I’m not sure I’m politically knowledgeable to know what a liberal is
(This is a joke, and I don’t need anyone to explain it to me. The thing I struggle with is discerning whether the people I’m talking to at any given point know what a liberal is)
When someone calls me a fascist but isn’t politically knowledgeable enough to know I’m a centrist 🧘
and if somebody wants to know where that character is from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moomins
!moomin@sopuli.xyz if you are interested in the comic!
Okedoke, well I just learned that I have no concrete grasp of political labels and need to do a LOT of research.
Extreme simplification:
Liberalism: supports capitalism. Current system + tweaks
Leftism: supports anticapitalism of some form, the two biggest umbrellas being Marxism/Communism and Anarchism
Marxism/Communism: supports collectivization, public ownership, and central planning (I have an introductory reading list if you want to learn more, or just read Principles of Communism)
Anarchism: supports full horizontalism and networks of communes
Thank you for the reading list! I’ll take a gander :)
They’re conveniently leaving out the entire concept of Socialism for some reason, while making sure to mention Marxism by name.
So I would make sure to add that to the list. Communism is a specific form of socialism, but the two are non synonymous.
No problem!
Sorry to say I’m a self aware liberal capitalist. I must say I love to consoom (with some moderation)
You can still get goods and services in Socialism and Communism, I don’t know what you mean by “consooming.”
New kids are trying to pretend that liberal means centrist instead of its actual meaning which is simply “not conservative”
Liberalism is an ideology. Conservatism is a position on an ideologic binary. Uf you ascribe to Liberalism you are claiming belief in a very specific form of government and economy. If you claim to be a conservative you need to clarify what kind of conservative you are.
That is not and have never been it’s meaning. In fact, conservatives are a type of liberal.
No they are not unless if they are conservative Liberals. A conservative Maoist and a conservative libertarian have very different ideologies despite being conservative within their own binaries. This is due to the fact that conservatism is a position in a binary and is not an ideology.
You can be a conservative and be illiberal.
Ok, sure. But the “conservatives” that they were referring to are liberals.
They state “In fact, conservatives are a type of liberal” and that’s objectively incorrect.
I have news for you. The most notorious conservatives in the last few decades (Reagan, Thatcher, Trump, to name the most significant) are all neoliberals.
Economic liberalization, according to Wikipedia, is the lessening of government regulations and restrictions in an economy in exchange for greater participation by private entities. Policies in service of this include privatization, deregulation, depoliticisation, consumer choice (“the invisible hand of the free market”), globalization (economic imperialism), free trade, monetarism, austerity, and reductions in government spending. These policies are designed to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society.
You might not realize it, but this encompasses the entirety of your US political options. For example, when Democrats say they want to make housing more affordable; they don’t mean they want a government-driven effort to build housing, control rent prices, or win any ground back from corporate landlords. They mean they want to supply tax incentives to big business and “cut red tape” by deregulating the housing industry. They talk about it differently, but at the end of the day they want and work towards the same things as Republicans, if not in a slightly less obviously fascist way.
Liberalism overall is a conservative ideology. The way american media uses these terms is completely disconnected from reality. They don’t want you to understand that who you’re cheering for does not represent you or further your views. They don’t want you to understand what leftism is, they just want you to be afraid of it. They want you to pick a flavor of conservative and think you made progress for the social good.
If you deliberately ignore context, sure.
🤣
deleted by creator
Near as I can tell, a leftist would do anything to keep a liberal out of power over believing only 75% of the same things as them, and allow the right to take control, but at least they get to keep the moral high ground of not allowing a liberal to do that 25%. Never mind that the right actively opposed everything to leftist wants completely.
When discussing liberalism in the context of liberalism vs Leftism, they are faily opposite. Liberalism desires Capitalism, perhaps with some tweaks or larger safety nets, while leftists seek to end Capitalism and pursue Socialism of some form. This isn’t “75%” of the same views at all, liberalism is fundamentally entirely incompatible with Leftism just like fascism is incompatible with leftism.
Additionally, in the West, Leftists have not been the deciding factor in elections, liberals have, be they more conservative or more progressive liberals.
