Were 80s slasher flicks politically conservative?

It depends on the slasher. Wes Craven made the excellent 'Scream' and the supernatural slasher 'A Nightmare On Elm Street' (1984). He filmed a documentary in The White House when Bill Clinton was in office and was reported to have voted for Barack Obama. He was often castigated by the conservative press and called a vile, reprehensible, subversive communist back in the 1970s.