I don’t think people join the right because they are annoyed by leftists, I think they join the right because they see a bunch of people full of hatred and want to join in because of their self-centered misanthropy.
Youre all good, my upstairs neighbor were thumping bass till 5am so I feel your pain, about to take a nap before getting started on a Thanksgiving meal. My apartment complex’s solution is for me to call the Police non emergency line to tell em to turn it down, cause in their words, “the police usually scares them.” Not gonna use institutionalized violence to solve my probelms so I did an annoyingly loud loop over my guitar amp to tell them to turn it down.
It’s the same people that say Atheists are as annoying as Christians. Bro, there a lot of atheists you just don’t hear about, you’re making a lame excuse to be Christian.
I live in Czech Republic. Atheism is the default here. Almost nobody talks about faith, since most people don’t care, so you can’t really tell if someone is Christian.
To me, internet atheists are annoying as shit. I get it that the USA close to being an open theocracy and a lot of pushback is still needed before things are even close to normal, but still. Forceful atheism you usually see online is obnoxious, goes to extremes, the smugness is off the charts - simpmy annoying.
IMHO, the modern US is how Divide et Impera (divide and rule) looks when it has entirelly taken over the public discussion domain: identitarian wars over moralistic stuff that has no connection with real power, all the while those who have the one and only greatest power of the land - money - most of whom themselves couldn’t care less about those things, keep on milking the rest for what they still have.
In Europe, you don’t yet see quite the same warring in the moral plane whilst excluding what maters the most to most people (you know, live well in a nice place with a full belly) , though I’ve noticed that both on the Left and the Right here already quite a number of people have been “inspired” by the heavy, heavy propaganda that leaks from the US system and staked and taken identitarian sides in an environment that lacks most of the social and historical anchoring-points that exist in the environment where those chewing-gum for moralism “ideologies” were crafted.
I think to a degree the left pushes people out though, as your lefty card needs to be spotless or it’s revoked.
Sometimes a person can say one thing wrong and they’ll be labelled an alt-right fascist, and not part of “the group” on the left, especially online.
Obviously that doesn’t make people right wing, but it is a problem that pushes people away from more left leaning views/groups. Rather than try to discuss and correct, people will berate and ostracise.
You think that doesn’t happen on the right? There’s a huge fight in congress now about which idiot is the Republicanest. They’re all calling each other RINOs.
it depends, a lot of european politicians for example were recently voted out of office and replaced by far right dickheads in large part because of their anti-ukraine views… it’s alarming how common this is and how much ground the left has lost in a lot of european countries because of not supporting ukraine, meanwhile the right used this to their advantage and went all out pro-ukraine (for example in italy with fascist girlboss PM and her coalition). i think this was also a contributing factor in recent finnish elections.
the right is uniting in eurpope for once, instead of hating each other, as well as taking advantage of anti-immigrant anti-LGBT sentiments in the population, meanwhile infighting in the left is causing it to crumble. it’s a terrible sign
Not supporting Palestinians (you know, the civilians, including children) tends to bring out those accusations.
The way you formulated it, however, indicates that you think that Hamas = Palestinians or at least that it’s fine if Palestinians suffer for the actions of Hamas, something only a racist would think, so in your case the “accusations” are associated to you being percieved as a racist.
Maybe the one thing the entirety of the Left agrees on is that Racists are scum, not least because racism is one the main defining features of the oldest most murderous kind of rightwing extremism there is: Fascism.
I consider myself a communist, I have been called a nazi or a fascist (I don’t remember) by some people here because I don’t share 100% some of their ideas, I’m still on the left, I still have empathy, I fully support individual freedom. But they are annoying nonetheless.
People don’t align with the Right because of shared political ideals, they align with the Right because the Right hates the same people they do and promises to punish those they hate.
They can scream and wail about “family values” all they want, but when they’re lined up with neo-nazis, white supremacists, and pedophiles all praising their glorious leader (who, BTW, believes that there are “very fine people” among a group who chants "Jews will not replace us! "), everyone on the outside has to wonder what “values” they are really fighting for.
I will say, anger and hatred are very contagious. I mean, not so contagious that I could start being racist and homophobic…wait, yeah, right wingers are assholes.
Usually memes make up what one side says to make a great comeback, but in this case it’s definitely correct. People absolutely go right because of stupidity on the left, and vice versa
I thibk what thwy’re saying is, is that it is proof you have horrible moral axioms or no axioms at all if you’re willing to shift entire poolitical directions over annoyance. Constructing society MUST be done by people who are less petty and judgemental.
you are correct, however consider that most voters are stupid and they care more about who’s louder and is painted in a better light by the news and their coworkers, not actual policies or beliefs
Yeah, but voting left or supporting lefty positions doesn’t get us anywhere close to Stalin currently, whereas on the right we have at least a Mussolini with a solid trajectory through Franco to Hitler waiting to get elected.
I’ve known (and know) many conservatives. While they all had very diverse reasons, the through-line is always hate. Either hate of LGBT people, women’s bodily autonomy, immigrants, POC, workers, or the poor (or all the above).
I don’t consider most of these people bad people, per se. People are complex, and many are good people in other aspects. Most don’t have any kind of power, and aren’t overt about their hatred in strange company, so it doesn’t matter much who they hate. If anything, their hatred is damaging to themselves (emotionally and socially). Though, I guess on the grand scale, they end up voting for politicians that worsen the conditions of the people they hate; and, in most cases, worsen their own conditions.
The fact that Trump has made it his life’s mission to be a fucking cartoon villain, and that people actually follow him, is not a moral failing of the guy you replied to.
People on the right wanting to take away medical treatment from trans people that we all know will result in more of them being miserable and committing suicide. That’s hateful.
Laws passed to censor any discussion of homosexuality, ensuring gay people stay isolated, closeted, and unaccepted by larger society. That’s hateful.
Silence any talk of racism lest we work to overcome it? Hateful.
We hear Trump telling us he will lock up the lefties. Believe it or not, hateful.
