I don't get conservatives...particularly American conservatives.

Weak minded people are all in for a strong man type leader.
Freedom to these people is nothing more than permission to hate and spew ugliness.

Once upon a time in America, we had fiscal conservatives, social conservatives and other folks like segregationists (racial conservatives), but these days, they all seem to have hitched, along with sociopaths, anarchists, crony capitalists, libertarians, fascists, neo-Nazis, and others, onto Trump, and the idea that they'll somehow profit by going along with him, hating and seeking revenge on "others," especially "liberals."

They tend to want their own "freedoms" at the expense of others, but it really seems like selfishness and contempt for others is more of the central message.

For example, they're peachy keen on locking up, roughing up, and deporting others without due process, but they whine like hell when their own rights are perceived to be threatened.

"Individualism" is a myth as it would require collective thinking to have any substance

If you really want to learn about conservatives, read Our Bill of Rights and the Constitution

Well, what you are missing is, the use of the term conservative doesn't mean what it used to mean. So, the label has been claimed and the belief system and the behaviour that goes along with it are, by and large, something entirely different from what it used to be.

If you paid taxes and “ affordable healthcare”, maybe you’d know why conservatives want less government involved.

It’s called taxation without representation.

Get someone to read history books to you then maybe you’ll understand

Those are Right Wing Extremists. Not Conservatives.