'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Fri Oct 29, 2021 8:58 pm

Liberty and Freedom Are Left-Wing Ideals

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Fri Oct 29, 2021 9:01 pm

Marionumber1 » 27 Oct 2021 23:27 wrote:
For most of my life I considered myself to be on the left side of the political spectrum.


So where does this person consider themselves to be? Your principles shouldn't automatically do a flip just because groups who claim (that is a key word, by the way) to share many of your principles turn out to be problematic. Yet I keep seeing this pattern of self-proclaimed former leftists beginning with qualms about the corporate left's rigidity and authoritarianism (generally more on social issues than economic or foreign policy issues) and ending up as full-blown right-wingers on nearly every policy issue; Michael Rectenwald of NYU is one who comes to mind. I have to say that if such principles are that easily reversed, they probably weren't held very strongly to begin with.


It seems to me that such people don't care as much about principles as they care about having a willing audience. And in today's Red vs. Bluverse, ...
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Elvis » Fri Nov 05, 2021 5:59 pm

I see 'the left" as being concerned with achieving universal full employment with good incomes, free healthcare and access to education.

Everything else is just talk.

If it's not about those three things, it's probably not "left."
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby drstrangelove » Sat Nov 06, 2021 9:20 am

It's interesting to note that if we accept a binary ideological spectrum, which one does when they feel the need to debate semantics, then every new ideological trend must be categorised alongside every old one, on either the left or the right. So the left and right both become more and more extreme, even if they don't in fact embody that extremism in actuality. However, by viewing each other as more and more extreme, they in fact become more and more extreme in reaction to each other. And the means through which democracy operates, majority view rule with minority view rights, becomes untenable.

Due to majority rule justification and the fact that urban populations are larger than rural ones, the left has been mobilised and radiclised to stomp out the right. And they do so righteously. But what's been created in this process isn't progressive or sociallist, but a Scientific Caliphate.

The issue as I see it these days is no longer political, but philosophical. Between those who believe scientific reductionism/specialisation can make human institutions omnipotent, and those that reject this premise.

It really is a tragedy that within the course of a decade the left has seen its last great hope in Bernie Sanders be snuffed out and replaced by the spiritual legacy of men like Josef Mengele and Shiro Ishii. Which is to say, the quest for unbounding knowledge in all absence of ethical consideration.
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Mon Nov 08, 2021 7:07 pm

drstrangelove » 06 Nov 2021 13:20 wrote:It's interesting to note that if we accept a binary ideological spectrum, which one does when they feel the need to debate semantics, then every new ideological trend must be categorised alongside every old one, on either the left or the right. So the left and right both become more and more extreme, even if they don't in fact embody that extremism in actuality. However, by viewing each other as more and more extreme, they in fact become more and more extreme in reaction to each other. And the means through which democracy operates, majority view rule with minority view rights, becomes untenable.

Due to majority rule justification and the fact that urban populations are larger than rural ones, the left has been mobilised and radiclised to stomp out the right. And they do so righteously. But what's been created in this process isn't progressive or sociallist, but a Scientific Caliphate.

The issue as I see it these days is no longer political, but philosophical. Between those who believe scientific reductionism/specialisation can make human institutions omnipotent, and those that reject this premise.

It really is a tragedy that within the course of a decade the left has seen its last great hope in Bernie Sanders be snuffed out and replaced by the spiritual legacy of men like Josef Mengele and Shiro Ishii. Which is to say, the quest for unbounding knowledge in all absence of ethical consideration.


Unfortunately, I can't say I disagree. The vast majority of individuals I know who previously considered themselves progressive seem to have summarily decided that lockdowns, mask mandates, and universal vaccine mandates are self-evidently the morally right things to do and worse still that any questioning of the costs and risks vs. benefits of any of these policies is morally reprehensible. There has never been a rational discussion about these policies but instead only a moral imperative to blindly trust in them. Thus, COVID-19 containment efforts have become a quasi-religious issue, and most of the individuals who were once deemed "the left" have now become the equivalent of radical "scientific" fundamentalists who are more than willing to offer up their own children up to a lifetime regimen of mandatory mRNA vaccinations every few months in order to prove their total devotion to their new-formed inflexibly righteous creed.

In other words:

https://twitter.com/JeffWellsRigInt/sta ... 5936641030
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Wed Nov 10, 2021 4:43 pm

https://vinayprasadmdmph.substack.com/p ... sm-is-dead

Progressivism is Dead. COVID19 killed it

My entire adult life, I have been a progressive. To me that label meant that when done well, government, is capable of improving the lives of people. With better design, and better incentives, government (a form of collective action) can enhance freedom, and promote good choices.

