Really pay attention to the lyrics in the latter half because I mean every fucking word
If I were literally drowning and you reached our your arm to help I would grab your hand but not to accept your help, I would rather drag you down into the abyss with me
So you’re saying I was a liberal my whole life but just didn’t know it until I fortuitously came across this meme thread and all these helpful people pointed it out? Checks out 🤟
You live in the biggest liberal country, it's politics are liberal. It's ruling parties are flavors of liberalism, you just aren't aware of the terminology I guess. It doesn't help that the conservative wing of the liberals here label their opponents liberal, it's an easy misunderstanding to have.
Yes you have always been a Liberal because you exist in a hegemonic Liberal society, ie the only option presented ever are various flavors of Liberal. You are like a fish who doesn’t understand what water is because you’ve never tried to jump above its surface
You're being deliberately obfuscating. Read the rest of the thread, they're literally responding to you, not making a universal claim about living in a country meaning you become that country's politics.
I wish, unfortunately it’s very difficult to gain permanent residency in almost all of the socialist states and they are under intense siege and embargo by the dominant Liberal world order.
Liberalism is a word that means different things to different people, especially from country to country.
Having its origins in the assertion of bourgeois right against conservative forces, liberalism of all its different varieties is generally an ideology of the urban bourgeoisie. Very broadly, liberalism asserts individual autonomy against the intrusion of the community into that. The main source of ambiguity in liberalism is the divergence between “economic liberalism” and “civic liberalism”.
“Economic liberalism”, sometimes called Neo-liberalism or “big-L Liberalism” advocates a laissez faire economic regime, i.e., the right of property-owners to exercise the power of money unhindered by regulations, redistributive taxes and so on. Economic liberalism therefore easily makes common cause with the traditional sources of conservative politics – the landed aristocracy and Christian fundamentalists. Neo-liberalism (“Economic rationalism” in Australia) favours reliance on market forces to resolve social problems, rather than methods of state regulation.
“Civic liberalism” on the other hand, emphasises the importance of individual autonomy against determination by traditional norms, racial prejudice, entrenched power relations and economic disadvantage. Under the banner of “equality of opportunity”, civic liberalism can come close to forms of communitarianism in emphasising the responsibility of the community to secure the basic conditions of life of members of the community, or, under the banner of “freedom of the individual” on the other hand, to libertarianism, in emphasising the rights of individuals to make “life-style” choices free from interference by the community, provided they do no harm to others.
In the U.S., “liberal” has the specific connotation of seeking to promote the social good without challenging the right of the ruling class to rule. Thus, the American ‘liberal’ who wants higher wages and a better health service is quite distinct from the labour activist who aims for much the same things but whose conception is that this entails a fight against the ruling elite.
Too bad. I think in its common usage, it's clear that it varies. We use the Marxist definition which is standard and class based as opposed to relativistic.
Do you have a definition of liberalism that you find useful?
It's not as though democrats were leaping at the chance to roll back the PATRIOT act or close Gitmo. When Trump was president, they moan about how "insane and backward" his tariffs were, only to double down once in office. It's like how congress members behave one way when the cameras are in the room, and another when they're off; the difference is slight and exaggerated for our viewing pleasure.
"Well behaved" You weird racist losers who think of other countries like naughty children to be controlled have been the same flavor of stupid for the last several hundred years, and you deserve the social decay capitalism has wrought on your life.
It's more like what hundreds of years of political and economic theory have to say, but you clearly don't read so that explains why seeing the terms used correctly has you completely baffled.
Nah there are plenty of communists and fascists on other Lemmy instances as well. We call people liberals when they do liberal things like voting for a capitalist who implemented neoliberal policies
You’re never going to find a perfect candidate. Trump wants to be an isolationist, sort of how the US was prior to WW2 but he’s also an assclown.
Harris at least can speak in complete sentences so the bar is pretty low around here.