Trump making fun of disabled people and Republicans laughing along with? Again, Hateful.
Putting brown kids in cages, or yanking them away from their families and then losing them? Hateful.
And on and on.
Rabid right wing extremists have taken over the GOP over the last few decades. They’re the hateful ones.
It does not mean they are hateful, you silly billy. It means they cannot observe the reasons for the hate.
That COULD be because they agree with it and do not want to admit, but you MUST understand how wishful thinking and ignorance to evil ABSOLUTELY produces the same result.
MLK Jr. was not calling everyone who sat on their butt evil. He called their inaction the banality of evil. It does NOT take an evil person to do a horrible thing. The fact you do not realize that means it is you who has a lot of growing to do.
Yes, inaction because of ignorance is bad. Though calling people evil because they’re ignorant is utterly counterproductive and frankly, pathetically judgemental, too.
Except they literally are, looking at the US. I’m European and I see most right-wing European politicians as just “assholes I disagree with”, but the US Republicans are literally cartoon villains at this point. Like, Trump would get labeled as unrealistic if he was an antagonist in a remotely adult-oriented movie.
That’s not all Europeans, and it also applies to most American Republicans. Whataboutism is already weak as an argument, at least mention an issue the US don’t have as well (not that I can come up with any, honestly)
Obviously it’s not ALL Europeans. No country in the world is a monolith. The governments, however, ARE representative of the general will of the people. The fact that the governments of Europe (again who are representative of the people) are backpedaling on gender affirming care and pausing things like hormone replacement therapy, gender reassignment surgery, and shutting down gender clinics indicates to me that the general will of the people in Europe is one of transphobia.
“Most American Republicans” are in the minority and NOT representative of the will of the people as indicated by the fact that our current administration is Democrat. We also affirm trans individuals by allowing widespread access to gender affirming care, flying the trans flag on public buildings, and highlighting trans individuals in mainstream media.
For the record, my argument was not a “whataboutism”, but yours in fact was.
When were we talking about “all Americans”? I always talked about “right-wing politicians”, and the large majority of US right-wing politicians are anti-trans. That’s not generalizing. Saying Europeans, or even European governments are “anti-trans bigots” is generalizing and implying the left-wing governments are anti-trans as well, when it’s pretty much only the right wing, just like in the US. You’re also exaggerating a lot of what’s actually happening in Europe, unless I’m coincidentally looking in all the wrong places. For example, it seems to me “shutting down gender clinics” is referring to exactly one clinic being announced to shut down in the UK, while others are being built in the exact same area.
”You’re a hateful person if you see people on the right as cartoon villains”
”US Republicans literally act like cartoon villains though”
”Well Europeans are all anti-trans bigots”
You replied to my point with a different one, with the intent to diminish mine by pivoting the attention to yours. How is it not the exact definition of whataboutism?
The problem of modern politics is that both sides are thinking that the other side is morally evil, while their side is morally right. The problem with this is because there is no middle ground possible, no compromise. And politics is all about compromise. So that means that the government stops serving to the people because it is in permanent lock.
Problem is that I genuinely do struggle to think of an issue that I think the right-wing are correct on. It’s not mere tribalism, it’s not “other team bad”. It is a fundamental difference in values, and worldview.
I had an honest to God reasonable discussion with a very conservative Christian man. We talked and I told him about the major problems I see today (this was before the current demonization of LGBT). Each one, like gun violence, I asked what proposed solutions the right-wing had and he conceded that every position they had was reactionary to a proposed solution by the left. I basically told the guy that I’ll vote for the group that has some kind of solution, even a less than ideal solution.
I have a lot of respect for that guy. I don’t think his position has changed but his willingness to hear me out was refreshing.
Here’s how I see it and forgive me if it’s totally off:
In the US, the part of the Right which was all about “making a better country through making life better for businesses” (the ones you could say wanted a better country just like the lefties, but disagreed on the importance of broadly sharing the benefits of it) has won, decades ago even: both the Republicans and the Democract absolutelly and unequestinably came to believe that “doing what’s best for business” - not for society, not for people, for business - is the right way to manage the country.
What you have now is the breaking down of that political thinking monopoly, because it didn’t actually deliver on its promises, especially the “when the tide rises all boats rise with it” promise (the “for the greater good” promise of that ideology, something the Traditional Left might understand even if it disagrees with the methods).
This breakdown is shaping both the Right in the US and what is seen there as Left: the Right is falling back to good old Fascist tropes - religiosity, racism, ultra-nationalism to quite a rabid level, whilst what passes for “Left” there is actually a newly built ideology, based on the moral side of neoliberalism - i.e. moral liberalism - with almost no links to the traditional Left of worker movements and the fight against wealth inequality, and which does not follow of the “the greatest good for the greatest number” ideology but rather the “people should be free to do what they want” ideology, so an ideology which is totally compatible with things like there being people accumulating obscene amounts of wealth, which the ideology of the Traditional Left is most definitelly not compatible with.
So the public face of the Right in the US are basically Fascists (with all the traditional illiberal values of that) whilst the public face of the “Left” in the US is not a Left in the Traditional sense but rather a whole new ideology created around the moral part of neoliberalism (which is by nature liberal in all things) hence said “Left”, whilst completelly compatible with things like The Low Regulation Free Market, and Wealth Inequality, is antithetical to the moral illiberal values taken from Fascism which are held by the current Right in the US.
So yeah, the only fighting going on between what people think is Left and Right in the US is between absolutellyt totally and complete opposite sides on the moral domain (liberalism vs religious and racist illiberalism), with a negligible or even non existent dispute of how to best manage the country for the greater good, so there is no “same general goals different methods” area were Left and Right might find common ground.