For the 3 people who read Ending Medical Reversal (2015), Malignant (2020), and the 300 papers I’ve published, you will not be surprised to hear this is my view—it is present in all my work.

To me Progressivism has several corollaries:

1. It means freedom of speech and freedom to think, even if those views threaten the powerful

2. It means society is judged by how it treats the poorest amongst us, not by how it rewards the rich

3. Structures—political, economic, social—are the real root of problems, and solutions require careful, incremental fixing of structures, not shaming or blaming of individuals.

4. Tolerance & compassion were core tenets amongst progressives I admired.

COVID19 killed progressivism. People who identify on the political left, are increasingly frenzied and disinhibited. Their policies contradict all of the principles of progressivism. Let me highlight a few e.g..

1. Censoring "misinformation". Many progressives have embraced the idea that social media must censor ‘misinformation.’ But none of them are capable of defining the line between honest debate and misinformation. Few appreciate the potential for an authoritarian to abuse this power.



And consider the case of lab leak—Facebook suppressed discussion of it for 4 months—only to rescind after it was clear we needed to have that discussion. You cannot censor science in a crisis. It is too volatile, too live, and too unsettled.

2. We forgot the poor! The policies that were pushed by the left were policies that shielded principally the zoom class of worker—the upper middle class, highly educated laborer. Among these: school closures. What will soon be seen as the greatest policy blunder of the pandemic; One that will scar the lives of hundreds of thousands of kids. This policy was pushed by left of center cities, and cities with strong teachers’ unions. Progressives forgot about the poorest amongst us, while red states remembered.

3. Blamed people not structures—the rhetoric online was a constant stream of shame and blame. Good people (those who can afford to stay home) and bad people (all the rest). The shaming and blaming and moralizing continue to this day. Pre-vaccine everything was the fault of libertines who would not stay home, and post vaccine everything is the fault of the unvaccinated.

4. Tolerance & compassion has been replaced by vaccine passports, and mandates, and passionate calls that people who decline vaccination should pay higher premiums, lose their jobs or not receive medical care!

Progressives have forgotten that the structures of society—our tribalism, our income inequality, our politics—trap people in information bubbles where they are not given open and honest information about vaccines. On the other side, there is a different bubble of dishonesty that won’t consider adverse effects fairly. I learned this the hard way, trying to talk about the benefit of vaccination while reducing the risk of myocarditis.

In short, for each pillar of progressivism that once existed, we instead have the precise opposite sentiment among self-proclaimed liberals. A full analysis of the origin of this swing is beyond me, but it is undeniable that many people were anchored to Donald J. Trump. Whatever he said, we did the opposite. That is evident by massive opinion poll swings in school re-openings the moment he said we ought to do them, documented by Vlad Kogan.

That was the original sin. Closing schools for so long in Democratic stronghold cities, strong union cities, precisely after the President that many disliked pushed for it. But no matter how wrong he was about other matters, he was right on that issue. We should have reopened schools. And the net result has been devastation so catastrophic it will shape this country for the next 100 years, if we survive it. The damage is done; time will reveal it. As for me, I had been pushing on schools since Sept of 2020, and I think there is progress now. In 2021, It is inconceivable to close them again, but, I still live with regret. My regret was not doing more in the summer of 2020.
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Elvis » Fri Nov 12, 2021 4:58 pm

If you do these, most of the other stuff falls away.

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Fri Nov 12, 2021 8:23 pm

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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Fri Nov 12, 2021 8:58 pm

^^^^^^^^^
simple and clear-cut depiction of the wide chasm between then and now. What's grotesque, however, is the utter lack of self-awareness.

wholly conditioned.


(yes, a similar argument can be made for those on the 'Right'. But when has the conditioning of the 'Right' ever caused such sheer devastation to lives and livelihoods over a ~20 month period? There is no precedent to this in the U.S. Nothing comes remotely close.)
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Marionumber1 » Fri Nov 12, 2021 9:23 pm

Belligerent Savant » Fri Nov 12, 2021 7:58 pm wrote:(yes, a similar argument can be made for those on the 'Right'. But when has the conditioning of the 'Right' ever caused such sheer devastation to lives and livelihoods over a ~20 month period? There is no precedent to this in the U.S. Nothing comes remotely close.)


The post 9/11 period?
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Fri Nov 12, 2021 10:38 pm

.

