Is social conservatism really winning in the United States?
These days, it’s probably easier to convince a pickup truck enthusiast to switch to a Prius than to persuade a Democrat that cultural liberalism remains dominant in the United States of the 2020s. After all, the Dobbs ruling, a Vice President who openly contemplates the virtue of diminishing voting rights for women without children, and the rise of pervasive Christian online influencers might all be seen as harbingers of America’s very own Handmaid’s Tale. Nevertheless, it is an incontrovertible fact that today’s American society is much more culturally liberal than it was 30 years ago.
Back then, social conservatives championed many pet projects fundamentally at odds with a liberal, enlightened, and secular nation. Behind each sub-group of dedicated and vociferous activists for “a proper moral order” stood sizeable segments of America’s voting populace. But what happened to these strident endeavors—banning stem cell research, instituting nationwide school prayers, teaching creationism in public schools across the country? They went nowhere. And just as these grassroots initiatives foundered, so too did popular support for them.
Meanwhile, inter-ethnic, inter-religious, inter-racial, and same-sex marriages, relationships, and partnerships have grown—accompanied by rising societal acceptance and an embrace of freedom and love over philistine bigotry. Support for the death penalty has declined, while female workforce participation and educational attainment have both improved remarkably.
Church attendance has dropped, as has the number of parents who still endorse corporal punishment. Relatedly, the number of states that permit corporal punishment in public schools has also declined. In this climate of growing cultural tolerance, cannabis has become far more socially and legally accepted—for better or worse. Immigration, too, is more popular today than it was three decades ago. The immigrant population has grown in both size and proportion, while the majority of Americans—whose views are often dismissed as broadly anti-immigration—are in fact mainly concerned about an unregulated, violent, and chaotic border. Their concerns are rooted in the perceived breakdown of law and order, a loss of national sovereignty, and a potential drain on the welfare state. Fewer and fewer oppose immigration because of fears over demographic shifts, a changing racial composition of the country, or labor market competition.
However, just like the crisis at the border, other illiberal identity-based policies have triggered a backlash. There is a renewed focus on expanding opportunity rather than enforcing equal outcomes, and a growing appreciation for the virtues of color- and gender-blindness over increasingly sectarian and divisive thought experiments that artificially impose categories among free and equal American citizens.
Affirmative action programs, policies perceived as special privileges for transgender individuals, calls for unlimited abortion access, public social micromanagement through DEI mandates in the private sector, weak on crime public prosecutors, illiberal cancel culture, and a politicized weakening of law enforcement—all have become untenable and political vulnerabilities for their unrepentant advocates. Notably, this includes the current Trump administration’s attacks on the FBI, which risk eroding its competence and integrity.
Back then, social conservatives championed many pet projects fundamentally at odds with a liberal, enlightened, and secular nation. Behind each sub-group of dedicated and vociferous activists for “a proper moral order” stood sizeable segments of America’s voting populace. But what happened to these strident endeavors—banning stem cell research, instituting nationwide school prayers, teaching creationism in public schools across the country? They went nowhere. And just as these grassroots initiatives foundered, so too did popular support for them.
Meanwhile, inter-ethnic, inter-religious, inter-racial, and same-sex marriages, relationships, and partnerships have grown—accompanied by rising societal acceptance and an embrace of freedom and love over philistine bigotry. Support for the death penalty has declined, while female workforce participation and educational attainment have both improved remarkably.
Church attendance has dropped, as has the number of parents who still endorse corporal punishment. Relatedly, the number of states that permit corporal punishment in public schools has also declined. In this climate of growing cultural tolerance, cannabis has become far more socially and legally accepted—for better or worse. Immigration, too, is more popular today than it was three decades ago. The immigrant population has grown in both size and proportion, while the majority of Americans—whose views are often dismissed as broadly anti-immigration—are in fact mainly concerned about an unregulated, violent, and chaotic border. Their concerns are rooted in the perceived breakdown of law and order, a loss of national sovereignty, and a potential drain on the welfare state. Fewer and fewer oppose immigration because of fears over demographic shifts, a changing racial composition of the country, or labor market competition.
However, just like the crisis at the border, other illiberal identity-based policies have triggered a backlash. There is a renewed focus on expanding opportunity rather than enforcing equal outcomes, and a growing appreciation for the virtues of color- and gender-blindness over increasingly sectarian and divisive thought experiments that artificially impose categories among free and equal American citizens.
Affirmative action programs, policies perceived as special privileges for transgender individuals, calls for unlimited abortion access, public social micromanagement through DEI mandates in the private sector, weak on crime public prosecutors, illiberal cancel culture, and a politicized weakening of law enforcement—all have become untenable and political vulnerabilities for their unrepentant advocates. Notably, this includes the current Trump administration’s attacks on the FBI, which risk eroding its competence and integrity.