Things are more subtle elsewhere, at least in Europe, though neoliberalism has also conquerer the entire mainstream “center” (whether they called themselves “Left” or “Right”) in most countries, but most countries have voting systems which are not or at least not as much rigged for maintaing a Power Duopoly as the one in the US, so there usually still are more traditional left voices in the ideological field, plus the rebirth of Fascism is happenning from the fringes rather than right in the middle of one of the two Power Duopoly parties (though if you look at countries with very similar voting systems to the US one, like Britain, they’re showing almost exactly the political transformation: Fascism taking over one of the Power Duopoly parties and the “Left” being taken over by a brand new ideology created from the moral side of neoliberalism, still siding with the Economic thinking of neoliberalsim and which ignores wealth inequality.
I don’t need explanations. I’ve spoken to a lot of conservatives, about a lot of topics. It’s not that I don’t understand. It’s that we value different things. That we see the world differently.
Very abstractly, conservatives tend (and individuals are different so may tend more or less) to believe that hierarchy is natural, and unavoidable. That hierarchy simply is the way the world is. Progressives on the other hand tend to be more egalitarian, all are created equal and hierarchies are usually unjust and should be dismantled.
It’s why there is such a consistent division of beliefs. Why people, if they hold some conservative or progressive values, tend to also hold other beliefs of the same categorisation. Where when new issues come up, we can predict with good accuracy who is going to take what stance, by answering the question: Does this move power up, or down, the hierarchy? Does this reinforce the hierarchy, or does it weaken the hierarchy?
It also explains seemingly contradictory conservative beliefs. It explains why the right-wing, who at their fringes host white-supremacists and who are represented in government by people who talk about “Jewish space lasers”, are now supporting Israel and accusing people of antisemitism. Because Israel is higher in the hierarchy than Palestine. Their claims to care about antisemitism are laughably flimsy in context, they are lies propped up in front of the real belief.
Interestingly you can believe that hierarchy is natural and still be a leftist, because coercive hierarchies (such as capitalist or the state) that the left is against prevent these natural hierarchies from emerging. The problem with the right is that they have a model of society in their mind and think that any divergence isn’t natural and must be fixed (by either capitalism or the state). While the left understands that there is no reason some people can’t be in power and so want’s to equalize the playing field.
Human beings aren’t made equally and there will always be some hierarchy in human society. Leftists just want to give everyone the opportunity to rise up the ranks instead of just the “right” people. That is why everyone must be treated equally you don’t know where they exist in the hierarchy.
Technically there isn’t a single social hierarchy. But multiple overlapping ones. Some people are better in some things and other are better in other things. Saying that everyone is equal is too simplified. Society is more complex than that.
But as a generalization (especially when compared to the right) it is correct.
I’d like to make a nuanced correction to your statement. You state that conservatives believe that hierarchy is natural and unavoidable, and progressives believe in equality. As someone who considers themselves a right leaning centrist, I think you’re missing an important distinction. I believe that good people and evil people exist. I believe that hard working people and lazy people exist. I believe that kind people and selfish people exist. You can never have true equality in a progressive sense so long as those two sides exist. The evil, selfish, and lazy people will ALWAYS prey on the good, kind, hard working. It isn’t that we fundamentally disagree with what progressives want, it’s that we think they have an unrealistic utopian view. Sort of like how a child will say they wish for world peace. It’s sweet and well intentioned, but misses the reality of the world. As a native Californian, I can tell you that many of these progressive policies you want have led to increased violence, property crimes, and a general reduction in quality of life across the board, not just for the people at the top, but for literally everyone.
You haven’t actually corrected anything I’ve said. In fact you have reinforced it.
You’re a conservative. You believe that there are different types of people, an us and a them, and that those differences are innate to people are. And so you don’t believe equality is possible, so the hierarchy must exist, and thus you want to make sure that your group of people is higher up than the groups of people you disparage as lazy, selfish, and evil.
That is a fundamental difference in values.
As a native Californian, I can tell you that many of these progressive policies you want have led to increased violence, property crimes, and a general reduction in quality of life across the board, not just for the people at the top, but for literally everyone.
And I think your political literacy is poor, and barely surface level. The conditions you speak of are not due to nebulous “progressive” policies, but to the vast wealth inequality your country as a whole, but California particularly, suffers from. California has progressive policies, but still does not address many of the worst of the issues.
You are suffering from the hierarchy. Because the people lower on that hierarchy are aggrieved with their living conditions, and thus cause unrest. The system is not working for them, so they do not respect the system in turn.
The difference between progressives and conservatives is that we disagree on what to do about that. Progressives want to flatten the hierarchy so that the disparity is smaller and the grievance is addressed, so that the system works for those people too, so those people can live full lives, and thus they have little motivation to destroy a system that takes care of them. Progressives believe that true peace comes from justice.
Conservatives instead want to maintain and increase the oppression on those lower down the hierarchy, so that they know their place. Conservative peace is enforced by beating the aggrieved down until they stop complaining.
Spoken like an elitist liberal. You’d fit right in in California.
You remind me of someone I once read about. They too believed in progressive ideals. They decided to hitchhike from Italy to the middle east in an attempt to share their message of love and peace. Three weeks into the trip they were raped, murdered, and left in a ditch. But I guess you’re right, evil people don’t exist, it’s just those damn aggrieved saps at the bottom who don’t respect the system.
You’re right, there are certainly people who have been downtrodden by the world and become cold and callous, but there are also people simply born cruel. I’ve seen downtrodden people act with tremendous kindness/morality, and I’ve seen successful people act with tremendous evil/immorality. For you to pretend that bad behavior is simply a result of “the system” is idiotic and out of touch with reality.
And I think your political literacy is poor, and barely surface level. The conditions you speak of are not due to nebulous “progressive” policies, but to the vast wealth inequality your country as a whole, but California particularly, suffers from. California has progressive policies, but still does not address many of the worst of the issues.