You know, if leberals wanted the support of the leftists, they try something called compromises. But the only compromises they’re ready to do is with the fascists unfortunately, which the leftists will never support.
So no, the leftists didn’t refuse to make compromises. The liberals did, with the left, because they actually accepted all the compromises with the fascists. And act now surprised that fascism is taking over.
Liberals are spoiled children incapable of taking accountability for their actions.
Liberals are “the right” and they sure as hell don’t believe 75% of the same things as leftists. Leftists in the west also don’t really have the power to keep liberals out of power, hence why liberals have consistently been the only ones in power for decades. Liberals on the other hand, absolutely do have the power to keep leftists out, and they will go as far as allying with fascists to murder leftists in their beds.
Liberalism is literally and historically where the left begins. The right is authoritarianism and the left is liberalism to anarchism. Liberals are not leftists but it is a signof a distinct lack of education in political philosophy to claim liberalism as a right wing ideology.
Liberalism is the ideological basis of Capitalism. When Capitalism was a progressive force, ie during the French Revolution, it was considered left wing. Now that Capitalism has become entrenched and turned to Imperialism, the progressive side is undeniably Socialism, while liberalism entrenches the status quo.
Simply saying that liberalism at one point was progressive does not mean history has not had several centuries of shifts and developments since then.
You’re being incredibly euro-centric with your claims here.
How so?
Liberalism didn’t exist for most of history, so trying to invoke “history” to argue that liberalism has some kind of timeless and eternal claim to being on the left is unconvincing. Yes, liberalism was the left in the eighteenth century, but we’re in the twenty first century.
The division of political ideologies into left and right derives from the French Parliament which had the monarchists on the right and the liberals on the left.
Every reference to right and left stems from this so yes in fact Liberalism has always been where the left starts even if liberals are nit leftists because the political left is anti-authoritarian.
The binary has not changed and I promise you any claim ypu make to the contrary is going to be mired in euro-centric beliefs.
I always try to tell the Marxists this, but they always come up with some dumb rebuttal.
We’re the People’s Front of Judea, not the FUCKING Judean People’s Front!
Wankers!
Unpopular opinion:
Alienating liberals doesn’t create more leftists, it only causes people to be dismissive of the term and dig in their heels.
Insulting them rather than educating them does nothing but divide anyone left of center and after the last election I think it’s abundantly clear that we need to be unified rather than divided.
No one is going to argue that left leaning candidates aren’t far from perfect, but they’re a hell of a lot better than the far-right fascists were about to have in power in less than 2 weeks.
Yes, I agree modern liberals are too centrist and ineffective but at the end of the day they’re light-years ahead of the far right, and I’d rather be agitated about having another centrist administration than alarmed and outraged at the onset of fascism.The liberals have to do their mea culpa, not the left. Right now it will soon be a matter of choosing a side : humanism or fascism. Until now the liberals always chose fascism and called the leftists dangerous extremists.
Choose a side liberals. You made the world what it is today. And you’re now blaming the leftists and asking them to support your insanity. That’s not how it works. Leftists know which side they are fighting for, and they will suffer the consequences. What about you liberals?
I don’t think they really are “light years ahead of the right”. Most of the difference as far as I can tell is in how they talk-- not what they do. Liberals fundamentally just believe in the status quo. MLK Jr saw it the same way when he described " the white moderate" as the greatest obstacle to change.
I’m definitely willing to engage liberals (and even conservatives) in honest conversation when I feel the context warrants the effort. Lemmy rarely seems to qualify.
I think we’re about to find out, in the coming months, just how “far ahead” of the right they are.
last election I think it’s abundantly clear that we need to be unified rather than divided.
Who’s “we”? Liberals are not on the left and are ideological enemies of the left: you can’t be unified with people who fundamentally oppose you.
Also, which election? Oh right, you’re one of the those American liberals who think foreigners are fictional characters. That explains why you think leftists would want to ally with the people committing genocide against these “fictional characters”
I definitely feel like we can be unified against things like: islamic extremism, climate change denial, fascist government policies, etc no?
what is the benefit of writing a response with such a hostile tone?