Certainly, implemented policies post-9/11 (Patriot Act, Homeland Security, etc.) were the first big steps in ushering in creeping/incremental authoritarianism, and it inspired jingoism/uber-nationalism (conditioning methods realized).

But this is orders of magnitude worse, not only with respect to policy overreach, but also the extent of mass hysteria/psychosis. What makes today's circumstances particularly unprecedented, at least with respect to the U.S., is the manner in which the people have submitted themselves to the propaganda and conditioning, which, in contrast to the post-9/11 years, is trained not on an external/foreign enemy, but instead on labeled enemies among us. But it's far deeper than that, too. The messaging and setup of the covid operation triggered primal fears -- there is a deep denial, a refusal to reflect, to self-assess, not only at the individual level (e.g., facing the prospect of death), but also a refusal to acknowledge an Empire in decline.

There is a subconscious urge among many -- they've been trained over time -- to grasp desperately to the notion of Progress and The Science as Salvation. Blind allegiance. To deny The Science (and its promoted technologies -- 'vaccines', space travel, etc.) is to deny our [promoted] Reality. Hence the visceral hatred of those that question the narratives.

(this is years-long in the making -- it didn't start with covid. Incremental and fragmentary, the process over time to divide and atomize)

The unvaccinated.
The unclean.
The non-contributors.
The others.

The "Left"/"Liberals" of today want to punish the others. They wish harm on them. They are all too eager to agree to increasingly draconian measures inflicted upon The Others.

The parallels to another time in history, in another country, is there for anyone to see, regardless of how crudely such comparisons may be applied by some of the undesirables.

What's happening now is far worse than the early 00s. More encompassing. Broader. More damaging to wider demographics.

Not to mention lives and livelihoods lost both domestically and internationally have already far surpassed the lives lost during the aftermath of 9/11. (other than the unfortunate thousands that lost their lives here in the States that day, most of the ruin was incurred overseas, not domestically).
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby stickdog99 » Fri Nov 12, 2021 10:55 pm

Marionumber1 » 13 Nov 2021 01:23 wrote:
Belligerent Savant » Fri Nov 12, 2021 7:58 pm wrote:(yes, a similar argument can be made for those on the 'Right'. But when has the conditioning of the 'Right' ever caused such sheer devastation to lives and livelihoods over a ~20 month period? There is no precedent to this in the U.S. Nothing comes remotely close.)


The post 9/11 period?


I was there. And, at least in the USA, the Clinton/Biden supporter wing of the Democratic party wholly supported it. RIP Paul Wellstone.
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Marionumber1 » Sat Nov 13, 2021 3:01 am

Belligerent Savant » Fri Nov 12, 2021 9:38 pm wrote:the manner in which the people have submitted themselves to the propaganda and conditioning, which, in contrast to the post-9/11 years, is trained not on an external/foreign enemy, but instead on labeled enemies among us.


I don't think this can be downplayed in the post-9/11 landscape, considering how those who dared oppose the warfare state in the Bush era were often labeled as unpatriotic or even outright traitors/terrorist sympathizers. (To stickdog's point, there were obviously self-identified Democrats onboard, but any semblance of an actual left was not.) A ton of the right-wing rhetoric back then was absolutely disgusting and a mirror of how those who oppose the COVID narrative get treated today.

Even if this conditioning is being deployed to greater effect nowadays on the opposite side of the spectrum, we cannot ignore how similar the "right" was back then, nor how massive the consequences were: unending devastation to "enemy" nations around the world and crackdowns on dissent at home. It's hardly worth making a competition being "right" and "left" conditioning, especially when the creeping authoritarianism of the GWB era ultimately led us to right where we are now.

Not to mention that even if today's "right" falls more on the side of skepticism of the Covidian agenda, many of them would still otherwise be supporting measures that systematically screw over the most vulnerable in society. Our "politics of illusion" (to borrow Dave McGowan's phrasing) is set up to allow these out-of-character reversals from time to time, occasionally mixing things up between different sides (e.g. the liberals becoming McCarthyists after the 2016 election while the conservatives filled a quasi-anti-war opposition role)...and it is all a fraud in the end, one that entrenches a singular agenda shared by everyone at the top of the food chain. A "left" that justifies oppression antithetical to its principles in the name of public health and a "right" that carved out one reasonable line in the sand while changing nothing else about itself are two groups that both fill me with disgust in different ways.
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Harvey » Sat Nov 13, 2021 10:12 am

A "left" that justifies oppression antithetical to its principles in the name of public health and a "right" that carved out one reasonable line in the sand while changing nothing else about itself


More or less that. I'm certainly under no illusions about the severity of what happened after 9/11.