What do you suppose led to the vast inequality? I’ll give you a hint, it was elitist thinking and liberal policies. California is one of the most progressive states in the country. It’s been that way basically my entire life. We charge more for everything (taxes, healthcare, energy, housing, etc) so that we can fund our progressive agenda. As a result our middle class has evaporated. Now we have only the poor and the insanely wealthy. Our progressive leaders know this, so they pander to the poor, giving them benefits to keep voting them in, and cut deals with the rich. They don’t want to stigmatize anyone so they’ve stopped enforcing many basic laws. The rich aren’t terribly impacted, they live in gated communities and have armed security. Instead it’s everyone else who suffers. You acknowledge California has progressive policies that don’t address the problems, yet you simultaneously dismiss them being the cause of the problems. What is your answer then? Let me guess… communism? That seems to be the answer everyone on Lemmy espouses.
Secondly, what do you mean elitist? I’m literally suggesting the the dismantling of the hierarchy. My entire point of view is that concepts of elitism are inherently wrong. That criticism does not even make sense, it’s a meaningless insult.
You remind me of someone I once read about. They too believed in progressive ideals. They decided to hitchhike from Italy to the middle east in an attempt to share their message of love and peace. Three weeks into the trip they were raped, murdered, and left in a ditch. But I guess you’re right, evil people don’t exist, it’s just those damn aggrieved saps at the bottom who don’t respect the system. You’re right, there are certainly people who have been downtrodden by the world and become cold and callous, but there are also people simply born cruel. I’ve seen downtrodden people act with tremendous kindness/morality, and I’ve seen successful people act with tremendous evil/immorality. For you to pretend that bad behavior is simply a result of “the system” is idiotic and out of touch with reality.
Please try read what I wrote, instead of just imagining my position.
I never said that people don’t do bad things, and I never said that all unrest or violence would end, I never said that every person would become an upstanding member of society. But people are a product of their environment. People who have decent lives, who live in more equitable societies, have less motivation to attack those societies.
Don’t fold me into your ridiculous black-and-white pattern of thinking.
What do you suppose led to the vast inequality?
Capitalism.
California is one of the most progressive states in the country. It’s been that way basically my entire life.
And is still capitalist, and still rather conservative on key issues, because your whole country is quite conservative at the federal level.
California is more progressive than much of the US, that doesn’t make them actually progressive in a broader sense.
Now we have only the poor and the insanely wealthy.
Gee whiz, it’s almost as if they aren’t at all as progressive as you think they are :)
I believe fundamentally, psychologically the main reason that makes conservative a conservative is a believe that we, as society, can not make things better, and quite likely will make things worse. This is why they are “conserving”. It works - don’t change, don’t breaks. Hierarchy works, so we keep it - type of things.
Or could it be that we see policy enacted which tangibly DOES in fact make our lives worse, our community run down, and our family less safe? Why is it that in the 50s you could leave your front door unlocked without fear of someone stealing your stuff or harming your family? The country has gotten significantly more progressive since then. Would you feel safe doing that now? In big cities (overwhelming progressive) people are advised to leave their car windows down so that anyone trying to break in won’t shatter the window. In those same cities homeless encampments, open drug use, and relieving oneself in the streets has become the accepted norm. Call me crazy, but I liked it better the way it was before.
Not all change is good, and not all conservation is bad. That seems to be a sentiment we’ve lost sight of.
Quite often it isn’t, or those fighting for the middle ground rather than taking the correct side out of a principle for compromise end up making the situation worse, rather than just fixing it.
You’re not supposed to compromise before negotiations have even began… I will never understand why Democrats and “centrists” can stay alive with literally no spine.
If you look at History, human progress happens in cycles made up of long periods of consolidation with shorter periods of disruption in between.
You actually see something similar inside companies.
If all you had was those who favour the incremental building on top of the way things are, i.e. consolidators, i.e. conservatives, you would end up in a dead-end of stagnation followed by collapse since we never found a perfect “way things are” that will work forever - all static systems accumulate problems over time due to their own imperfections and/or are unable to adapt to changing conditions, so naturally fail, not a question of “if” only a question of “when” and “how”.
If all you had was those who favour change, i.e. disruptors, i.e. revolutionaries (not necessarilly of the Left), massive amounts of effort, energy and even pain would be constantly wasted in permanent change with little being actually build even on top of the best of ideas - this is also a path for collapse because there is no such thing as building for the Future under ethernal change.
You could say the “middle ground”, “steady as she goes” solution is better during most of the progress cycle but at the end of the cycle it’s just maintaing the system as is, the accumulated problems being painful and becoming ever worse with not chance at improving because the system in place has never managed to overcome those long-running accumulating problems because it has no solution for them and never will. At such a stage “steady as she goes” politics is pretty much “full steam ahead and don’t mind the fog or the icebergs” and we all know how that ends.
(Funnily the captain of the Titanic chose to risk it is because that ship was said to be unsinkable, which has massive parallels with what we are told - and most believe - about the resilience of the political and economic system that has been dominant in the last 50 years).
I would say we’ve reached a point were the accumulation of problems from the dominant ideology of the last 4-5 decades is becoming too much and now is not the time for “more of the same” but rather it’s the time for change, which will happen whether we want to or not. The question is: will it be controlled change done before the problems become too much or will it be the natural chaotic kind as societal tensions are violently released (societal collapse, revolution, war, iron fist dictatorships and so on)?
Mind you, afterwards, the time for “consolidation” will come again, its just that how much will we be able to save of the positive things built during the last period of consolidation will depend on how much change and changers are embraced now and in the near future vs how much it will just be imposed on us by the unsustainable tensions of the last systems resulting in uncontrolled change.
And the problem of modern US politics is that the middle ground is already what is called “left”. Biden would be seen as right-wing in Europe. If they keep finding a “middle ground” they’ll just shift the Overton Window more and more.
I don’t think people join the right because they are annoyed by leftists, I think they join the right because they see a bunch of people full of hatred and want to join in because of their self-centered misanthropy.
100% they just use being annoyed by leftists to hide their ideological view points. Just wanted to share this cause I thought it was funny.
Yeah, I probably shouldn’t have posted that. I didn’t get enough sleep and I’m grouchy. Sorry.