What’s the benefit of mollycoddleing genocide apologists like Chainweasel?
this is a false dichotomy. in this context, i don’t think there’s much benefit to mollycoddling, and i don’t think there’s much benefit to open hostility. i was simply trying to ask why you chose to reply in such a hostile tone.
it’s also not clear to me how chainweasel is a genocide apologist. could you explain how you reached that conclusion?
Because he thinks it makes him look cool and edgy, especially in an environment like this, where the way to gain popularity is to be the most extreme far left voice in the crowd.
People like that are the vegans of politics: even if you may agree with them in many ways, their repulsive attitude and conduct more than overrules any common views you might share.
People like that are the vegans of politics: even if you may agree with them in many ways, their repulsive attitude and conduct more than overrules any common views you might share.
And the left is just lousy with them. It’s been their main hurdle since time immemorial… Constant infighting and purity tests that prevent them from unifying against a common enemy.
Well you see, I reached that conclusion by reading their comments and not being deliberately disingenuous.
thats not an unpopular opinion though? maybe on the west? revolutions happen by convincing your fellow brothers, not by force or manipulation.
this is the hard part imo, we all have to go against the media machine.
Liberals facilitate fascism
That’s why it’s important to communicate with them rather than alienating them.
You’re talking as if for over a year (cough decades cough) Palestinian activists hadn’t tried talking to the liberals about their party’s unshakable support for the ongoing genocide.
What’s left to say to people who are “going to pick the lesser of 2 evils” even when you showed them that their pick is still funding the ethnic cleansing of all Palestinian people?
We should talk to general leftist people. Not the liberals. They still value money and profit over people
i probably would have taken that liberal stance long ago, but i had people explain their views to me in a good way that eventually made me rethink some of the things i held as truth. its just that it doesnt happen overnight. im not saying anyone will be convinced but the socialist strategy of getting people talking about political topics in a consistent organized way actually helps a lot here.
I might sound like an asshole and I apologize in advance if I do because it’s not about you specifically in this case but, while I’m glad that you had people in your life who were willing to consistently talk to you and help you rethink some things, the problem to me is exactly that like you said, it does not happen overnight. At all. It actually takes a long time and a lot of trust between people to achieve what was achieved with you in this particular case. And while I am certainly glad to have another ally, time is a luxury in some cases.
Using the case of Palestine, a Palestinian village getting bombed because so many liberals simply don’t value their lives enough and don’t pressure their officials to do something about it, doesn’t have the luxury of time.
As another example, the collapse of our ecosystem is happening every single day. And while we let companies continue business as usual, those liberals think that it’s a topic that can always be postponed. But it can’t. And now we’re past the point of no return and yet we waste time in pointless conversations trying to explain to people that what is happening, is happening.
If some people on the left are willing to and have the time to take liberals by the hand and explain to them things they could look up for themselves if only they weren’t so dismissive and disinterested in the suffering of others, great. They surely have my thank. But I don’t think as a general strategy makes sense to wait for such liberal people to suddenly decide that importent issues are finally important enough to them to be acted upon.
Those issues have always been important and worthwhile. Their previous lack of interest about such topics is their own failure.
Using the case of Palestine, a Palestinian village getting bombed because so many liberals simply don’t value their lives enough and don’t pressure their officials to do something about it, doesn’t have the luxury of time.
It’s disingenuous and unhelpful to put the entirety of the blame for this on liberals… You are really letting a whole lot of awful people off the hook when you do this.
I feel like “liberal” has become the under-educated leftist’s version of “everyone that disagrees with me is a fascist” meme.
Why? They will side with fascism over leftism every time.
That assumption isn’t true. Socialists aren’t born that way, most come out of the status quo ideology of liberalism. By abandoning all liberals with blanket statements, we’d simply self-fulfill that prophecy. Even US libertarian militias, a peak of liberalist ideology, have sometimes sided with antifascists over fascists (see: Redneck Revolt lines of affiliation with American Pit Vipers).
You’re referencing a real trend, and there’s a kernel of truth behind it, however it’s harmful to the socialist movement to assume that as a universal inevitability.
There aren’t enough leftists to win with violence, so our only hope is to win with dialogue. What’s your plan?
Dialogue can’t change the mode of production, so we must create more leftists so revolution becomes feasible.
agreed – how do we make more leftists though?
