What is a leftist

kunst nugget

I see a lot of people complaining about leftists on boards. To the people that complain about leftists - what is a leftist? What social, political and economic values do you associate with a leftist and what makes a person a leftist in your eyes.

backspin.

A naive person who does not understand human nature.

pleas advice

They ain't right...

NIMAN

They believe people can be whatever they want to be, such as a 40yr old man when they are actually 60yr old.

Oh, and they think money grows on the magic money tree.

And that the rich should be taxed more to pay for free houses for everyone.

tuxy

I think of people like like Chairman Mao and Joseph Stalin.

TheValeyard

Writes with left-hand but is somehow better with kicking using the right foot.

NIMAN

Famous quote:

"If you're not left-wing in your 20's you've got no heart. If you're not right-wing in your 40's you've got no brain"

Mr. Incognito

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-wing_politics

joe_99

Mr. Incognito wrote: »

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-wing_politics

Definitely not Mao and Stalin so

freshpopcorn

Going from I've learnt from Boards.
You hate Donald Trump.
You want unisex toilets everywhere.
You want kids to change gender whever they want.
You love travellers and want them as neigbhours.

kunst nugget

Mr. Incognito wrote: »

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-wing_politics

I'm not looking for the dictionary definition - I want to know what the people on boards that complain about the leftists on here actually define a leftist as.

orourkeda1977

Leftists are all like meh and sh1t

Church on Tuesday

joe_99 wrote: »

Definitely not Mao and Stalin so

Ask DBS90 whatever.

He knows apparently.

endacl

It’s shorthand for ‘calls unpleasant people out in their unpleasant opinions and attitudes’.

kneemos

freshpopcorn wrote: »

Going from I've learnt from Boards.
You hate Donald Trump.
You want unisex toilets everywhere.
You want kids to change gender whever they want.
You love travellers and want them as neigbhours.

Leftism has nothing to do with gender and toilets.
All that stuff is a whole other kind of ism.

kildare lad

Its a person who think there's 72 genders.

Spleerbun

The impression I get of "leftism" online is generally the idea that people's feelings are seen as more important than reality. Any problem or issue that if addressed might cause someone to be offended is a problem not worth addressing.

somefeen

A leftist is an imaginary type of person that only really exists in the feverish nightmares of angry, bitter auld fellas. Who devoid of any meaning in their lives, convince themselves they are under siege from gender-fluid unicorns and the entire population of sub Saharan Africa.

Kinda like the opposite of the alt-right, with more glitter and crappier memes

padd b1975

freshpopcorn wrote: »

Going from I've learnt from Boards.
You hate Donald Trump.
You want unisex toilets everywhere.
You want kids to change gender whever they want.
You love travellers and want them as neigbhours.

You dress in army fatigues but would swerve your mother's funeral to attend an anti war protest.

SEPT 23 1989

Leftism was a good album

Sonics2k

Murray TheDemonic TalkingSkull wrote: »

Writes with left-hand but is somehow better with kicking using the right foot.

huh, today I learned I'm a leftist.

Snickers Man

kunst nugget wrote: »

what is a leftist?

Whatever you want it to mean.

The idea that the political spectrum can be adequately explained by a simple linear scale from "right" to "left" is ridiculous, hopelessly inadequate and not reflective of the real world.

Even if you accept that "Left" means Socialist, or at least interventionist in terms of state involvement in the economy and "right" means Capitalist, or laissez faire with people participating freely in economic activity with the state only assuming responsibility for vindicating property rights and maintaining law and order, you are still only dealing with economic factors.

Both Socialism and capitalism are inherently materialistic: socialism--real socialism, that is--is based on dialectic materialism in which the motivation of people is assumed to be entirely defined by their economic self interest as represented by their "class". Capitalism, as the name suggests, is entirely to do with the allocation of money (capital) through freely transacted exchange of goods and services, with rewards and costs determined by "the market".

None of which has ANYTHING to do with any sort of "identity politics" in which people determine the meaning of their lives with regard to their social, cultural, ethnic, national, religious or even sexual preferences. People who quip that "Leftists are those who think there are 57 genders" or that right wing people are all religious zealots, eager to impose their God view on everybody else, they simply don't know what they're talking about.

It's a very Anglophile view of the world, and is largely a disorder brought about by the insistence that we live in a bipolar world where all choices eventually resolve down to a selection between A and B. This is especially represented in the political systems of the UK and the US which are utterly bipolar (in every sense of the term) in that they break down if there is more than one alternative.

You want to get rid of Trump? Vote Democrat
You hate the democrats? Tough. You're stuck with Trump.
You want to form an alternative party?You can't do that!!!! You'll SPLIT THE VOTE!!!!!

