An Appeal to Conservatives; Why Nominalism Undermines Your Own Cause
Conservatism is Collapsing: Because Conservatives Have Accepted the Enemy’s Premises Conservatives Are Losing; Not Only Because of “the Left”, Because of Their Own Assumptions
If you are a conservative, you’ve probably noticed that no matter how hard you fight, the culture keeps shifting left, traditional values keep eroding, and every institution seems to be falling into ideological corruption.
Laws are being rewritten to mean the opposite of what they once meant.
Tradition is no longer seen as wisdom, but as an obstacle to progress.
Even the Constitution, once seen as the anchor of American liberty, is now treated as a “living document” - open to endless reinterpretation.
You have fought against this. You have debated, voted, argued, and defended conservative values. And yet, every time you win, the goalposts move.
Why?
Because many conservatives (perhaps even you) have unknowingly accepted the very idea that makes this endless drift possible. That idea is called Nominalism, and until you understand how it works, you will never win another battle.
PART I: The Hidden Enemy Inside Conservative Thought
Nominalism is the belief that words, laws, and categories do not reflect anything objectively real; they are just names we assign to things for convenience. If that is true, then everything conservatives want to “conserve” is just a social construct that can be rewritten at any time.
If you believe in:
The Constitution as the foundation of American freedom
Objective morality, based in Natural Law
A permanent, unchanging human nature
The family as the cornerstone of civilization
Then you cannot be a Nominalist because Nominalism rejects every one of these ideas as mere human conventions that can be altered. But here’s the problem; most conservatives today are functional Nominalists without realizing it.
How Did Conservatives Absorb Nominalism Without Noticing?
You Were Educated in a System That Taught You That Truth Evolves
Even if you attended a “good” school, the entire academic system is built on the idea that knowledge is constructed, not discovered. You were taught that society defines morality, law, and even human nature - never that these things are rooted in something real.
You Believe in the Constitution, but Not in the Reality That Gives It Authority
If the Constitution is just a legal contract, then it can be reinterpreted and changed. But if it reflects unchanging Natural Law, then no judge, politician, or “expert” has the right to redefine it. Many conservatives defend the words of the Constitution but fail to defend the eternal truths behind it.
You Defend Tradition Without Understanding Why It Matters
If tradition is just inherited customs, then it can be discarded. This is why one of my earlier substack articles in the ‘Mere Credulity’ series has the title ‘Custom & Customer’ and in it I mention a ‘Pedagogy Of Custom’ and the consequences of that. This has been one of my major criticisms of Classical Education™️ through the past century - it has rhetorically marketed its services on ‘Upholding Tradition’, while functionally paying only lip service to it. It is cosmetic rather than substantive.
If tradition reflects unchanging realities about human nature, virtue, and order, then it must be upheld as a duty. Many conservatives defend symbols (flags, statues, historical figures) but fail to defend the metaphysical principles those things represent. This results in trying to defend an order that you have already allowed to be redefined as a flexible human construct.
PART II: The Fatal Mistake of Nominalist Conservatism
A conservative who accepts Nominalism cannot conserve anything because they have already surrendered the idea that anything is fixed and real.
What Happens When Conservatism is Rooted in Nominalism?
Conservatism Becomes Nostalgia, Not Principle
Instead of defending objective truth, conservatives settle for defending whatever version of society they grew up with. This is why older conservatives say “I just want things to go back to [insert ‘era’] the way they were” instead of “I want things to align with eternal principles.”
Conservatives Defend the Forms, But Not the Substance:
They fight for the Constitution but not Natural Law. They defend religion but not the metaphysical truths that make it necessary. They cling to symbols of the past but hesitate to demand obedience to the eternal truths those symbols represented.
Conservatives Lose Every Moral Battle
A nominalist-conservative will say “Marriage has always been between a man and a woman” instead of “Marriage is an intrinsic, natural reality that cannot be redefined.” The best articulation of this I have ever heard was spoken by Dr Alan Keyes - but he did have to help the journalist who was interviewing him to understand what a Principle is - in function, in practise. Do you see the foundational problem we have!! A nominalist-conservative will say “America was built on Christian values” instead of “Christian values are objectively true and necessary for human flourishing.”
Without the ability to appeal to unchanging reality, conservatives have nothing to fight with except preferences and tradition; both of which are easily discarded by a culture that sees them as arbitrary constructs. Conservatism cannot be about slowing down progressivism. It must be about restoring and defending objective truth, natural law, and the reality of things as they are.
Conservatives Must Reject Nominalism Entirely:
If a law, tradition, or institution is good, it is not because people created it - it is because it aligns with reality.
We do not invent rights. We do not create morality. We do not redefine law.
We recognize what is true and defend it because it is true.
Conservatives Must Stop Defending Symbols & Start Defending Reality
The American flag means nothing if the people flying it do not believe in the principles that made America great. The Constitution is a dead document unless it is tied to the unchanging Natural Law that gives it authority. Traditions are worthless unless they reflect and uphold eternal truths.
Conservatives Must Stop Playing Defence & Go on the Offensive
Stop trying to conserve “the way things were.” Instead, acknowledge and embody the unchanging order that should never have been abandoned. Stop debating moral issues on pragmatic grounds; defend them as unchanging truths rooted in human nature and reality itself. Stop treating “political compromise” as a victory; if the principles are true, they cannot be compromised. A conservatism that is built on truth rather than mere cosmetic tradition will no longer just slow down the destruction; it will actually reverse it.
CONSERVATIVES MUST CHOOSE; TRUTH OR DEFEAT
If you do not reject Nominalism, you will eventually accept every leftist redefinition of law, rights, and society. The funding and forces controlling your ‘education’ understood this well, deploying their tactics teleologically, but they didn’t share your telos. If you do not recognize that truth is real, fixed, and unchangeable, you will lose every argument and every battle. If you do not ground conservatism in reality, rather than nostalgia, you will have nothing to conserve.
Will you continue trying to defend a hollowed-out conservatism built on shifting sand, or will you return to the foundation of truth, Natural Law, and objective reality?
I’m not entirely sure that “Conservatism” in its political embodiment wasn’t a fabricated entity from the outset. I’d like to be proved wrong about that - but from the depths of the weeds and machinations I’ve been exploring - I’m not holding my breath.
What You Can Do Today:
Recognize how your own education has shaped your assumptions about truth and reality. Stop accepting progressive framing; start fighting for truth, not just traditions. Demand that leaders and institutions anchor themselves in unchanging principles, not shifting political trends. If you don’t stand for 🔥Realitas, you will lose everything.
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