Talking and organizing.
Exactly. Talking. Violence isn’t going to make more leftists.
That said, call me paranoid but I think three-letter organizations are the main obstacle to organizing. I don’t know what to do about that.
Revolution will be required eventually, which was the original point.
By telling potential allies they’re as bad as the enemy of course! It’ll start working any day now.
The leftists have their own magical thinking and it’s seems be to inherient to the movement. But unlike rightist magcial thinking, one cannot bully their way to a leftist paradise so right wins and will always win until the leftists compromise. No sign of that happening in my life time.
I mean, liberalism and those who support the current system are bad, yes. That doesn’t mean it is necessarily deiliberate, but the Capitalist and by extension Imperialist system most of us on Lemmy live in is an extreme source of cruelty and brutality worldwide.
Don’t know what you mean by “magical thinking” though.
Liberals are the enemy though.
I disagree, so my plan is just violence
Apparently to some that’s the goal. I had a chat with a leftist a while back while the US election was in full swing and she was absolutely against the concept of voting for a lesser evil, since the worse things get, the more people will turn to leftist extremism, which is a win in her book. Suffice it to say, that talk made me anything but sympathetic of her view…
Calling US leftists extremists is the funniest joke I’ve read today!
Truth is liberals are much more extremists than most leftists. At some point they will need to realise it and take responsibility for the shit they did for so long.
And that is an accelerationist. Anyone champing at the bit for a violent revolution is deeply naive or deranged. We need to put the brakes on at all levels and speeding up extremism will only get innocents killed. The status quo sucks but anyone who has lived in a war torn nation can tell you a chained rabid dog is better than a loose one.
You’re already committing genocide and killing innocents by the hundreds of thousands, there is no chain on the rabid dog that is the USA. Fuck comfortable US liberals who believe they should never have to be subject to what they do to foreigners: anything that destabilizes the US and brings the collapse of its empire closer is a win.
I am?
Push an American liberal on their disgusting views and they inevitably try some bad faith troll, like pretending to be illiterate as you are doing
Removed by mod
See? You’re deliberately playing dumb.
as has been pointed out and you keep demonstrating you’re a bad faith troll. dont expect us to engage with you.
Currently, the usual settler-colonialism internally as well as the genocide of Palestinians externally.
Gestures at the current state of affairs
I don’t think patience is working guys.
Patience was a virtue.
But stabbing your neighbor isn’t exactly something most people are willing to do.
And any sort of attempt at organization leads to Alphabet Squad raids and whatever bullshit charges they feel like throwing at you after deciding you’re guilty of being a dirty commie/socialist/librul/not them.
We really need to not stab our neighbors, anyway. CEOs, however.
Whacking a CEO doesn’t do shit. They just install a new one and divert more funding to the police state.
That’s a lie. Capitalists will only make compromises if their lives (directly or figuratively) is in danger. That’s what History demonstrates.
Right now they’re so comfortable with power and propaganda that they’d rather make fascism happen.
Violence is the only language they understand. I’m not talking about everyone here, I’m talking about the capitalist overlords. They’re ruthless monsters who only understands vital threat to their way of life or their life directly.
The person you are replying to is a Marxist, they are revolutionary but anti-adventurist. Violence is a requirement, but its form and direction makes a huge difference.
You’ll soon see what fascists do with violence. In an idealistic world, pacifism is fine. But in reality the threat of violence is still the only thing that can prevent violence from the opposing side.
Violence has been used to shut down leftist for decades now. Pacifism did nothing to prevent capitalism from degenerating. At some point one need to accept the reality.
I don’t disagree with you. I think the reason you aren’t understanding what the Marxists are saying is a difference in understanding of revolution, pacifism, and adventurism.
Killing a random CEO? Will not put the working class in power. Cool move, but not going to change anything.
Organizing a revolution? Will change society, as it has done historically many times in favor of Leftists.
Revolution isn’t pacifist, it’s organized violence. Random assassinations aren’t a part of that process.
One. Sure. 100? 500? Maybe not.
At that point, just organize a revolution like has already been done, nobody has assassinated a revolution into success.