Ask the families and the communities of the 5 million+ murdered by the most recent two decades of American wars how more or less inconvenienced by Covid they feel. That said, clearly Covid is an equivalent or greater escalation, very likely planned and orchestrated by all the same powers, employing combinations of regulatory capture, institutional bias, blackmail, financial inducement, threats, propaganda, group-think, legislative chicanery and self interest, all aimed at complete removal of any last vestige of autonomy.

Bodily autonomy is the last battle ground remaining and many of you have surrendered without noticing. That would seem undeniable at this point. Soon you will all have less right to your own body than you currently have to express an opinion in the 'public' space. And many here, while being against all or most such things, have argued consistently for the mechanism (Covid) to be sanctified. Much as it pains me to say it, the furthest-out there are generally the most accurate amongst us, certainly when it comes to the big picture.

Forty years into the Neo-liberal project, I have to say to my ten year ­old self, he who observed its beginning with considerable scepticism: there have been no great surprises. I can’t believe so many didn’t see it coming but now that it's here, most embrace it for convenience if they aren't already shareholders. From Academia to the Arts, technology to medicine, even science is not exempt, everything is up for grabs to the highest bidder, including the truth. Don’t get me wrong, the truth eventually does come out, but only in small print and even then, only once it can have no possibility to affect anything.

The ‘Free Market’ remains a myth, an irrational fig-leaf for unbridled aggression and greed. There never was any competition; competition itself being a pseudoscientific misreading of Darwin. Today, a monopoly of four or five companies quite literally own everything at various stages of apparent remove. Societies are atomized and fragmented along economic and ideological contrivances. The price always goes up, just as surely as the quality always comes down. Workers are once again at the mercy of feudal overlords, mere cattle, their rights and conditions dwindling. Say it aint so.

Left or Right as presented is a discussion of Pepsi or Coke, rather than asking whether anyone should put that shit in their body in the first place and what, if any, alternatives could possibly exist in such an environment.

There is no political or media Left in any part of the American establishment. Same in the UK after the last few years since December 2019, but importantly, this final stage of the process really began on September 11th, 2001, the equivalent for our countries of September 11th, 1973 in Chile.

Total regulatory capture and the revolving door between defence, commerce, finance, media, politics and policing ensures complete homogeneity within any notional disagreement. Even up until the last few years, from a European perspective, the perception was that you have no left in America. You've been so far to the right for most of my life it just isn't funny. Yet this discussion of left vs right trundles on and on as if it has some power to describe the world today. The UK similarly, after forty years of intensive work by all the same forces, any distinction is meaningless. Let's face it, the trillions in looted wealth buys a lot of man hours to make it so.

As I write, the privatised water companies are once again set to pollute with every kind of shit imaginable, the owner class are now pouring raw sewage into our rivers. Sure, that'll help. The ability to afford a doctor will soon be the preserve of the favoured few in the UK, those who can afford it. The final round of NHS privatisation is going through Parliament aided and abetted by both sides of the Covid 'debate'. The state can legally detain us without charge indefinitely, in an increasing number of circumstances convict us without a trial by jury and even kill us if it wishes, through any number of legally available avenues. Students are burdened with a lifetime of personal debt before they get their first job. They will not even get that job let alone hold it down if they have a record of independent opinion on social media. There is simply no possibility of independent opinion in 'Public Life.'

What is the so called right in this context? What is the so called left? Just the same owner class.

When I drill down to what people actually believe, and almost daily, I'm talking to whatever narrow cross section of opinion remains there is actually very widespread agreement on what not to do. The disagreement is mostly over words and imaginary concepts which have no real meaning or relevance and can't be explained rationally once the clap-trap is stripped away.

The bottom line is that everyone I have spoken to over the last two years who still has a television is having a really hard time understanding what is happening to them. They're more fearful, more likely to employ jargon, more likely to respond with heightened emotion to any challenge, generally less well informed and far more likely to be possessed by outrage at some other minority or group who are also without any power of autonomy whatsoever, just like them.

Rant over!
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Re: 'Liberals'/'Leftists' in America

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sat Nov 13, 2021 11:01 am

.
Worthwhile, deep rant - thank you for expressing it here.

Mario: i'm in agreement with your comments (directly above Harvey's). We're essentially saying the same things, though I recognize yours, and then Harvey's longer missive, better articulate the futility of attempting to delineate between left/right constructs as manifested in the u.s., particularly since 2001.

(The last ~several comments here essentially capture the key drivers in starting this thread)
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