posted
These are very general, and many people would be inconsistent on this. I'm also giving the "professed" views, n ot necessarily what gets put into practice.
Right pro-life, left pro-choice Right anti-gun-control, left pro-gun control Right anti-gay marriage, left pro-gay marriage Right low taxes/small government, left bigger government (with higher taxes) Right criminal justice based on deterrance, incapacitation, and retribution; left criminal justice based on rehabilitation and social ills.
But there are some strange cross-currents. There is a trend in conservatism to keep the government out of people's lives, so there's a lot of overlap with libertarians (see small government, anti-gun control). on the left, there's a distrust of authority which also creates libertarian principles. But these hit in different areas.
It's very complicated, and a lot of people on either side would disagree with this.
Again, all very stereotypical and not useful for any specific conversation. I hesitate to add more.
Seriously, though, and I may have posted this last week, but my aunt who thought she was a pretty moderate person was surprised by an evaluation that she leans heavily to the left. I mean, I always thought she celebrated her liberalness.
I'm in the process of re-evaluating my right wingness. Maybe I'm more moderate than I thought.
My main tenet is that parties are bad. Compromising important beliefs or forming them based on a party platform is, in my opinion, philosophical prostitution. I really hate both Planned Parenthood and the NRA.
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It all depends on your electorate. The right is everyone but the crazies, according to politicians on the right. The left is everyone but the crazies, according to politicians on the left.
The result--If you claim to be neither, you must be Crazy.
MORE POWER TO US CRAZIES!!!
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Lefties want to eliminate the death penalty since they don't have believe that judges and juries handle life and death matters competently and consistently.
Those on the right scoff at this, but they want to limit damages in malpractice and other lawsuits since they don't believe judges and juries handle damage awards competently and consistently.
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posted
I'm going to invoke my friend John once again, partly because I agree with most of what he said, and partly because he put it more clearly and fairly for both sides than anything I've seen here or on his own site.
quote:Liberty versus equality.
The typical conservative thrust is usually centered around liberties, and the typical liberal thrust is usually centered around equality.
To get more in-depth, the conservative view is aimed towards protecting and advancing individual liberties, which often promotes the more competitive nature of man(kind), sometimes having a weakness which tends to create more of a struggle for those who are—in various different ways—not as strong/smart/healthy/young and able to adapt to changing situations. The liberal view is aimed towards protecting and strengthening individual equalities, which often promotes a progressive look at changes within society, sometimes having a weakness where the more able and capable are held back or hampered in some way in order to make up for the less capable.
When not taken to extremes, both approaches are valid and workable. To wit, extreme conservatism leads to a stratification of classes that has an insurmountable divide, making it eventually impossible for people to grow outside of their born class. This would create a caste system similar to that of the dark ages. With extreme liberalism, every decision, policy, and law would constantly favor the lowest common denominator, at the cost of those who excell. This would eventually make an otherwise progressive outlook become quite stunted (and possibly stagnant).
In America, it means that a conservative will be more prone to fight for a more laissez faire policy economically (warning: biased link), and more regulation on the decisive reprimanding of social inappropriateness (criminal behavior). A liberal will be more in favor of a socialist-like economic system (not to be confused with socialism purity, or even Communism), and is more concerned with curbing anti-social (criminal) motivations than with punishing the behavior in a black-and-white manner. More taxes and government programs are developed under American liberal policies, and more stress has been put on individual liberties (as a whole, not specific groups) under conservative policies. It's a give-and-take that seems to constantly seem like one is vying for more power than the other, while mostly retaining a "general" balance (not as compared to the world, but to the extremes therein), excepting only short dips into one or the other. The complex and circuitous layers of the government in America tend to favor this kind of struggle, because without it, the nation would quickly become an extreme one way or the other (which, incidentally, many people fear is the case today).
Disclaimer: the US is typically more "conservative" in nature (from my first definition, not the US-tailored one) than most other powerful countries in the world. I don't really see this as a weakness or an intrinsic problem. However, I am typically more conservative on many issues than I am liberal, so that could easily be a bias. I will say that the conservative issues with liberty in particular play a large role with America being more conservative than most world powers, because of its history and roots (it was basically founded on fighting for individual liberty).
I agree with him on a lot of it, but I also agree with a lot of what saxon75 said in it as well. I probably fall somewhere between the two.
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posted
John's explanation generally explains the economic half of the left/right divide. The disparity on social issues, however, aren't accounted for by it.
I'm not sure that the fact that conservatives generally oppose gay marriage, for example, can be accounted for by John's explanation. The only problem is, I can't think of any explanation that's as predictive as John's on as many issues.
I can't help think that at least some of the alignment of seemingly disparate issues along the left/right continuum might be a historical accident.
Dagonee To be clear, I think the weakness is not with John's explanation but with the two-dimensional continuum of left/right as a description of political views.
posted
Anyone know when Mormons stopped being predominantly democrats and started being predominantly republicans? Was it maybe with FDR? Mormons used to be salt of the earth farmer types of Jefferson's visions. Then at some point they began pursuing more of an entrepreneurial independent ideal. Maybe the rise of farming subsidies had to do with this.
P.S. The conservative "liberties" idea also breaks down with abortion. I feel abortion goes back to the founding principles of the republican party (I know it's not strictly in keeping with left and right) that some principles are more important than the popular vote (like slavery and polygamy, which for the record republicans were against )
posted
It accounts for things like gay marriage, as he pointed out in a later post in the discussion. He says it is the difference between the individual and the group. He also told me personally that those who are against gay marriage don't feel that way because of conservative leanings, but religious ones. Since more conservatives are religious than are liberals, especially the Christian religion, perhaps that accounts for such policies, and not political ideology.
