NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The counselor to the president who likes to tweet and retweet advised conservatives to conduct their advocacy in person instead of lingering online.
On the first morning of the Conservative Political Action Conference, Kellyanne Conway was asked how conservative college students can “survive in terms of being in these more liberal institutions.”
“Several different ways; first of all, don’t live online, live in real time. I’m just astonished how many people live online,” she said, garnering applause from the audience.
“On Facebook, Twitter, texting, e-mails, remember, it’s a mode of communication, it is not communication. It’s not real life. So step aside, make sure people see something other than the top of your head and live in real time, in the real world,” she added.
Conway noted that she saw “a lot of old timers like me in the audience, too,” and didn’t “want to give them short shrift.”
“Thank you for sticking with the conservative movement. Thank you for believing in a set of ideas and principles that are timeless beyond politics, beyond any one political candidate or party, which is far less important, frankly, than the idea that you bring to bear,” she said.
“Converse with each other, help each other out. I learned so much from our younger staffers, a great deal of technologies, their native tongue, they had these great experiences and great perspectives. And they learn form us. Go ahead and mentor folks and do that exchange of information and ideas. Be willing to have a lunch or a coffee with someone. Don’t be too busy for other people is really what I would say, don’t be too busy for each other because that is something also today that I find to be incredibly unfortunate.”
Conway told the audience she believes in “an individual feminism, if you will, that you make your own choices.”
“I look at myself as a product of my choices, not a victim of my circumstances. And that’s really clearly what conservatives, feminism, if you will, is all about,” she said, adding that “one thing that’s been a little bit disappointing and revealing is — that I hope will get better is — turns out that a lot of women just have a problem with women in power.”
“You know, this whole sisterhood, this whole let’s go march for women’s rights and, you know, just constantly talking about what women look like or what they wear, or making fun of their choices or presuming that they’re not as powerful as the men around,” she said. “This presumptive negativity about women in power I think is very unfortunate, because let’s just try to access that and have a conversation about it, rather than a confrontation about it.”
Join the conversation as a VIP Member