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I was talking about the voting base, and how dem voters are willing to criticize the dem electorate, while GOP voters (even leaving MAGA aside, bc they're a lost cause to the cult) don't hold their representatives accountable.
Dem voters are the Dem electorate. Did you mean Dem representatives?
And you're still eliding the difference between the left and centre-right. Left and centre-left voters are willing to criticise Dem politicians. The centre is not. And, while hypocrisy absolutely is a characteristic of the right because they know how power works, it's nonsense to suggest that the entirety of the Dem electoral coalition holds its representatives to account. It doesn't, not least because a large proportion are in on the grift. And that's why we're having another global fascist spasm. Liberals refuse to challenge power, not least because they like its perks and also believe that those perks should exist.
Right, I meant elected instead of electorate.
I don't think a large portion of the dem voter base benefits from the grift that the dem politicians are participating in. If they were rich and wanted to benefit, they'd just vote GOP. Don't get me wrong, the rich who vote dem absolutely benefit from the corporate center of the party (which is most of it), but the wealthy class is a tiny proportion on both sides and I was talking about the majority.
And I think you're giving too much credit to the GOP voters by saying they "know how power works". The vast majority of them are useful idiots taken in by culture war nonsense continually voting against their self interest.
I didn't say GOP voters know how power works.
And there is barely any difference in the proportion of rich people voting GOP or Dem. 1-2% in the 2020 exit polls. In 2016, Clinton had swings in her favour amongst the very rich, and larger swings against amongst lower income and POC voters. Not because they switched to the GOP but because she gave them no reason to turn out.
You're projecting your ideal onto a party which relies on the very wealthy to fund their politics. And they can do that because it is how power works and why they do not want to challenge power.
Stop confusing the left with the centre. The necessity of the electoral coalition is precisely a result of power, and its ability to silence the left while pandering to the right.
I'm not talking about the rich, because while they wield outsized clout in what their parties do, they're a tiny percentage of the population and consequently voters. All I'm saying is the vast majority of dem voters (they're not wealthy and they don't benefit from the grifting that the majority that the dem pols do) are willing to criticize dems. The opposite is not true--most GOP voters, who also don't benefit from anything the GOP elected does, will never speak a word against the people in office.
Yeah, sure. Wealthy people don't have any power, even with all those newspapers and TV channels they own, or the politicians relying on them for donations and cushy jobs once they're out of office.
I refer you back to the Schumer quote and beg you to wise the fuck up. You cannot understand anything about this world if you do not understand how power works.
Dude I have no fucking idea what you're talking about. Poor people make up the majority of the country and poor dem voters criticize dem pols. Poor gop voters don't criticize gop pols. That was the entire meaning of my original comment.
Yes they do. The fuck are you smoking?
The last time I checked, the right disowned that musician for clarifying that he was criticizing the wealthy right as well as the wealthy left. He was disowned by conservatives as soon as they realized he was criticizing them too.
I think you are being weirdly aggressive in your approach to "debate", if a debate is even what is happening here. This guy is not your enemy. You should focus that anger where it's needed, at an actual enemy.
The actual enemy being liberals who deliver us to fascism every fucking time. Don't ever lose sight of that.
Define "liberal".
FFS
Page 181
Here's some more reading for you. Excellent writing, if you can be bothered to apply yourself. If you do, you'll discover that you (currently) have no clue what a liberal is, or why they're very fucking bad.
Ur-Fascism
While Umberto Eco is great reading, this passage does not offer your definition of "liberal" or why you think it is bad. We may agree on this, but you seem to be unable to articulate your definition for "liberal" or why you think it is bad. I am sincerely not trying to trick you. People have different definitions for the word, so I can neither agree with nor debate you on this without first knowing your preferred definition. But maybe debate is not necessary here.
In response to my question, you've cited passages of essays that offer no definitions or value assignments. For example, you referred me to a book of essays written almost 50 years ago by a talented Welsh author. I have read the page you cited (and several other pages), and found the essayist to make great points about various political connotations of the word "liberal" for that year (1975). The author is very clear in his refusal to define the word or even point to the connotation with which he agrees. Instead, he describes the various connotations of the word from different political perspectives. The most negative ones seemed to describe what most people in the U.S. now call "neoliberalism". Again, great author. I really enjoyed what I've read so far and plan to read more. Thank you for that.
Being from the U.S. and very much alive in the 1970's, I will give you my observations from that perspective. Until the 1980's (after the essay you referenced), most political discourse in the U.S. used the word "liberal" as a term to describe a fiscal policy that could be applied to anyone in the right circumstances. During the Reagan administration, U.S. conservatives began using the word exclusively as a pejorative to mean "progressive" or even "socialist". As you know, neither of those words are synonyms for "liberal" in any respect. This use of the word was a scare tactic intended to drive uneducated voters into conservative arms. This narrow use of "liberal" became the new label for progressives here, unfortunately. Today, that damage is slowly beginning to become undone as socialists, Marxists, communists and progressives begin to communicate more effectively with the rest of the world on forums such as Lemmy.
I'm not sure why you chose such a demeaning and insulting tone in your interactions here, but I don't think it's because the people you are communicating with truly disagree with your politics. The author you cited seems great to me and I agree with his observations. So, I suspect our politics may be more aligned than you realize. But, I find the way you communicated with the other person in this thread to be unreasonably hostile. I then stepped in to let you vent on me, thinking you might be a conservative. I love making conservatives look like the dumb-fucks they are. But, you don't seem to be a conservative. So, I guess I'll be nice to you despite your inexplicably condescending and angry tone. In any case, please feel free to respond or share more great authors. Or not. Either way, I wish you well.
OK, so I did read this in a bored moment, and what the actual fuck?
Are you somehow under the impression that liberalism is a new concept that could not possibly have been understood by scholars 50 years ago? Do you know anything about its origins or the philosophical works it draws from? Or do you just believe that people should pull definitions straight out of their arse rather than use authoritative sources?
You do have a substantial disadvantage, being from the US where the word is so badly misused. But come the fuck on, do some reading. The link is another excellent esssay, by an actual liberal. Read it.
I never said it did. Which is why I'm not reading the rest of your post because it is unlikely to be a good use of my time.
I referred the poster to Raymond Williams for a better understanding of what liberalism is. As you would know if you were paying attention.
I said page 181. You will need to look at page 181.
And no, I am not going to pretend to have the skills of Raymond Williams, nor the time to rewrite his perfect words just for you. Sorry 'bout that but, do some reading, yeah?