How do you define "left" and "right" or "liberal" and "conservative"?

People throw these labels around all the time, yet what do they really mean? What are the principles behind these terms? I personally see them as largely arbitrary and meaningless, but maybe others disagree.

 

Republican or Conservative constitute zero difference, and they represent the richest, and also the southern redneck. The left encompasses the majority of the rest of the populous. There are exceptions but that is largely the deal.

 

So a conservative is defined simply as someone who is rich? I don't think you are getting the gist of the question. What is the philosophy of conservatism or rightism, contrasted with liberalism or leftism?

 

[video=youtube;IsztFB8SFFk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsztFB8SFFk[/video]

 

I think the titles are more about identifying people we disagree with then those who we agree with. Most people are not consist in any one viewpoint. For example, I am pro choice, I am pro background checks and also am a firearm owner I also support using drones against any enemy of the United States on US soil or in a foreign country.

Being pro choice makes me a big Liberal to some. Owning guns yet being for extended background checks makes me a moderate. And being pro drone makes me a raging NeoCon.

In the end identify with the Democratic Party and consider myself pretty a Liberal. But it is really all about perspective.

 

Conservatism is essentially embracing personal responsibility and making one's best attempt to abide by an honest moral code. Acknowledging that one is flawed by nature and will tend to screw up from time to time but still making the best effort to be a good human being and excel to the best of one's capabilities. To maximize one's potential.

Liberalism is whimsical emotionalism governed by the id in bleeding hearts which results in animalistic displays of populism and excessive ego-driven rationalization in pseudo-intellectuals which results in elitism, condescension, megalomania, and authoritarian micromanagement. It holds that all morality is subjective and yet contradicts itself by insisting that all of society must follow the specific liberal moral code.

The former is largely rooted in pragmatism, and the latter is largely rooted in idealism.

Hope that helped.

 

It was defined with Archie Bunker and the T.V. show "all in the family" years ago.
m.imdb.com/title/tt0066626/

 

I've made a thread about a thesis of mine that rightism could be grouped together based on them being various interpretations of masculinity.

http://www.politicalforum.com/political-opinions-beliefs/303724-essence-rightism.html

However, going a bit shallower I will say that according to me leftism seeks equality in different ways be it gender, economic or racial whilst rightism is accepting of inequality either because they actually prefer it, are indifferent to it, or see it as the result to be expected if people are given freedom. That's one of the main differences in my view.

Liberal means some one that wants freedom, but in the modern interpretation of the word that doesn't often mean economic freedom. Liberalism has kept the concern for civili liberty throughout its history but economically it seems to have shifted from promoting 'freedom from high taxes' to a 'freedom to have a level playing field (payed for by tax money)'. So they're still in favour of freedom but just that they interpret and value it a bit differrently now adays.

Conservatism is in essence just about preserving what's good about the old order, and taking away the bad through gradual change rather than revolution. One can't really say that a certain position is inherently conservative as conservatism is wholly dependent on what is the established order. In the USA the legacy is that of a mostly classically liberal economic view and a solidly christian population, thus we get a party with the mix we know today. Whilst for an american conservative monarchism is unthinkable, it's a cornerstone for tories. Showing how it varies based on history. To sum up conservatism, which I think is a very good mindset actually, is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, the tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limitedto the unbounded, the sufficient to the superabundant et cetera. When dealing with important things like the management of a country I think it's very wise to have a conservative approach. even small changes can have huge implications so it's better to go slow and think things through. It also keeps the bond to the past alive.

edit: I will also say that these term are thrown around sometimes without consideration and without knowing what they really mean. Sadly.

 

http://www.politicalforum.com/blogs...-people-have-their-definitions-messed-up.html

That's how.

Right and left are different though.

The "left" is broad, but typically the general mantra of the left is some vision of a utopian or semi-utopian society where everyone is happy and equal in many/most/all respects - a kind of utilitarian "Big happy family" approach. It is in essence a search for the perfect society. This quest for the perfect society is what causes the left to be "progressive" (ie they constantly want change to bring us closer to their vision). This is the territory of Socialism and its extreme version, Communism.

The "right" generally represents an older, tradition-oriented view of the world. Rightists are typically defenders of, and most comfortable with, either the status quo of society or what is was in the past - thus, they are the classic opponents of leftists who think we have yet to achieve the greatest society, whereas the right-wingers think what we have now or had before was better and are wary of new ideas. "Conservatism" and "right wing" are basically synonyms, with the extreme versions being Theocracy and Fascism.

 

Fascism isnt conservative though. I dispute that conservatism and rightism are synonymous

 

good post, but I look at life from the view as a trouble shooter.. I fix machines. Some people want to operate in a chaios spectrum, piull I/O boards change them run around like a chicken with their head cut off... I have to slow them down, lets take out the prints read it so we dont make no mistakes.

 

Fascism is an ultra-nationalistic, gung-ho, war-mongering, honour-duty-and-tradition driven ideology. It is a extreme extension of conservatives' belief, as Unifier correctly stated, that people are inherently immoral and must be constantly ensured to be moral - the difference being, Fascism does this by being authoritarian and also stresses a collective duty towards the state - fascists idolize their state, the collective entity they represent, whereas communists idolize a utilitarian equality among the citizens of said state.

Also, if the "right" is not conservative, then what is it?