Youre all good, my upstairs neighbor were thumping bass till 5am so I feel your pain, about to take a nap before getting started on a Thanksgiving meal. My apartment complex’s solution is for me to call the Police non emergency line to tell em to turn it down, cause in their words, “the police usually scares them.” Not gonna use institutionalized violence to solve my probelms so I did an annoyingly loud loop over my guitar amp to tell them to turn it down.
I don’t blame you for not calling them. That can lead to very bad things these days. Hope your solution at least pissed them off if it didn’t work.
It definitely pissed em off, and my nap was EPIC.
It’s the same people that say Atheists are as annoying as Christians. Bro, there a lot of atheists you just don’t hear about, you’re making a lame excuse to be Christian.
To be fair, I’m sure there are dozens of legit good Christians out there…somewhere
There’s plenty, you just don’t hear about them because they don’t go around shoving their religion down everyone else’s throats
I live in Czech Republic. Atheism is the default here. Almost nobody talks about faith, since most people don’t care, so you can’t really tell if someone is Christian.
To me, internet atheists are annoying as shit. I get it that the USA close to being an open theocracy and a lot of pushback is still needed before things are even close to normal, but still. Forceful atheism you usually see online is obnoxious, goes to extremes, the smugness is off the charts - simpmy annoying.
IMHO, the modern US is how Divide et Impera (divide and rule) looks when it has entirelly taken over the public discussion domain: identitarian wars over moralistic stuff that has no connection with real power, all the while those who have the one and only greatest power of the land - money - most of whom themselves couldn’t care less about those things, keep on milking the rest for what they still have.
In Europe, you don’t yet see quite the same warring in the moral plane whilst excluding what maters the most to most people (you know, live well in a nice place with a full belly) , though I’ve noticed that both on the Left and the Right here already quite a number of people have been “inspired” by the heavy, heavy propaganda that leaks from the US system and staked and taken identitarian sides in an environment that lacks most of the social and historical anchoring-points that exist in the environment where those chewing-gum for moralism “ideologies” were crafted.
I’m right because women are wrong /s
I think to a degree the left pushes people out though, as your lefty card needs to be spotless or it’s revoked.
Sometimes a person can say one thing wrong and they’ll be labelled an alt-right fascist, and not part of “the group” on the left, especially online.
Obviously that doesn’t make people right wing, but it is a problem that pushes people away from more left leaning views/groups. Rather than try to discuss and correct, people will berate and ostracise.
We eat our own.
Need to improve your diet and eat the rich!
Outstanding.
You think that doesn’t happen on the right? There’s a huge fight in congress now about which idiot is the Republicanest. They’re all calling each other RINOs.
Ok, I’ll bite, give me an example of “one thing wrong” that gets you labelled as an alt-right fascist.
Supporting Ukraine, or liking Stalin. Depending on which instance you’re chatting in
Ok you got me, I don’t see tankies as mainstream left wing, they’re fare gone but wouldn’t label them alt-right
Yeah alt-right maybe not, but they’re called red fash for a reason
huh, generally i’d say not supporting ukraine gets you labelled as a twat and excluded from leftist circles
Tankies love Putin
and tankies are labeled as twats and excluded from most leftist circles
it depends, a lot of european politicians for example were recently voted out of office and replaced by far right dickheads in large part because of their anti-ukraine views… it’s alarming how common this is and how much ground the left has lost in a lot of european countries because of not supporting ukraine, meanwhile the right used this to their advantage and went all out pro-ukraine (for example in italy with fascist girlboss PM and her coalition). i think this was also a contributing factor in recent finnish elections.
the right is uniting in eurpope for once, instead of hating each other, as well as taking advantage of anti-immigrant anti-LGBT sentiments in the population, meanwhile infighting in the left is causing it to crumble. it’s a terrible sign
Shouting “Sig heil!”
Saying you are against abolishing or defunding the police.
Lately, not supporting Hamas tends to bring out those accusations
Not supporting Palestinians (you know, the civilians, including children) tends to bring out those accusations.
The way you formulated it, however, indicates that you think that Hamas = Palestinians or at least that it’s fine if Palestinians suffer for the actions of Hamas, something only a racist would think, so in your case the “accusations” are associated to you being percieved as a racist.
Maybe the one thing the entirety of the Left agrees on is that Racists are scum, not least because racism is one the main defining features of the oldest most murderous kind of rightwing extremism there is: Fascism.
I consider myself a communist, I have been called a nazi or a fascist (I don’t remember) by some people here because I don’t share 100% some of their ideas, I’m still on the left, I still have empathy, I fully support individual freedom. But they are annoying nonetheless.
People don’t align with the Right because of shared political ideals, they align with the Right because the Right hates the same people they do and promises to punish those they hate.
They can scream and wail about “family values” all they want, but when they’re lined up with neo-nazis, white supremacists, and pedophiles all praising their glorious leader (who, BTW, believes that there are “very fine people” among a group who chants "Jews will not replace us! "), everyone on the outside has to wonder what “values” they are really fighting for.
It’s a joke, and it references a commonly heard fake argument from the right that they were left leaning once but couldn’t stand the people.
I will say, anger and hatred are very contagious. I mean, not so contagious that I could start being racist and homophobic…wait, yeah, right wingers are assholes.
Usually memes make up what one side says to make a great comeback, but in this case it’s definitely correct. People absolutely go right because of stupidity on the left, and vice versa
I thibk what thwy’re saying is, is that it is proof you have horrible moral axioms or no axioms at all if you’re willing to shift entire poolitical directions over annoyance. Constructing society MUST be done by people who are less petty and judgemental.
you are correct, however consider that most voters are stupid and they care more about who’s louder and is painted in a better light by the news and their coworkers, not actual policies or beliefs
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Yeah, but voting left or supporting lefty positions doesn’t get us anywhere close to Stalin currently, whereas on the right we have at least a Mussolini with a solid trajectory through Franco to Hitler waiting to get elected.
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You’ve literally never hung out with conservatives in your life, just admit it. You have no idea who we are.
Apart from my wife’s entire family, sure.
I’ve known (and know) many conservatives. While they all had very diverse reasons, the through-line is always hate. Either hate of LGBT people, women’s bodily autonomy, immigrants, POC, workers, or the poor (or all the above).