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quote:Anyone know when Mormons stopped being predominantly democrats and started being predominantly republicans? Was it maybe with FDR? Mormons used to be salt of the earth farmer types of Jefferson's visions. Then at some point they began pursuing more of an entrepreneurial independent ideal. Maybe the rise of farming subsidies had to do with this.
It was more likely the 1950's & 1960's, when the majority Democratic party shifted, and the petering Republican party was bolstered by those leaving the Democrats.
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posted
I don't buy that adding an individual/group distinction accounts for the seeming disparity in views; I do agree that "that those who are against gay marriage don't feel that way because of conservative leanings, but religious ones." Which just goes to show that left/right is not a truly meaningful distinction.
posted
The cause for the shift that I've most heard was civil rights, but it could equally be because the Dems and Repubs seemed to each shift ideologically between conservative and liberal. Up until the mid 1900's, the Democrats were the staunch conservatives, and from its inception, the Republican party was usually more liberal until after WWII.
Well, Dagonee, you can argue that with him, because it seems to make sense to me. Conservatives are almost exclusively more likely to be religious in general and Christian in specific, which would account more for being anti-gay-rights than other political ideology. Liberals are usually very rights-oriented, and yet they almost exclusively champion Affirmative Action, despite its exclusive approach to student and worker aid. Not all political agendas fit squarely into the basic ideology.
posted
Except there was always an element of pro-business in the post-Civil-War republican party. I think a lot of that may stem from the fact that businesses associated themselves with the Republican party when it had pretty much total control, and in doing so concentrated a lot of power there that just didn't move when the parties became more evenly split.
And for 80+ years, a good section of the country was just Democrat, so all viewpoints were contained within it, making party even less important in predicting actual opinion.
Plus the existence of Bryan's 3d party progressive movement concentrated reformers outside the political mainstream.
quote:Well, Dagonee, you can argue that with him, because it seems to make sense to me. Conservatives are almost exclusively more likely to be religious in general and Christian in specific, which would account more for being anti-gay-rights than other political ideology. Liberals are usually very rights-oriented, and yet they almost exclusively champion Affirmative Action, despite its exclusive approach to student and worker aid. Not all political agendas fit squarely into the basic ideology.
I agree with that assessment, but I don't think the section quoted above accounts for why conservatives are more likely to be religious. And affirmative action is easily explained by the quoted section above.
posted
Read the link. Should I go ahead and quote the whole discussion? I'd ask him to post, but I wouldn't hold my breath after the way he was treated.
Do you really need a link to some statistic to show you that conservatives are far more likely to be Christian or religious than not? Or more than liberals? Are you really going to argue that such a claim is not believable or reliable? Is that your only defense to the claim that stances like anti-gay-rights are not specifically a religiously-motivated stance? That's unbelievable. Do you seriously base this on an informed opinion, or just disagreeing because you don't like the position boiled down to a religious issue instead of a political one?
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posted
it seems to me that assuming we split ideologies between economic and social, whomever came up with the platforms sort of switched which should go with which...
the "religious right" has ponied up to the conservatives, except that really makes little sense. traditional economic conservatism is all about liberty, as john pointed out, which leads to free market economies and competition for resources and all that. it would seem to me, however, that christian ideology is much better suited to the liberal social agenda; equality and compassion and helping the disadvantaged and all. i know the counter-argument; that economic conservatives care about these things just as much, they simply disagree on how to go about achieving them. i guess i would point to which issue takes primacy: the freedom of individuals (which supposedly leads to the equality of a population), or the equality of humankind (which supposedly leads to individual freedom).
i of course am not christian, so please don't anybody be offended. i know that individual responsibility and free will are central to the ideology, but it seems to me like when instructing the faithful on how to treat their fellow man, christianity favors the equality side of the spectrum.
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quote: I don't think the section quoted above accounts for why conservatives are more likely to be religious
i think what happened is that the republican party realized at some point that if it wanted to maintain mass appeal, it was going to have to diversify it's message. economic conservatism might be good for the economy in the long run, but it doesn't sound too good to the middle class guy struggling to get by (ignoring tax cuts, of course). they realized they had to find some way of reaching a broad spectrum of the population, and as the democrats were slowly drifting towards liberal social policy (women's and cival rights) they realized they could capitalize on a more traditional social ideology. sort of a frankenstein type thing really.
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quote:Do you really need a link to some statistic to show you that conservatives are far more likely to be Christian or religious than not? Or more than liberals? Are you really going to argue that such a claim is not believable or reliable?
Um, where did I dispute that conservatives are more likely to be religious?
quote:Is that your only defense to the claim that stances like anti-gay-rights are not specifically a religiously-motivated stance? That's unbelievable. Do you seriously base this on an informed opinion, or just disagreeing because you don't like the position boiled down to a religious issue instead of a political one?
In a post above, I clearly stated "I do agree that 'that those who are against gay marriage don't feel that way because of conservative leanings, but religious ones.'" Please revise your comments in light of this post. What led you to believe that I was uncomfortable with the dispute being religious?
Dagonee Edit: To try to be a kinder and gentler Dagonee, even when put-upon.
posted
I read it wrong, my mistake. However, stalking me to other threads just to get me to post just that is a bit unnerving, if not creepy. As to why: http://www.ctlibrary.com/542 maybe that's it.
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posted
Kerinin, I don't know if this is really the underlying factor, but many conservatives now believe that helping others is the responsibility of individuals, and that having the government do it instead is "passing the buck". Giving to the poor is a moral obligation, but as an act of mercy rather than strict justice, it isn't appropriate to codify it into law.
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