Aaand that is just another example of what OP is talking about ;)

The view that someone is automatically a monster or an "oppressor" because they voted Republican is wrong and offensive in the extreme.

It is possible to vote Republican without wholly supporting - let alone personally imitating - everything that Trump does, just as it is possible to vote Democrat without wholly supporting everything Obama did.

You vote for the party that gives you the most of what you want and has a reasonable chance of being elected. Rarely if ever will you be entirely satisfied with their personal behavior or policies once in office.

Maybe being conservative just isn't that smart to begin with?

Please don't foment flamewars on HN.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

THIS is a not-insignificant part of the problem. right here. You jumped straight out of the gate with calling the OP stupid. Not even a feigned attempt at some sort of discussion or debate.

You saw the word "conservative" and BOOM it's right into the Us vs. Them, Me vs. You, Good vs. Evil. I just don't see how that is healthy, at all, for anyone or anything including the country. It's childish. Social media and karma/upvotes/likes/karma/fake-internet-points, whatever you want to call it, has devolved us into kids on the schoolyard.

United we stand, divided we fall. grow up

I mean, if you look throughout history, even at the last century, you see civil rights actions that were vehemently opposed by conservatives and traditionalists.

Votes for women, emancipation of slaves, equal rights for women, for blacks, for gays, for the transgendered, worker protections, abolition of child labour, mandatory paid leave, maternity leave, environmental protections etc.

The list could go on, and in each and every instance we have had conservatives and traditionalists fighting them tooth and nail, and losing the battle every single time.

While the comment the person you replied to is short and lacking in substance, I do think there is truth to it.

What's that old Buddhist maxim?

Change is the only constant in life or You cannot change the wind, but you can adjust your sails.

Change is a certainty, but conservatives and traditionalists have made it their life's work to resist it.

You should separate what Californians think of conservatives from what they think about Republicans. California has a lot of liberterian leaning views but not a lot of respect for the GOP.

Depends on what Republicans you're talking about, the classic Buckley, Jack Kemp, Milton Friedman style of conservative, who you can have intellectual disagreements over economic policy about, or today's nationalist, xenophobic, cult-of-personality Republicans, which I'd call Trumplicans, who have abandoned everything classical liberals stood for (free trade, immigration, against crony capitalism) and now actively enable an administration that literally threatens to intervene in markets and pick winners or create losers.

Or the people who burn their shoes and lose their minds every time someone (who is black) kneels at a football game. Those are the monsters.