I don’t consider most of these people bad people, per se. People are complex, and many are good people in other aspects. Most don’t have any kind of power, and aren’t overt about their hatred in strange company, so it doesn’t matter much who they hate. If anything, their hatred is damaging to themselves (emotionally and socially). Though, I guess on the grand scale, they end up voting for politicians that worsen the conditions of the people they hate; and, in most cases, worsen their own conditions.
The fact that you see people on the right as cartoon villains means YOU are the hateful person.
The fact that Trump has made it his life’s mission to be a fucking cartoon villain, and that people actually follow him, is not a moral failing of the guy you replied to.
People on the right wanting to take away medical treatment from trans people that we all know will result in more of them being miserable and committing suicide. That’s hateful.
Laws passed to censor any discussion of homosexuality, ensuring gay people stay isolated, closeted, and unaccepted by larger society. That’s hateful.
Silence any talk of racism lest we work to overcome it? Hateful.
We hear Trump telling us he will lock up the lefties. Believe it or not, hateful.
Trump making fun of disabled people and Republicans laughing along with? Again, Hateful.
Putting brown kids in cages, or yanking them away from their families and then losing them? Hateful.
And on and on.
Rabid right wing extremists have taken over the GOP over the last few decades. They’re the hateful ones.
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Things it’s okay to hate people for:
Things it’s not okay to hate people for:
Thank you for saving us from the cancel mob
You sound like a happy person. I hope you get the help that you need.
I am
It does not mean they are hateful, you silly billy. It means they cannot observe the reasons for the hate.
That COULD be because they agree with it and do not want to admit, but you MUST understand how wishful thinking and ignorance to evil ABSOLUTELY produces the same result.
MLK Jr. was not calling everyone who sat on their butt evil. He called their inaction the banality of evil. It does NOT take an evil person to do a horrible thing. The fact you do not realize that means it is you who has a lot of growing to do.
Yes, inaction because of ignorance is bad. Though calling people evil because they’re ignorant is utterly counterproductive and frankly, pathetically judgemental, too.
Except they literally are, looking at the US. I’m European and I see most right-wing European politicians as just “assholes I disagree with”, but the US Republicans are literally cartoon villains at this point. Like, Trump would get labeled as unrealistic if he was an antagonist in a remotely adult-oriented movie.
And Europeans are anti-trans bigots who have begun limiting gender affirming care to minors. What’s your point?
That’s not all Europeans, and it also applies to most American Republicans. Whataboutism is already weak as an argument, at least mention an issue the US don’t have as well (not that I can come up with any, honestly)
Obviously it’s not ALL Europeans. No country in the world is a monolith. The governments, however, ARE representative of the general will of the people. The fact that the governments of Europe (again who are representative of the people) are backpedaling on gender affirming care and pausing things like hormone replacement therapy, gender reassignment surgery, and shutting down gender clinics indicates to me that the general will of the people in Europe is one of transphobia.
“Most American Republicans” are in the minority and NOT representative of the will of the people as indicated by the fact that our current administration is Democrat. We also affirm trans individuals by allowing widespread access to gender affirming care, flying the trans flag on public buildings, and highlighting trans individuals in mainstream media.
For the record, my argument was not a “whataboutism”, but yours in fact was.
When were we talking about “all Americans”? I always talked about “right-wing politicians”, and the large majority of US right-wing politicians are anti-trans. That’s not generalizing. Saying Europeans, or even European governments are “anti-trans bigots” is generalizing and implying the left-wing governments are anti-trans as well, when it’s pretty much only the right wing, just like in the US. You’re also exaggerating a lot of what’s actually happening in Europe, unless I’m coincidentally looking in all the wrong places. For example, it seems to me “shutting down gender clinics” is referring to exactly one clinic being announced to shut down in the UK, while others are being built in the exact same area.
You replied to my point with a different one, with the intent to diminish mine by pivoting the attention to yours. How is it not the exact definition of whataboutism?
The problem of modern politics is that both sides are thinking that the other side is morally evil, while their side is morally right. The problem with this is because there is no middle ground possible, no compromise. And politics is all about compromise. So that means that the government stops serving to the people because it is in permanent lock.
Problem is that I genuinely do struggle to think of an issue that I think the right-wing are correct on. It’s not mere tribalism, it’s not “other team bad”. It is a fundamental difference in values, and worldview.
I had an honest to God reasonable discussion with a very conservative Christian man. We talked and I told him about the major problems I see today (this was before the current demonization of LGBT). Each one, like gun violence, I asked what proposed solutions the right-wing had and he conceded that every position they had was reactionary to a proposed solution by the left. I basically told the guy that I’ll vote for the group that has some kind of solution, even a less than ideal solution.
I have a lot of respect for that guy. I don’t think his position has changed but his willingness to hear me out was refreshing.
It’s because the liberals already support any effective conservative policy, and it’s more important to oppose liberals at all cost
Here’s how I see it and forgive me if it’s totally off:
In the US, the part of the Right which was all about “making a better country through making life better for businesses” (the ones you could say wanted a better country just like the lefties, but disagreed on the importance of broadly sharing the benefits of it) has won, decades ago even: both the Republicans and the Democract absolutelly and unequestinably came to believe that “doing what’s best for business” - not for society, not for people, for business - is the right way to manage the country.
What you have now is the breaking down of that political thinking monopoly, because it didn’t actually deliver on its promises, especially the “when the tide rises all boats rise with it” promise (the “for the greater good” promise of that ideology, something the Traditional Left might understand even if it disagrees with the methods).
This breakdown is shaping both the Right in the US and what is seen there as Left: the Right is falling back to good old Fascist tropes - religiosity, racism, ultra-nationalism to quite a rabid level, whilst what passes for “Left” there is actually a newly built ideology, based on the moral side of neoliberalism - i.e. moral liberalism - with almost no links to the traditional Left of worker movements and the fight against wealth inequality, and which does not follow of the “the greatest good for the greatest number” ideology but rather the “people should be free to do what they want” ideology, so an ideology which is totally compatible with things like there being people accumulating obscene amounts of wealth, which the ideology of the Traditional Left is most definitelly not compatible with.