Funny enough, this exact conversation was had a long time ago, Lenin and the Bolsheviks advocated organizing the working class and reading theory, while the Socialist Revolutionaries advocated abandoning theory (believing it to cause more conflict among comrades than unity) and advocated assassinations. Ultimately, the Bolsheviks ended up being correct, which is why I think we can learn a lot from our predecessors in analyzing how our own conditions are similar and different in coming up with a strategy that works for us.
Butt stabbing sounds like the perfect way to get the message across.
How are you any different from an extremist right winger at that point? You want violence rather than solutions.
You want violence rather than solutions
Violence is a tool which can, and in the past has, created solutions when used appropriately. It’s how we dissolve the fascist groups in my area.
The problem with extremist right wingers isn’t merely that they’re violent, the issues are:
- Their demands and rationale (based on their values as a ‘right winger’)
- *Their ill-conceived, anti-social use of violence *(e.g. race war PotD envisioned by neo-Nazi terrorists, a strategy that history has demonstrated simply doesn’t work. They’re not even achieving their goals, just slaughtering innocent citizens)
Look at prominent cases of whoever you declare to be ‘left wing extremists’. They’re typically targeting specific atrocious people or groups like neo-Nazis or heads of state or capitalist industrialists, not just terrorizing citizens.
When peaceful protest is ignored or violently stopped, what other choice is there but to react violently?
Protest is the alternative to revolution. When protest goes ignored just so the powerful can retain their power, violence is the only remaining solution.
History tells us this time and time again.
Wheres your protests? You haven’t even tried to see if it gets put down.
BLM, Occupy Wall Street, the protests during Bush’s invasions in the Middle East, and a myriad of others would like to know your location.
Have you been sleeping this past year or so?
Have you been living under a rock, in a cave, on Mars?
And any sort of attempt at organization leads to Alphabet Squad raids and whatever bullshit charges they feel like throwing at you after deciding you’re guilty of being a dirty commie/socialist/librul/not them.
This is simply false, at least in the western countries I’m familiar with. Most organizations will get monitoring at worst unless they’re an imminent threat, plotting clearly illegal acts or in an unusually strict region.
Now, one could argue that effective organization will inevitably imply illegal acts or become an imminent threat, and that’s reasonable but that’s very different to claiming “any sort of attempt at organization leads to Alphabet Squad raids”, an unnecessarily and baselessly dissuasive claim.
If you want some violence, i’m sure you wouldn’t shy calling yourself commie and rallying under that red flag.
I also would recommend preparing digital violence, less bloodshed but very effective. Although hacking is not for everyone either.
Less stabby, more education
If you’re patient enough, it always works out 💪
I gave up on this conversation years ago.
Fine, for the sake of argument, I’m a liberal, because I don’t want to give you 45 extra minutes of my time in this comment section to try and explain the difference when I know you’ll ignore most of what I say anyhow, and derail us from the point I was actually trying to make. If I’m a liberal in your mind, so be it. My point stands.
What is the difference? I’m not sure what I am any more.
I’m not sure what I am any more.
Political labels are pretty junk, especially after centuries of mass media and propaganda in the mix. I find it helps to learn to convey your values specifically if you want to avoid that whole mess.
- The ‘left-right spectrum’ is subjective and relative which makes it pretty useless without having a ton of context. “Leftist”, by itself, is mostly a meaningless term. To socialists, a progressive liberal is usually considered center or even right wing. Some socialists even call other socialists right-wing. It’s just pointless.
- What the US mass media calls ‘liberals’ is a progressive liberal in political science. What the US mass media calls a conservative is usually a conservative liberal aka right-liberal, that’s why they constantly prize liberty and freedom. The US libertarian is simply a classical liberal. They’re all liberals!
Useful video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nPVkpWMH9k - “Why the political compass is wrong”, explaining how vague and ultimately ineffective the left-right auth-lib models of politics are.
I don’t like progressive used that way because historically progressivism was just about an ideology that was results driven and often independent of other labels. There were progressive conservatives like Teddy Roosevelt and the Nelson Rockefeller Republicans in America (though the progressive conservatives in Canada are anything but). They were fundamentally liberals though, essentially a watered down version of radlibs.
