I have met many people and have myself been in many walks of life, have been all over the
United States, and have talked to all sorts of people about politics. So
for what it’s worth I feel qualified to psychoanalyze conservatives (and everyone else for that matter).
From what I have seen, when people adopt or advocate traditionally conservative viewpoints1, it is almost always out of reasons other than compassion, sympathy, or generosity. It is very often a visceral and negative reaction to things about the world that they don’t like or understand. This is not to say that one can’t arrive at traditionally conservative positions with a heart full of good intentions, it is just to say that people don’t usually arrive at them that way.
In the most common situation then, conservatives, IMHO, are indeed mean spirited as regards their politics. They want the government to control how you or I spend our free time and who we choose to love simply because they want to exercise authority. They hate welfare not for any of its specific (and many) policy failings, but simply because it is benefiting someone unlike them.2 In what is possibly an extreme example, the Wall Street Journal editorial of November 25, 2002 actually advocated for increasing the taxes on the poorest Americans.
This is not to say that traditional conservatives have a monopoly on mean-ness, but they are mean more often than not.
1 By ‘traditionally conservative,’ I mean ‘conservative’ as it is understood in contemporary American political discourse - favoring fewer government programs and less regulation of corporations but more regulation of people’s private lives. Conservative can have a host of different meanings, but this is the one that is used in this node.
2 If this doesn’t ring true, think about how infrequently (traditional) conservatives rail against corporate welfare and subsidies, even though they are much more costly to the federal treasury. Not often.