So the public face of the Right in the US are basically Fascists (with all the traditional illiberal values of that) whilst the public face of the “Left” in the US is not a Left in the Traditional sense but rather a whole new ideology created around the moral part of neoliberalism (which is by nature liberal in all things) hence said “Left”, whilst completelly compatible with things like The Low Regulation Free Market, and Wealth Inequality, is antithetical to the moral illiberal values taken from Fascism which are held by the current Right in the US.
So yeah, the only fighting going on between what people think is Left and Right in the US is between absolutellyt totally and complete opposite sides on the moral domain (liberalism vs religious and racist illiberalism), with a negligible or even non existent dispute of how to best manage the country for the greater good, so there is no “same general goals different methods” area were Left and Right might find common ground.
Things are more subtle elsewhere, at least in Europe, though neoliberalism has also conquerer the entire mainstream “center” (whether they called themselves “Left” or “Right”) in most countries, but most countries have voting systems which are not or at least not as much rigged for maintaing a Power Duopoly as the one in the US, so there usually still are more traditional left voices in the ideological field, plus the rebirth of Fascism is happenning from the fringes rather than right in the middle of one of the two Power Duopoly parties (though if you look at countries with very similar voting systems to the US one, like Britain, they’re showing almost exactly the political transformation: Fascism taking over one of the Power Duopoly parties and the “Left” being taken over by a brand new ideology created from the moral side of neoliberalism, still siding with the Economic thinking of neoliberalsim and which ignores wealth inequality.
While I am not right, I do spend some time how it can be. So, pick a topic, I might be able to explain it.
I don’t need explanations. I’ve spoken to a lot of conservatives, about a lot of topics. It’s not that I don’t understand. It’s that we value different things. That we see the world differently.
Very abstractly, conservatives tend (and individuals are different so may tend more or less) to believe that hierarchy is natural, and unavoidable. That hierarchy simply is the way the world is. Progressives on the other hand tend to be more egalitarian, all are created equal and hierarchies are usually unjust and should be dismantled.
It’s why there is such a consistent division of beliefs. Why people, if they hold some conservative or progressive values, tend to also hold other beliefs of the same categorisation. Where when new issues come up, we can predict with good accuracy who is going to take what stance, by answering the question: Does this move power up, or down, the hierarchy? Does this reinforce the hierarchy, or does it weaken the hierarchy?
It also explains seemingly contradictory conservative beliefs. It explains why the right-wing, who at their fringes host white-supremacists and who are represented in government by people who talk about “Jewish space lasers”, are now supporting Israel and accusing people of antisemitism. Because Israel is higher in the hierarchy than Palestine. Their claims to care about antisemitism are laughably flimsy in context, they are lies propped up in front of the real belief.
Interestingly you can believe that hierarchy is natural and still be a leftist, because coercive hierarchies (such as capitalist or the state) that the left is against prevent these natural hierarchies from emerging. The problem with the right is that they have a model of society in their mind and think that any divergence isn’t natural and must be fixed (by either capitalism or the state). While the left understands that there is no reason some people can’t be in power and so want’s to equalize the playing field.
Human beings aren’t made equally and there will always be some hierarchy in human society. Leftists just want to give everyone the opportunity to rise up the ranks instead of just the “right” people. That is why everyone must be treated equally you don’t know where they exist in the hierarchy.
Technically there isn’t a single social hierarchy. But multiple overlapping ones. Some people are better in some things and other are better in other things. Saying that everyone is equal is too simplified. Society is more complex than that.
But as a generalization (especially when compared to the right) it is correct.
I’d like to make a nuanced correction to your statement. You state that conservatives believe that hierarchy is natural and unavoidable, and progressives believe in equality. As someone who considers themselves a right leaning centrist, I think you’re missing an important distinction. I believe that good people and evil people exist. I believe that hard working people and lazy people exist. I believe that kind people and selfish people exist. You can never have true equality in a progressive sense so long as those two sides exist. The evil, selfish, and lazy people will ALWAYS prey on the good, kind, hard working. It isn’t that we fundamentally disagree with what progressives want, it’s that we think they have an unrealistic utopian view. Sort of like how a child will say they wish for world peace. It’s sweet and well intentioned, but misses the reality of the world. As a native Californian, I can tell you that many of these progressive policies you want have led to increased violence, property crimes, and a general reduction in quality of life across the board, not just for the people at the top, but for literally everyone.
You haven’t actually corrected anything I’ve said. In fact you have reinforced it.
You’re a conservative. You believe that there are different types of people, an us and a them, and that those differences are innate to people are. And so you don’t believe equality is possible, so the hierarchy must exist, and thus you want to make sure that your group of people is higher up than the groups of people you disparage as lazy, selfish, and evil.
That is a fundamental difference in values.
And I think your political literacy is poor, and barely surface level. The conditions you speak of are not due to nebulous “progressive” policies, but to the vast wealth inequality your country as a whole, but California particularly, suffers from. California has progressive policies, but still does not address many of the worst of the issues.
You are suffering from the hierarchy. Because the people lower on that hierarchy are aggrieved with their living conditions, and thus cause unrest. The system is not working for them, so they do not respect the system in turn.
The difference between progressives and conservatives is that we disagree on what to do about that. Progressives want to flatten the hierarchy so that the disparity is smaller and the grievance is addressed, so that the system works for those people too, so those people can live full lives, and thus they have little motivation to destroy a system that takes care of them. Progressives believe that true peace comes from justice.
Conservatives instead want to maintain and increase the oppression on those lower down the hierarchy, so that they know their place. Conservative peace is enforced by beating the aggrieved down until they stop complaining.
Spoken like an elitist liberal. You’d fit right in in California.
