Edgetho
Platinum Member
- Mar 27, 2012
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I've been trying to get this point across in here and not doing very well.
Too many people, ESPECIALLY dims, mis-label or (more accurately) just don't understand the meanings of political words.
This person does a better job explaining it than I do. Of course, a lot of people do a better job explaining things than I do.....
That's why I link so many outside sources
But I'm tired of dims trying to corner the market on words. It's time we stood up and took control of the language.
Too many people, ESPECIALLY dims, mis-label or (more accurately) just don't understand the meanings of political words.
This person does a better job explaining it than I do. Of course, a lot of people do a better job explaining things than I do.....
That's why I link so many outside sources
But I'm tired of dims trying to corner the market on words. It's time we stood up and took control of the language.
Fundamental Concepts Me vs We Weirddave
Fundamental Concepts – Me vs We [Weirddave]
—Open Blogger
Lets take a moment to consider political labels. All too often, they are used as simple pejoratives, not the least by me. If we're talking and I tell you “You're so progressive!”, chances are it isn't a complement. Progressive, Conservative, Liberal, Libertarian, Communist, Fascist, Totalitarian, Royalist (haven't heard that one in a while), Maoist, Theocratic...each one of these terms has a specific meaning, but how do they all fit together in the big picture?
It's really not that hard, if you just visualize a continuum. On the far left you put the label “Collectivist”. On the far right, “Individualist”. Alternately you could label the right side “Freedom” and the left side “Order”. Or “Liberty” and “Control”. Once we have constructed this graph, what does it tell us?
Well, the first thing it does is give us a handy way to slot how various philosophies relate to one another. Reaching into our political hat (please don't reach into The Political Hat, no matter what sock he's posting under. He's a human being, reaching into him would be bloody) we pull out Communism and Democracy. Since Communism is collectivist by definition, it goes to the left of Democracy. Draw another philosophy: Anarchy. That goes all the way to the right. Socialism. Since Socialism is a transitional system from Democracy to Communism, it goes to the left of Democracy and to the right of Communism. Fascism. Just barely to the right of Communism (and only because it at least allows the illusion of private enterprise, making it a tiny bit less collectivist.) and left of Socialism. And so on. Once everything is in it's place, what use is it?
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