Political Spectrum Poll

[Nahdia]

i mean, i would also argue both the Republican and Democratic party in the US are conservative parties. they certainly aren't progressives, at any rate.

[Mitillos]

Most conservative parties are liberal, and vice-versa, not just in Europe, but everywhere.

[chamber]

i mean, i would also argue both the Republican and Democratic party in the US are conservative parties. they certainly aren't progressives, at any rate.

I think its probably more fair to call them both conservative than to call them both liberal. Modern Republican's don't actually seem very liberal at all.

[SleepyKrew]

Yeah the way the US uses the words is bad and incorrect but having a poll using the terms the US way is like Fine. Educating Ircher won't have a meaningful impact on the number of Americans that see things like progressivism, socialism, and communism as "very liberal".

[Ircher]

Poll updated again with respects to the recent comments. Though I guess y'all do bring up a good point about the usefulness of this poll; this did not really go how I envisioned it would go.

[panthaleon]

i mean, i would also argue both the Republican and Democratic party in the US are conservative parties. they certainly aren't progressives, at any rate.

I think its probably more fair to call them both conservative than to call them both liberal. Modern Republican's don't actually seem very liberal at all.

Liberalism is characterized by democracy, private property, and capitalist economic systems. Republicans are Liberals who skew reactionary or fascist-leaning depending on their mood.

[Nahdia]

Poll updated again with respects to the recent comments. Though I guess y'all do bring up a good point about the usefulness of this poll; this did not really go how I envisioned it would go.

somehow this is worse.

[chamber]

Equality is a pretty core idea of liberalism.

[Nahdia]

i mean, i would also argue both the Republican and Democratic party in the US are conservative parties. they certainly aren't progressives, at any rate.

I think its probably more fair to call them both conservative than to call them both liberal. Modern Republican's don't actually seem very liberal at all.

Liberalism is characterized by democracy, private property, and capitalist economic systems. Republicans are Liberals who skew reactionary or fascist-leaning depending on their mood.

i mean at some point we're playing semantics. modern conservatism is all of those things too.

[panthaleon]

Equality is a pretty core idea of liberalism.

Shore theoretically equality under the law is core to liberalism

[chamber]

i mean, i would also argue both the Republican and Democratic party in the US are conservative parties. they certainly aren't progressives, at any rate.

I think its probably more fair to call them both conservative than to call them both liberal. Modern Republican's don't actually seem very liberal at all.

Liberalism is characterized by democracy, private property, and capitalist economic systems. Republicans are Liberals who skew reactionary or fascist-leaning depending on their mood.

Also, modern republican's do their best to undermine actual democracy.

[Mitillos]

@chamber: No, it's not. The core idea of liberalism is a vague, undefined, and nebulous "freedom", which ultimately just means "money is power". Equality is only paid lip service in liberalism. If it truly was a core idea, leftist critiques of capitalism would never have arisen or been necessary.

pedit: This was to post 32

[chamber]

Equality not equity.

[Mitillos]

Equality implies being the same. Equity implies fairness and impartiality.
Neither survives in a system where power is accumulated in the hands of a few. This is why it's merely lip service.
As for republicans undermining democracy: this is a feature of capitalism, not a bug. Democracy and capitalism are in direct opposition to each other.

[chamber]

Even if its only lip service iyo, it is still a core ideal of liberalism, and modern Republicans do such a poor job at embodying it that I don't think they can be called liberal.

[OkaPoka]

liberalism's core tenet is opposition to authoritarianism

[Mitillos]

Nice shade there. I already explained why it's not simply my opinion, but I will reiterate: If it were not only lip service, leftist critiques of capitalism would not exist nor be required. The whole point of leftism is that liberal revolutions like the French and American ones failed to bring "liberté, égalité, fraternité" as they promised. The reason for this is that the "liberté" takes precedence and is generally understood to be the liberté of the owner class to do what they want. Given this, égalité becomes impossible and so does fraternité. In short, liberals will say they are for equality, but when the chips are down, money dictates what happens. You correctly accuse the republicans of not supporting equality, but if this means they are not embodying liberalism then the same accusation can be brought to liberal parties, like the democrats.

In short, either liberalism is self-contradictory and thereby impossible, or equality is not something that liberals really give much thought to.

pedit: This is also incorrect. Liberals rely heavily on authoritarianism through heavy-handed police forces. They also uphold authoritarianism in poor nations that they exploit. Both of these are, again, because of a commitment to the whole thing about the owner class having all the power.

[chamber]

Republicans wont even claim they want it though. An ideology being bad at realizing one of it's ideals because of some internal conflict doesn't mean the ideal doesn't exist.

[OkaPoka]

ok this conversation can go nowhere because there is a divide in what i view as liberalism vs what you view as liberalism in same way you might get frustrated in how i view <insert your ideology> and you view your own ideology

[panthaleon]

You're disagreeing with the academic and political definitions though

[OkaPoka]

the definition of liberalism is reliance on authoritarianism ?

[Mitillos]

That assumes that the ideals are actually there. We've had a few centuries to observe the self-contradictory nature of these notions. If we were arguing this in the late 18th or early 19th centuries, you would have had a point. The fact that it's the early 21st century means you must be ignoring a lot of social, political, and economic theory, as well as actual history, in saying what you are saying.
Please don't do that. You know better and I know you know better.

pedit: No, not the definition, but the history of it. People who claim to be against authoritarianism but who support and use it are simply lying, possibly to themselves, but definitely to the rest of us.

[panthaleon]

Liberalism is also not defined by its relationship with authoritarianism. If anything it's defined by its relationship to monarchism or feudalism.

[OkaPoka]

i think a lot of liberals would view monarchism and feudalism with a similar lens to fascist dictatorships as the enemy to their ideas is my point

[panthaleon]

I mean a lot of liberals are politically illiterate by design. What's your point?