 

Well, they are meaningless, in fact I try not to use them as such. I think it's probably more useful to use something closer to the Nolan Graph (it's the political compass test graph) where you can talk about whether you want more economic control or more social control rather than simply saying "liberals are for big government" or "conservatives are for small government" -- it usually depends on what the topic is. Republicans prefer to use the government on social issues (Abortion, Sexuality, Drugs) but not on economic issues (Pollution, regulations for business). Democrats could be roughly defined to be the opposite positions, for example being Pro-Choice, and favoring legalization of soft drugs, while favoring more business regulation. But it's not the only positions possible. A real control freak party might very well want to regulate both economics and social issues, libertarians would favor not regulating much of anything. But then any system could be improved upon, and Nolan is still probably too simple to give a complete picture.

 

The abstract usage of these terms is probably one of my biggest pet peeves about posting on this forum. The ideas behind "the right" and "the left" for example, come from the French revolution and had to do with the position in relation to the throne and respective views on centralization of power. People to the right of the throne supported centralized power and people to the left supported decentralized power. Neither modern political party falls neatly into either category as both parties have aspect of both ideologies depending on the issue. In a similar sense, liberal and conservative are not opposites or even mutually exclusive. In some instances, being conservative means being liberal. They have become so twisted beyond their original intent, that they are meaningless in modern political conversations.

 

Unfortunately, governments have a vested interest in teaching "democracy" as if it were synonymous with freedom - it is not.

The political spectrum should be taught linearly - afterall, what is the point in trying to differentiate Hitler from Stalin?? Does it matter if you as a victim are gassed, shot, or starved??

On the far left - total government (all forms of tyranny, oligarchy, and positive government reside here; communist, nazi, monarchies, fascist, socialist, etc)

On the far right - no government, i.e. anarchy. This condition never really exists except for a brief period... eventually the citizens call for order to be restored, and they usually end up with some form of oligarchical rule.

Democracy is nothing more than a transitional form of government - it is inherently unstable, as I should think obvious; yet, it escapes most people. Most people associate democracy with freedom, when nothing good be further from the truth.

The only stable form of government in which freedom can flourish is that of a republic, i.e. the rule of law; and that rule of law constrains the government itself, not the people. Those who would seek to overthrow America's republic have succeeded in convincing most of the population that we are a democracy, and over the years our Constitutional protections have slowly been chipped away at, until we find ourselves in the mess we are in today.

So, to answer the thread -

Left - (all forms of tyranny, oligarchy, and positive government - this is what most of the world faces today, unfortunately)

Right - (a republic, the rule of law which restricts government. This is what America was founded as, but not longer functions as)

Members of the Republican Party should never be confused as being advocates of republican government though. Most of them are just as sleezy and disingenuous as any democrat.

 

If one draws a vertical line with Anarchy at the bottom and totaliatarianism at the top one would find that the further left one's political beliefs are the closer one comes to the top of the line. On the other hand those on the right will generally fall closer to the bottom of the line.

 

I agree completely. When looking at what ideologies have been historically called liberal and conservative, the labels today in American politics seem arbitrary if not deceptive.

- - - Updated - - -

So the right is closer to anarchy, the left being closer to totalitarianism? I guess I agree with making such a distinction, but "the right" in American politics hardly is closer to anarchy. I would put the "right" and "left" of US politics pretty close together on the line.

 

I remember reading (in regards to modern US politics) that liberals care most about equality and fairness, conservatives care most about tradition and power, and libertarians or classical liberals care most about liberty and freedom. Does that seem accurate? I am not sure myself. I think foreign policy adds another twist. Both liberals and conservatives seem to be pretty keen on the warfare state, regardless of party rhetoric.

 

Distilling "Right / Left" down to the brass tacks, one ideology can function without the state, the other cannot.

I'll let you decide which.

 

It's all relative. What's liberal in the US might still be conservative in Norway and what's conservative in the US might still be liberal in Saudi Arabia.

 

Sorry no what the left in America wants is equality of outcome. That is only possible by way of a very close aproach to totalitarianism. And it is in no way fair. The left tends to think of Robinhood as a guy who stole from the rich when in fact he stole from the governing authorities their excessive gains through unfair taxation. The right would like to free you of your bad habits the left cares little about your bad habits save that the more you become a slave to those bad habits the less likely you will be to object to their theft of almost all other freedoms. The left in this country has given us a 5 million word tax code that no two IRS agents wholly agree upon as regards interpretaton of it's varous arcane formulations, whose purpose is not so much to raise money with which to operate the government but in the main to micromanage everyone's behavior.

 

That depends on how far the person is on the left wing. I wouldn't describe Blue Dog Democrats as such.

 

I wouldn't describe a blue dog Democrat as a leftist either. I think a lot of them in the future will be Neocons going home.

 

Of course all democrats are leftists, as are neocons - they believe in positive government.

The only people who believe in freedom, i.e. limited government are libertarians and republicans.

And as I said in my earlier post, members of the Republican Party should not be confused with being republican - they are simply in one wing of 'The Big Government Party', and Democrats are in the other.

Lovers of freedom who actually understand the principles of freedom, are few and far between. There are very few of us left in Amerika... in terms of being a minority?? no group is smaller.

We stand absolutely no chance of salvaging our country and saving our Constitution and freedom - the masses are simply too ignorant to understand. The process will play out - the economy will be collapsed, the currency will be collapsed, more terrorism will be visited upon us, thereby justifiying increased police state measures, etc.

It's all too predictable. History 101.

As James Madison said, "... as short in their lives, as they are violent in their deaths."

 

Conservative should be not wanting to be wasteful and utilize resources to be most effective.
However, those who say they are conservative, really want gov't to waste money on federal program limiting individual freedoms.
Liberal, should be, let people do what they want as long as they don't violate laws or the constitution. And don't care what someone does in their home or cars if they don't hurt anyone outside that realm.