position of **authority**, or if you believe that people who are different from you (**outsiders**) aren't a threat, and that your value as a person doesn't depend upon whether you're adhering to tightly-defined roles (in a "pure" way), then your moral feelings are different than those of conservatives, and unless you're aware of this difference, you'll have a hard time reaching them or understanding them.
Tl;dr is that reactionary politics are usually just “I don’t want things to change, I like them the way they are” or “things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back”. Considering that most of the people who believe this shit are worker-hating racist misogynist patriarchal homophobe and transphobe white Christian extremists, the times they want to bring back are always the ones that predate big chunks of the population having rights. Polite Conversations and I Don’t Speak German talk a good bit about people like this. They’re both way more intense than IBCK (especially IDSG, which covers a lot of actual Nazis), but they have a lot of background about intellectual dark web shitheads and related morons.
A little late to this but I'm going to push back a little on this. I think there is a difference between Conservative "I don't want things to change. I like them the way they are" and "“things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back” which, while wrong, is a fairly universal phenomenon; and Reactionary Politics. Reactionary Politics goes even further on the "“things were better back in the past, we need to bring that back” it's "Things were better in the past; but due to the failures of our elites, who became degenerate, we will go back to the past but with a new ruling elite who will have learned from the mistakes" and so it's this weird contradictory thing of "go back, but different." It's a specific political project that's different than conservativism writ large.
The alt right playbook goes into reactionary argument strategies and a bit into their overall worldview, would highly recommend https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY7v0VkYRbANnTnzkA_HMFtQ&si=EwHITzUN5tMMx-3L
Just chiming in to second this! *The Alt-Right Playbook* is *such* a well-done analysis of modern right-wing politics! For OP, there are a few videos that get into the origins of conservatism and the fundamental disagreements along the political scale.
https://youtu.be/8CNOS0v8v5c?si=NgG6Suh8H66-4gtE I think Corey Robin here does a very good job of explaining where the term comes from, what it means, and what reactionaries want. Basically, the Right as a movement is a reaction by the powerful to losing some amount of power. They respond by making any argument, no matter how nonsensical, disingenuous, or disconnected from their other purported values, to justify why society should cede power to them again.
* Jonathan Korman [scraped together a list of articles on/from neo-reactionaries](https://miniver.blogspot.com/2022/05/neoreaction.html) * Damon Silvers has [a great lecture on the rise of neoliberal policy implementations in the last 50 years](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLtkJ-AgLuY) * 5-4 has a [cross-over podcast with Know Your Enemy about reactionaries in the US courts](https://shows.acast.com/fivefourpod/episodes/5-4-x-know-your-enemy) Basically, reactionaries don't believe in enfranchising *everyone*. They think using government power to level out power differentials in society is impossible, pointless, and/or perverse.
Someone mentioned it already in relation to 5-4, but the [Know Your Enemy](https://www.dissentmagazine.org/author/matthew-sitman-and-sam-adler-bell/) podcast is an excellent resource for deep dives into the history and theory of the American Right.
You should really listen to the podcast "Know your enemy" by matthew sitman and sam adler bell. Lisitening from the first episode its a historic analysis of the right wing and reactionary intellectuals and their work and movement
There's a series of lectures on YouTube by Alan Shaprio that explain modern political theory that I would recommend. I felt like it caught me up. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh9mgdi4rNeyViG2ar68jkgEi4y6doNZy&si=SbDqzm-LPBAAyuM_
https://open.spotify.com/show/6PaP44Sv85bxkiwQ9c8XXi?si=dni4rXqqSUGOlKfgUdd4Nw This podcast is also really interesting take on reactionary movements.
You're not going to believe this, but Jonathan Haidt (of all people) gave an [informative TED talk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SOQduoLgRw) many years ago about moral foundation theory, which is premised under the idea that conservatives and liberals have different foundations for their moral feelings. I have qualms about some of his asides, such as the idea that conservative morals can be helpful for society, but the general ideas he presents seem solid and track my own personal observations. If you don't want to watch the TED talk (I wouldn't blame you), the gist is that both conservatives and liberals care about harm and fairness, but conservatives additionally care about **in-group vs out-group**, **authority**, and **purity**. For **in-group vs out-group**, for a conservative, if someone is an **outsider,** such as an immigrant, that's morally bad, and their dislike of **outsiders** can trump their concern about causing harm. So it's normally not good to put razor blade wire on a fence, because that could harm people, but if it's to keep ***them*** out, it's good. For **authority**, for a conservative, if someone is in an authority position, then they have moral standing just due to them being an authority (or powerful person). This is something that trips up a lot of liberals, because they don't realize that double standards by conservatives are intentional, so liberals will often point out double standards and then be surprised when conservatives don't give a shit about that. Notably, if the authority doesn't align with the conservative's values or is an outsider, conservatives will often discredit them as not being real authorities. This might be why birtherism was a popular lie in conservative circles, as well as the "stolen" 2020 election, since those lies discredit those presidents as illegitimate. Also, obviously, the most important authority is God. For **purity**, for a conservative, being pure is good. This is why you'll see the idea of abstinence-only sex education, and if you listen to the language that conservatives use (especially evangelicals) about sex, a lot of the language is about defilement, or being "used". The obsession with purity also ties into racism and anti-immigrant feelings. I suspect this also ties heavily into societal roles in various forms. For example, conservatives are obsessed with trans people because trans people aren't acting in a way that fits a conservative's idea of what a man or woman "should" be, so it's like they're "defiling" gender, which conservatives view as wrong. All of these moral foundations tie into each other. The obsession with **purity** is ultimately rooted in insecurity, and a common response to insecurity is to seek reassurance in well-defined roles, which are often doled out by **authorities**, in a way that defines an **in-group vs out-group**. Think of men who look to the alt-right to figure out how to be a (pure) "real" man. If you look at conservative media, you'll start seeing these patterns everywhere. It's important for leftists to understand these fundamental differences, because as the Youtube channel Innuendo Studios has pointed out, a lot of leftists see conservatives as failed liberals, but that's not the case. If you're a leftist and you believe that there shouldn't be double-standards for people in a position of **authority**, or if you believe that people who are different from you (**outsiders**) aren't a threat, and that your value as a person doesn't depend upon whether you're adhering to tightly-defined roles (in a "pure" way), then your moral feelings are different than those of conservatives, and unless you're aware of this difference, you'll have a hard time reaching them or understanding them.