You remind me of someone I once read about. They too believed in progressive ideals. They decided to hitchhike from Italy to the middle east in an attempt to share their message of love and peace. Three weeks into the trip they were raped, murdered, and left in a ditch. But I guess you’re right, evil people don’t exist, it’s just those damn aggrieved saps at the bottom who don’t respect the system.
You’re right, there are certainly people who have been downtrodden by the world and become cold and callous, but there are also people simply born cruel. I’ve seen downtrodden people act with tremendous kindness/morality, and I’ve seen successful people act with tremendous evil/immorality. For you to pretend that bad behavior is simply a result of “the system” is idiotic and out of touch with reality.
What do you suppose led to the vast inequality? I’ll give you a hint, it was elitist thinking and liberal policies. California is one of the most progressive states in the country. It’s been that way basically my entire life. We charge more for everything (taxes, healthcare, energy, housing, etc) so that we can fund our progressive agenda. As a result our middle class has evaporated. Now we have only the poor and the insanely wealthy. Our progressive leaders know this, so they pander to the poor, giving them benefits to keep voting them in, and cut deals with the rich. They don’t want to stigmatize anyone so they’ve stopped enforcing many basic laws. The rich aren’t terribly impacted, they live in gated communities and have armed security. Instead it’s everyone else who suffers. You acknowledge California has progressive policies that don’t address the problems, yet you simultaneously dismiss them being the cause of the problems. What is your answer then? Let me guess… communism? That seems to be the answer everyone on Lemmy espouses.
Firstly, I’m not a liberal.
Secondly, what do you mean elitist? I’m literally suggesting the the dismantling of the hierarchy. My entire point of view is that concepts of elitism are inherently wrong. That criticism does not even make sense, it’s a meaningless insult.
Please try read what I wrote, instead of just imagining my position.
I never said that people don’t do bad things, and I never said that all unrest or violence would end, I never said that every person would become an upstanding member of society. But people are a product of their environment. People who have decent lives, who live in more equitable societies, have less motivation to attack those societies.
Don’t fold me into your ridiculous black-and-white pattern of thinking.
Capitalism.
And is still capitalist, and still rather conservative on key issues, because your whole country is quite conservative at the federal level.
California is more progressive than much of the US, that doesn’t make them actually progressive in a broader sense.
Gee whiz, it’s almost as if they aren’t at all as progressive as you think they are :)
I believe fundamentally, psychologically the main reason that makes conservative a conservative is a believe that we, as society, can not make things better, and quite likely will make things worse. This is why they are “conserving”. It works - don’t change, don’t breaks. Hierarchy works, so we keep it - type of things.
Or could it be that we see policy enacted which tangibly DOES in fact make our lives worse, our community run down, and our family less safe? Why is it that in the 50s you could leave your front door unlocked without fear of someone stealing your stuff or harming your family? The country has gotten significantly more progressive since then. Would you feel safe doing that now? In big cities (overwhelming progressive) people are advised to leave their car windows down so that anyone trying to break in won’t shatter the window. In those same cities homeless encampments, open drug use, and relieving oneself in the streets has become the accepted norm. Call me crazy, but I liked it better the way it was before.
Not all change is good, and not all conservation is bad. That seems to be a sentiment we’ve lost sight of.
You are just proving what I said.
Cool, thanks for engaging with my points and not giving a lazy response. Appreciate you.
Compromise and finding a middle ground is absolutely worthless unless the middle ground is the superior stance, which it rarely is.
Quite often middle ground solution is better stance than current situation.
Quite often it isn’t, or those fighting for the middle ground rather than taking the correct side out of a principle for compromise end up making the situation worse, rather than just fixing it.
You’re not supposed to compromise before negotiations have even began… I will never understand why Democrats and “centrists” can stay alive with literally no spine.
If it’s a good idea, STAND YOUR FUCKING GROUND!!
If you look at History, human progress happens in cycles made up of long periods of consolidation with shorter periods of disruption in between.
You actually see something similar inside companies.
If all you had was those who favour the incremental building on top of the way things are, i.e. consolidators, i.e. conservatives, you would end up in a dead-end of stagnation followed by collapse since we never found a perfect “way things are” that will work forever - all static systems accumulate problems over time due to their own imperfections and/or are unable to adapt to changing conditions, so naturally fail, not a question of “if” only a question of “when” and “how”.
If all you had was those who favour change, i.e. disruptors, i.e. revolutionaries (not necessarilly of the Left), massive amounts of effort, energy and even pain would be constantly wasted in permanent change with little being actually build even on top of the best of ideas - this is also a path for collapse because there is no such thing as building for the Future under ethernal change.
You could say the “middle ground”, “steady as she goes” solution is better during most of the progress cycle but at the end of the cycle it’s just maintaing the system as is, the accumulated problems being painful and becoming ever worse with not chance at improving because the system in place has never managed to overcome those long-running accumulating problems because it has no solution for them and never will. At such a stage “steady as she goes” politics is pretty much “full steam ahead and don’t mind the fog or the icebergs” and we all know how that ends.
(Funnily the captain of the Titanic chose to risk it is because that ship was said to be unsinkable, which has massive parallels with what we are told - and most believe - about the resilience of the political and economic system that has been dominant in the last 50 years).
I would say we’ve reached a point were the accumulation of problems from the dominant ideology of the last 4-5 decades is becoming too much and now is not the time for “more of the same” but rather it’s the time for change, which will happen whether we want to or not. The question is: will it be controlled change done before the problems become too much or will it be the natural chaotic kind as societal tensions are violently released (societal collapse, revolution, war, iron fist dictatorships and so on)?
Mind you, afterwards, the time for “consolidation” will come again, its just that how much will we be able to save of the positive things built during the last period of consolidation will depend on how much change and changers are embraced now and in the near future vs how much it will just be imposed on us by the unsustainable tensions of the last systems resulting in uncontrolled change.
And the problem of modern US politics is that the middle ground is already what is called “left”. Biden would be seen as right-wing in Europe. If they keep finding a “middle ground” they’ll just shift the Overton Window more and more.