Believing that....
* There are "Good Guys" and "Bad Guys".
* Good Guys win (or should win) in the end.
* Evil punished eventually.
* Hope and idealism.
DOES NOT AUTOMATICALLY MAKE YOU A CONSERVATIVE!
Quite frankly; I'm sick of Liberal/Progressiveness being associated with "Stark Realism (codeword for edgy, gloomy, pessimistic, etc.)", "True Art Is Angsty", "Accentuate The Negative", etc.
You look at Left-leaning society and the art scene (European cinema, etc.) and it's always a downer! Same with avant-garde stuff. It's always "Everything sucks and there's zilch you can do about it!". Why can't the darkness and angst have a "there's always hope" and "it can get better" vibe?
Even avant-garde artist Yoko Ono proved her peers wrong with a simple art installation....one that won John Lennon's heart; A hole in the ceiling with a magnifying glass...which one looks through and sees the word, "YES". "Yes" is very positive-feeling. Lennon saw hope in that. Say what you want with those two but even in their darkest, most seemingly-cynical mode, there was an undercurrent of "The Silver Lining".
Everyone laughs at the "Simplistic Traditional Hollywood Happy Ending" but what's wrong with that?! What's wrong with escapism? What's wrong with inspiring? What wrong with hope?
Why can't Hope, Optimism, Idealism, etc. be considered "Liberal" values. Why did the "dream" have to "die" at Altamont Speedway? True, one can be TOO idealistic to the point of Polyannish stupidity (probably what did the original youth movements back then in...).
I'm a Realist-Idealist. I'm all for hope, optimism and idealism....but I do try to not be naive. A slight bit of cynicism can be a good thing. I also try to be the silver-lining in the grimmest of situations.
For example, I like to think that Carrie White redeemed herself via-death in the original 1976 movie. When she dies, she dies inside that prayer-closet...which she hated! She could have dragged herself (with or without mom's body) to the front lawn....but she chose to die in the creepy Prayer Closet. She felt remorse for all that killing she did. She wasn't an evil person, just a sweet girl who "snapped". The only way she could redeem herself was to sacrifice her body so she could finally be free and at peace in Paradise. I ignore the message in that sign and Carrie's arm in Sue's nightmare...that's Sue's dream and Sue's guilt doing it's thing.
It's the "Gloomy-Doomy-Bohemian-Kafka-Liberal-Artsy-Fartsy" crowd with it's "True Art Is Angsty" business that gives the OP the misconception that good old-fashioned positivism, hope and triumphant good-guys are strictly "Right-Wing" territory.
Look, I'm not saying "Ban the pessimistic hyper-cynical gloom" stuff. Everyone has a right to express their views. However, I do say "give both positive & negative sides equal validity and weight".
The "dream" didn't "die" at Altamont, or at the hands of The Feds....or The Manson Family. It just went into a coma and folks wimped out too easily. It can rise again....perhaps this time in a bit more realistic, less-naive form. The dream still lives, baby!
To me, in stories, Tragedy is NOT cathartic. I just can't see how it is. When I see the Men's Club winning in The Stepford Wives...I don't see catharsis....I see the bad compounded and the activists saying "We give up"! Much of 70's cinema...even those supportive of positive social change...is a long line of bummers. While said films were brilliant and iconoclastic in their own way (and great at giving the old Hay's Code 'The Finger'), they were still grim-dark, pessimistic, misanthropic things.
Mind you, I'm not against darkness and gloom. However I see darkness and gloom in the context of "cleansing", "transition" or "purification". I think Goth imagery is cool and actually am fascinated by reading about death and funerals. Nonetheless...for me...there's an undercurrent of "Death is not The End. It's a transition". Darkness doesn't have to be negative or bad. There good & bad darkness and there's good & bad light. My spirituality and personal NeoPagan view is based on that. Though my mindset is "Hippieish" and "Rainbows", I still have some "Perky-Goth" in me. I'd love to see a "Romantic Perky Hippie-Goth" subculture. I'd definitely join it!
Call me old-fashioned....but I see media as having a very subtle influence on the human psyche....and I prefer to see "what could be" and not "what is".
Some folks dig tragedy. That's fine. However, I'm not into tragedy (though I can try to...in my head...turn a tragedy into some esoteric non-tragedy....like I did with Carrie).
John C. Wright is WRONG!