American conservatives tend to support freedom of contract and freedom of speech (including dishonest/incomplete speech) - and they consider monetary donations to politicians to be speech. They also tend to believe in supply-side economics (failures are met with “Well, you didn’t cut taxes on the rich enough!”), and the myth of the entrepreneur who singlehandedly builds a business empire (ignoring the myriad ways government supports these activities).
So... yes, American conservatives tend to dislike safety (people should be responsible for their own safety, regulation will slow down business and make everyone worse off), and they tend to support dishonest business practices (let the market handle punishment, it’s not the government’s job to decide what truth is and to make sure people are honest).
I get the sense that you're applying your feelings to a group you don't like.
As a conservative, I can say that I am interested in safety as much as anyone. I certainly don't want to become a victim of an avoidable incident, and I don't want anyone else to become a victim either.
> American conservatives tend to dislike safety (people should be responsible for their own safety, regulation will slow down business and make everyone worse off)
People being responsible for their own well-being certainly doesn't imply a dislike of safety. It's acknowledging a reality that ultimately we are responsible for our own fates. And it certainly doesn't rubber-stamp fraud, as is the case here where companies literally lied about the leveling of their product. In addition, it does not allow the government to shirk responsibility for requiring the use of the dangerous product in this case.
> it’s not the government’s job to decide what truth is
Allowing governments free reign to determine truth has historically led to immense suffering and hundreds of millions of documented deaths.
> People being responsible for their own well-being
It's literally impossible for a consumer to evaluate all the materials, labor, and external effects involved in all the products they encounter or are effected by. Even then, if they identify something they find unacceptable, how do they avoid it if it's related to a necessity and it's an industry standard?
How do you propose the consumer has any realistic chance of having a say in these matters other than collectively empowering a group of people to look into it and enact recommendations and rules?
It's acknowledging a reality that ultimately we are responsible for our own fates
Do you really mean "ultimately"? That means "in the end". At the last. Ultimately, we all die and there's nothing anyone can do about it.
None of us chose when or where to be born. None of chose how rich the family we were born into would be (the number one indicator of success in life).
People might have chosen to move into Grenfell Tower but they didn't know they were choosing to die horribly in a fire, and making choices without knowledge carries as much responsibility as saying that a lottery winner was responsible for their winnings - not untrue but hardly a maxim for life.
To say that there is a reality that ultimately we are responsible for our own fate just seems to disagree with reality.
Allowing companies to self-certify their products' safety is the same thing as rubber stamping fraud. Issues can only be caught after some disaster, as we see with Grenfell and the preventable tragedies behind every other regulation and certification board. Individual renters can't conduct independent fire safety tests on the cladding and insulation of their (low income) housing, that's absurd. Government regulation and testing for product safety is necessary for society to function, and there are many examples to this effect.
> People being responsible for their own well-being certainly doesn't imply a dislike of safety.
Totally agree, and yeah I think "conservatives on the street" aren't really advocating for Mad Max levels of safety.
But businesses spend billions (trillions?) of dollars lobbying against regulations--regulations designed explicitly to prevent tragedies like this--and their argument largely is "the market will decide". Another way to phrase this is "people should be free to choose to live in a skyscraper clad in highly flammable material if they so choose", which is classic right to contract. So, I think it's fair to remind everyone that opposing regulations and supporting "market will decide" dynamics is core conservatism.
But beyond that, how was anyone living there supposed to know this was a problem? I'm a pretty smart software engineer and I guess I would... google around for building permits? It feels like a tall ask. Like, quick show of hands, who here knows what the wires in their walls are insulated with? Is that something we think people should know? Perfect information is just... a mythical creature.
> Allowing governments free reign to determine truth has historically led to immense suffering and hundreds of millions of documented deaths.
I think there's a middle ground here between "state propaganda machine" and "free for all". It's not censorship or propaganda to require companies to meet building codes, or to punish companies for saying they meet building codes by pointing to results of rigged tests.
