The time to nominate candidates for the 2016 presidential election is approaching. There has been much speculation about who the Republicans will choose and some names that have been consistently mentioned are Chris Christie (R–N.J.), Marco Rubio (R–Fla.), Jeb Bush (R–Fla.), Mike Huckabee (R–Ark.), Ted Cruz (R–TX) and Rand Paul (R–KY). Conversation about this topic has been spurred by a caller on Rush Limbaugh’s radio talk show. The caller made the bold statement that, “the future of our country depends on a great executive,” he said, “and not a great politician.”

Many would suggest that to the Republicans, the best candidate is the most conservative candidate. However, this raises the question of what the word conservative actually means in today’s society. The Oxford English Dictionary defines conservative as “holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation, typically in relation to politics or religion.”

The misuse and over employment of the term conservative has begun to render the word somewhat meaningless. As it stands, most people mistakenly use conservative and Republican interchangeably. So when there is a true conservative Republican, many don’t understand the designation. To bring the meaning back to conservative, the media should severely limit their use of the word.

The problem with this is that, as Conor Friedersdorf wrote in The Atlantic, “Today, every GOP contender self-identifies as a conservative.” The truth, however, is that not all Republicans are conservatives, or they are not at least completely abiding by the true definition of the word. Conservatives are set apart from other Republicans by their strict adherence to moral conservative values. Many conservatives believe in marriage equality and are anti-abortion.

Rather than misusing conservative, the media should eliminate it from their vocabulary. As a result it would be forced to more clearly and accurately describe politicians. Then the public will have a much better idea of who these candidates are and what it is they believe in.

As Eliezer Yudkowsky said in his post on LessWrong.com, “When you find yourself in philosophical difficulties, the first line of defense is not to define your problematic terms, but to see whether you can think without using those terms at all.” It is probably not plausible to expect everyone to properly use conservative, but Republicans themselves should do their part in preserving the meaning behind this word. They are ultimately the ones in charge of creating the image of their party. It would be much more efficient to limit who is defined as a conservative.

One of the most well known conservative leaders was former President Ronald Reagan. He was a spokesperson for the values of conservatism before his term in office. And the decisions he made in office, such as proposing an amendment to allow for prayer in schools, exemplify conservative values as opposed to Republican ones. This is unlike Christie, who is incorrectly described as a conservative. His policies such as favoring some gun control laws in his home state and holding more moderate views on illegal immigration make it difficult to classify him as a conservative.

If the media are able to filter their word choice when speaking about Republican candidates, then it will be much clearer to society what the word conservative really means. This will eliminate confusion, strengthen the legitimacy of the term and clarify the difference between the average Republican and the conservative Republican.

Victoria Razzi is a freshman magazine journalism major. Her column appears weekly. She can be reached at vcrazzi@syr.edu and followed on twitter at @vrazzi.

Published on February 8, 2015 at 11:15 am