Democracy or What's Right?

[al Roumi]

no, Conservatism is about preservation and maintainance of society. Preservation of "existing power structues" might come under that, but that does not translate to, "we want to keep all the power for ourselves".

Conservatism is not inherrently selfish, which is your persistant position.

While it may not eaxctly be "we want to keep all the power for ourselves", it certainly is "we want things to stay as they are" -which does mean preserving the status quo Socially, politicaly and economicaly.

Lefties think that only in changing the status quo can a "fair deal" for all, if not the institutionaly exploited in particular, be ensured. Right wingers consider that sufficiently gifted/worthy people will extricate themselves from misery/poverty and that the system therefore needs no change.

Not wanting change is the very definition of the word "conservative".

Edit:

the apparent lack of compassion and unwillingness to change the system which entraps and impedes those unable to help themselves, does make conservatives look inherently selfish. That is, providing one believes the system is at least partly at fault for the misery of the unfortunates (i.e. what lefties think).