Does one have to be an iconoclast or revolutionary these days to be validly left? I consider myself to be left of center, and very much in favor of progressive policies.
Does one have to be an iconoclast or revolutionary these days to be validly left? I consider myself to be left of center, and very much in favor of progressive policies.
However I find myself being disagreed with quite often, mostly for not advocating or cheering violence, "by any means possible" change, or revolutionary tactics. It would seem that I'm not viewed as authentically holding my view unless I advocate extreme, violent, or radical action to accomplish it.
Those seem like two different things to me.
Edit: TO COMMUNISTS, ANARCHISTS, OR ANYONE ELSE CALLING FOR THE OVERTHROW OF SOCIETY
THIS OBVIOUSLY ISN'T MEANT FOR YOU.
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Lemmy has this weird point of view, if you aren't extreme left then you are not left at all. I've seen people make comments like "just be honest you aren't a liberal ".
They want to move the bar so they don't have to claim they are extremist. I wouldn't worry about it.
OTOH, USians have their Overton window so moved to the right, and it continues to move so fast, that it has a visible Doppler effect.
What in the US some people calls "radical ideas", most of the world calls "common decency" or "human rights".
True. But big ships turn slowly.
And the US is one hell of a big ship.
Who says that ship is turning?
Usually a large sum of smaller, quantitative changes results in a rapid qualitative change.
Lemmy has this weird point of view, if you aren't extreme left then you are not left at all. I've seen people make comments like "just be honest you aren't a liberal ".
Generally, the non-Marxists and non-Anarchists on Lemmy are absolutely liberals.
They want to move the bar so they don't have to claim they are extremist. I wouldn't worry about it.
I don't think Leftists here care about being labeled an extremist or not, the point is to pursuade more people to become Marxists or Anarchists by actually talking about their views openly.
If wanting equality for all people is extremist, then I’m an extremist.
Nothing extremist about wanting equality
According to your original comment, it is. Simply wanting results to fall out of the sky isn't support, ie if someone says they want everyone to be a billionaire it isn't genuine support.
Thinking an idea is good, but achieving it is bad, isn't support.
Interesting take. Not sure how you got there though.
How do you achieve equality for all people?
Still not sure how asking for equality makes one extremist
How do you achieve equality?
Question: do you consider yourself a liberal?
Got this from queermunist earlier. Didn't understand why the question was asked. I answered "Yes" though it seemed like a gotcha, but I don't know what was going on there. I used the words I wanted to use.
It depends on your definitions, but many on the left, myself included, don't consider liberals to be leftists. Liberals are primarily capitalists, and while they are left within the very pro capitalist mainstream, they are not "leftists", which to me means anticapitalist.
In my experience most liberals at least have problems with capitalism, they just can't imagine a better system. I think leftists need to be less shitty, and use less gotchas and jargon, especially to people who are allies on social issues. Though this is frustrating when some of you're local queer elders are small business owners who underpay their employees and hoard property.
It’s a shame that Marxists have to always be nice, friendly and tolerant. We get tired and frustrated with it all too.
Yeh I get it. It can be cathartic to be sarcastic and snippy to liberals, but unhelpful. Especially since most people who self identify as liberals are not ideologically firm neoliberal capitalists, just people with vaguely humanist ideals that don't know all the right terminology. That's where we alll were at one point, but some stranger on the internet gettimg pissy because someone hasnt read enough theory doesn't make them want to learn more or organize with people.
Be as snippy and mean as you want to people who are firm in their shitty beliefs. Like neoliberal politicians, landlords, neo nazis, etc. Not workers trying to make rent.
So, this is a very complex topic I don't have the time to give the treatment it deserves, but to try to give a very summarized historical viewpoint on it -
Liberalism was a set of ideas that cohered around the 18th century as a reaction to monarchism that emphasized universal civil rights and free markets (there were a ton of weird things going on with noble privileges and state monopolies issued by royal administrations and mercantile economics this was a response to)
Socialism was a set of ideas that cohered around the 19th century as a reaction to liberalism (and the whole industrial revolution) that said universal civil rights didn't go far enough and we needed to establish universal economic rights. Some socialists think the only way to achieve these things is by overthrowing or limiting the power of governments and ripping up contracts between private parties, which liberals tend not to like.
Progressivism was (sort of, I'm being very reductive here) an attempted synthesis of these traditions that cohered around the early 20th century, and (essentially) argued "ok, free markets but restricted by regulations (e.g. you can't sell snake oil, you can't condition the sale of property on the purchaser being a specific race), and open elections for whoever the voters want but with restrictions on the kinda of laws that can be passed" (e.g. no poll taxes).
Like I said, I'm simplifying a lot here and I'd encourage reading Wikipedia pages and other sources on all of these things (like, I'm eliding a whole very dark history progressives have where their attempts to perfect society had them advocating for eugenics and segregation early on because there was academic support for those ideas at the time, and there's a lot more to be said on how a lot of the first anti-racist voices were socialist ones and why it took progressives and liberals time to get on the right side of that issue, and how fights for colonial independence tended to be led by socialists and against liberals), but the fact that liberals progressives and socialists are all ostensibly "on the left" is a big cause of the infighting we see.
Get outta here with your detailed informative answers
We’re supposed to be having a big partisan argument about who is the poopy head in this sandbox
Lol, yeah, I'm really good at being nuanced and understanding right up until somebody starts talking about a person or subject that hits one of my angry buttons, and then I'm all "Bill Clinton will pay for his many crimes when the revolutionary vanguard takes power!"
But, yeah, when I'm not pissed beyond reason the thought I keep coming back to is that we all need each other to keep fascism at bay
Here’s a fun exercise: Ask queermunist what they think of some left wing issue that isn’t something that would be a good talking point for an outside adversary of the left to use to destabilize it, or make it lose.
They’re very vocal about wanting the left to use violence. They’re very vocal about wanting people not to vote for Biden. Foreign policy in Central and South America? Justice for farm workers? Prison reform? Fuck all that shit, let’s talk about some guns.
Idk, now that I have given the game away they may have a different reaction. 🙂 But that was my experience when I asked about it, and I made from that an inference about them and some other parts of the Lemmy left that may form a good potential answer to the original question you were asking.
how about you don't engage in bad faith red herrings? instead, you could address the points other people raise in their comments.
this is some smug, manipulative bullshit.
This was literally a conversation I had with queermunist (I am almost sure; it was a while ago but I am fairly confident that was the other participant when I had the exchange). I’m just filling OP in on the content and recommending they try to experiment themselves, because I think it’s an extremely relevant contribution to OP’s understanding of the answer to their question.
smug
Dude I am King Smug; it is 100% fair
manipulative bullshit
Not really
it is manipulative. it is designed to distract from the subject at hand and imply that the person being asked is acting in bad faith if they don't chase your red herring.
Yeah that was how the person reacted when I asked it that other time, too. Like HOW DARE YOU ASK ME ABOUT MY BELIEFS, THAT IS A DIRTY TRICK
I found it very notable, too, that perfectly normal reaction. Not like “why is Central America relevant to this lol” but “how dare you”
yea. how dare you. try engaging on topic and with intellectual honesty.