If there’s a third party that isn’t just some joke then I’m all for it but the system is what it is and currently Harris is the best option for me out of the two.
That said, you’re not gonna find anyone in any kind of official capacity in the USA who is going to side with anyone cozied up with Irans government.
we aren't looking for a candidate. We aren't voting because we have a principled stance against this government and both of its parties. Not because we're demanding some sort of "perfect candidate."
So I said “a capitalist who implemented neoliberal policies” and you thought I was criticizing Harris? I was talking about how Trump is a liberal. Maybe ask why you would mistake one for the other.
We don’t need perfect, just good (ie communist) although right now I’d settle for a non-warmonger anti-imperialist Liberal who didn’t support genocide, but none such options are available because we live in a genocidal war nation.
Unless you think Trump is like, a fascist (which I would entertain but you said you voted for him so I sincerely hope you don't think that) he's still within the bounds of liberalism. Free markets, liberty as individuals, private property, etc.
I would contend that Fascism is a subtype of Liberal. You go down far enough the neoliberal path and you are suddenly fascist, there’s 0 hard dividing line
I think that's fair, I think there are enough distinctions (its strong nationalism and backward- looking revanchism aren't innate to liberalism, I think there are real points of conflict where libs would usually depart from fascism, absent a threat from their left) that I would accept someone categorizing it as a form of liberalism or as a separate ideology if they support their view. I think for libs though it's best to try and be charitable if it's a distinction they recognize.
The original fascists invented austerity and deregulation and privatization. The Nazis and Italian fascists were the pioneers of these policies, unwinding the regulations and social policies of the social Liberals that came before them.
They are functionally indistinguishable from the “economic Liberalism” described elsewhere in this thread and “Libertarianism”. It’s all the same thing in different degrees.
American Liberals are extremely nationalistic, chauvinist, revanchist, warmongering and imperialistic. Your point of difference doesn’t even apply
I think American liberalism is distinct from other countries' in that way, yes. My experience is that it's not normal elsewhere. I think the free market strives to transcend national prerogative as well, that's why Mises and Hayek were so keen to set up organizations like the IMF and WTO to enforce market order on nations without their interests getting in the way. Libs frequently support a "world system" over national interest in other countries.
As I said though, I can buy an argument in either direction, since fascism is so slippery as a term and the common usage of these ideas varies pretty widely. Maybe that's too accommodating on my part. I dunno. I take your point though.
Homie look at all the European “liberals” clamoring over themselves to arm and fund Nazis to kill Russian orcs. They only pretend to be above that shit, when rubber meets the road they all fall in line.
If all it takes to make a Liberal into a fascist is a scratch, they were always a fascist with a thin coat of paint.
For sure, liberals will always side with fascism when threatened, they are far more compatible with it than communism. And since being scratched is inevitable they will always have a fascism problem.
Brother I am over 40 years old and not concerned about being a “winner”. I have a good life with kids, home and wife. I remember being pissed off at the world when I was much younger but grew out of it. Hope you all the best.
I feel very, very sorry for you, then. If you were younger I'd have more hope you'd look back on what you are right now and be glad you're not like that anymore.
I remember being pissed off at the world when I was much younger but grew out of it.
Not caring about human suffering isn't the same thing as "growing out of it."
Hope you all the best.
Passive-aggression is not the sign of emotional health.
I have a good life with kids, home and wife. I remember being pissed off at the world when I was much younger but grew out of it. Hope you all the best.
I feel sorry for your kids. Having a parent who doesn't care about the world they will grow up in must suck.
Guess what buddy. I am close in your age and still pissed because I have not hardened my heart to injustice and haven't given up on caring about others in order to silence my conscience to enjoy a comfortable lifestyle at the expense of millions of others. You just keep making yourself sound like a sociopath.
Everything that I just posted is more than enough to prove that China is a workers state and will continue to improve itself and its people. I have more things to post if you need futher convincing like this