I see. So for example, India's government revoking Kashmir's independence and imposing demographic change on it [1] is progressive, and resisting it is conservative. Likewise, unifying China is progressive, while ethno-religious resistance by the Uyghur's is conservative. The Republicans efforts to advance from a country of immigrants, to a country of natives, is progressive, while Democrats wishing the US remains a country of immigrants is conservative.

But these are just a handful of counter-examples, sorry, exceptions, sorry, sleight-of-hand. Add more epicycles to your theory of how your ideological opponents are just irrationally evil and want to bring back all the worst parts of the past, and all these exceptions will be explained away, and we shall see that the Earth stands still.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/08/08/kashmirs-new...

If my ideological opponents say "We want to bring back the past", I generally take them at their word.

If they say "We think this is a better way to move forward" and somehow manage to avoid giving the impression that they really just want to try to recreate some imagined version of the past, I generally give them the benefit of the doubt.

"We want to bring back the past regarding ecosystem integrity. We want to move forward with unsustainable fishing and oil drilling."

Because they don't say "bring back the past wholesale" - you are twisting their words. What they say is "bring back the past in these specific cases, and not others". But a motivated listener can always find ways to misunderstand.

> But a motivated listener can always find ways to misunderstand.

No more questions, your honor.