Liberalism is the ideological aspect of Capitalism, Leftists support some form of Socialism.
So you concede that social democrats are leftists?
Social Democrats support Capitalism with enlarged safety nets, they don’t support Socialism. So, no.
You just said leftists support some form of socialism. According to the Wikipedia page, a social democracy is a social, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist and democratic approach toward achieving limited socialism.
So social democrats have to be leftists then
No, not really. First of all, Wikipedia is not some holy text. Many Social Democrats consider themselves open to working towards a collectivized economy, but the facts remain that
-
Such a path has historically proven to be impossible
-
Such a definition of Socialism used on that Wikipedia page generally equates it to “Socialism is when the government does stuff.”
So what is an acceptable level of socialism required for a government or ideology to be considered leftist in your view?
Also, don’t you think the emphasis on public control over resources or greater economic equality in social democracies reflects some socialist principles, even if it’s not socialism in the Marxist sense?
Finally, even if social democracies don’t meet the Marxist criteria for socialism, wouldn’t you say that they represent a critique of capitalism and an attempt to address its contradictions, even if they don’t go far enough?
Good questions.
-
I don’t think it makes sense to classify Socialism as a quantitative measure, but qualitative. If you recall from Politzer’s work, there’s really no such thing as a “pure” system, ergo when deciding if an ideology is Capitalist or Socialist we need to see what it does and what it works towards.
-
Social Democracy definitely borrows from Socialism and Socialists, certainly in aesthetics and many supporters genuinely believe in Reformism as a tactic (even if I personally think it obviously disproven at this point). However, the basis of Social Democracy is in not only maintaining markets (which are found in Socialist countries as well), but Bourgeois control and the present institutions formed in Bourgeois interests, such as the US 2 party system. Without doing anything to truly assert proletarian control over the economy and leaving the Bourgeoisie uncontested besides the “democratic” institutions they set up and approve of, I don’t consider it truly Socialist.
-
In a way. If we are being serious, all ideologies are critiques of the present system in some way, even libertarian Capitalists believe in significant critiques of modern Capitalism. What matters more is the manner and character of the changes. In Social Democracy, even if adherents think social safety nets need to be expanded, they don’t typically think we should work towards collectivization and public ownership, and wish to “harness Capitalism.” In addition, the Nordic Countries many seek to replicate only exist via Imperialism, they fund their social safety nets largely through massive IMF loans and other high interest rate forms of exploiting the Global South. It’s like if Chase Bank were a country.
-
-
If you’re not conservative, you’re liberal.
Kids are trying to pretend the term is more complicated than that.
No, leftists are not liberal. And, in fact, conservatives are.
This is what I’m talking about 😅
Well, many flavors of conservatives are. Not the fascists though.
That’s true, though I genuinely don’t know if fascists fall under the umbrella of “conservatives”.
If you’re looking for a label, I recommend not. Soon after you pick one, the definition for that label will change and no longer fit your ideology. This change might be due to your own understanding improving, or due to societal shifts, or both.
Write out your ideology in long form. People tend to support good ideas when not attached to politically charged labels.
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Nope.
Yep.
It also makes sens, if you’re not knowledgeable on politics, your reasoning might rather resemble a philosophical one.
And philosophically speaking the basis of liberalism could means both left or right wing values depending on the philosopher.
For exemple Kant’s philosophy was based on rational individuals to wich giving positive rights would permit to govern themselves. It also means laws would be universal wich would create equality. You can see how this could be compatible with some anarchist ideas or more generally with democracy.
In communism you would also have those positive rights. But you would also justify interventions to protect those rights, against lack of resources for instance (although that’s outside of Kant’s scope).
In the contrary, Lock’s ideas is negative rights to protect people from the government and each other. Guaranteeing things like property. And ultimately wanting freedom. Thus giving the right wing liberalism it mainly refers to today.
Furthermore it’s the basis of capitalism. Which, if i’m being honest, is mostly what’s implied by liberalism when it comes to the economy, although i would argue against. With how defective capitalism is you could argue protectionism should be wanted by liberals to prevent all thoses monopolies we see everywhere. In this instance we could see a part of liberalism that tend more towards a leftist idea.