In British politics, especially on the left of the spectrum, the worst insult they can throw at you is "splitter". Look at the contempt that both Labour and Conservatives have for the small bunch of MPs who were so disgusted with their own parties' view of Brexit that they resigned the whips and formed their own group. Corbyn wouldn't even attend a multiparty meeting when he found that a former Labour "splitter" was also in attendance. Talk about unclean!!

In most of the rest of the modern world, proportional systems are in place which result in a greater spread of parties being represented in parliaments. This leads to a preponderance of coalitions, but at least they are obvious in their makeup.

Both Labour and Conservative parties are huge "internal" coalitions encompassing many points of view but when an issue comes up that divides parties internally, the system just cannot cope. Look at the Brexit fiasco taking place right now!! People may have very strong opinions but find it impossible to give expression to them because party unity is paramount in such a "one choice only, first past the post " system.

Similarly in America, the only realistic choices are between Republican and Democrat. Look how that is working out for them now with a complete chimpanzee in the White House.

Forget about "Left wing" and "Right Wing". That is the politics of the Anglosphere and their days as world leaders are passing.

RIP

FatherTed

hatrickpatrick

The problem here is that a large number of movements which have nothing to do with leftism as previous generations understood it, have tacked themselves on to "the left" in a way which causes fundamental contradictions in terms. For instance, the left in general, at least when I was growing up in the 1990s and 2000s, was always the pro free speech side, while the right wanted to ban and censor a wide variety of stuff on "family values", "think of the children" and "sex is bad" grounds. These days, a very large faction on the right is now in favour of unmoderated spaces and freedom of speech, while large factions on the left oppose them on two main grounds - firstly, the idea that there exists a "right not to be offended", or more accurately a right to be protected from things which might offend one, and secondly (in my opinion more dangerously) the idea that it's acceptable to deny breathing space to political opposition deemed "wrong" (usually "hateful", "violent [even if there's no evidence of this]", etc).

As a lifelong leftist I can give one very concrete example of this shift in paradigms: I was at the meeting back in the mid-2000s at which the People Before Profit (PBP) political party was first created, and at that time, this party was a massive, massive supporter of the concept of unfettered freedom of expression, freedom of speech, freedom of political association, etc. This was a classic leftist position and the party, as a solidly leftist party, was entirely on board with it.

Fast forward a decade or so, and when the referendum campaign on the Eighth Amendment was in full swing, various members of PBP engaged in what I would describe as profoundly undemocratic and inherently right wing behaviour, in the cause of trying to silence the pro-life opposition and starve it of the oxygen needed to mount a legitimate campaign - two specific examples would be (a) individual members of the party tearing down or vandalising "vote no" posters, and bragging about it on social media, and (b) organising a campaign of mass harassment against a Dublin Hotel (I think it was The Gibson, but I could stand corrected on this) which had rented out one of its function rooms to the pro-life campaign, which was going to hold an event inviting women who had been raped and chosen not to abort, as well as their children, to tell their stories. They targeted the hotel's Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc in a co-ordinated and organised manner, leaving bad reviews and posting negative comments all over the various pages until eventually the hotel caved in and announced that they would be withdrawing the booking of the function room from the pro-life movement. My ex-girlfriend was an organiser of this, and this particular incident incensed her more than any other incident during the campaign.

Both of these authoritarian ideologies fall under an umbrella known as "no-platforming". The definition of "no-platforming" is as follows:

NOUN: the action or practice of preventing someone holding views regarded as unacceptable or offensive from contributing to a public debate or meeting.
e.g. "the feminist activist and writer has hit out at the no-platforming of controversial speakers at universities"

Personally, as a '90s / '00s leftist, I regard this as fundamentally contradictory. Leftism and social or civil libertarianism, the idea that civil and human rights are the most important political red lines beyond economic policy, were always one and the same when I was growing up. I regard the concept of an authoritarian or conservative leftist as a nonsensical oxymoron. Of course that's only my own opinion, but I find it utterly bizarre that a movement can on one hand say something like "we fight for fundamental human rights like reproductive freedom and gender equality" while simultaneously saying "anyone who disagrees with us does not have the right to actually participate in the democratic process, and we will do everything in our power to prevent them from setting out their stall".

This, though, is fundamentally I think why so many people are now vehemently and bitterly opposed to "leftism". I told my fellow Repeal supporters as well as my fellow Marriage Equality supporters many, many times during both campaigns that we risked alienating the undecided and causing a blowback "protest vote" of people voting no just to say, in the words of Zack de la Rocha, "F*ck you, I won't do what you tell me". I am fully convinced that this type of blowback played a large - certainly not defining, but large - part in the results of both the 2016 US Presidential Election which elected Donald Trump, and the Brexit referendum that same year which resulted in a Leave victory. In both cases, the mainstream left was so utterly intolerant and vitriolic towards anyone with even the slightest reservations or differences of opinion, that in my opinion, many voted the way they did just to say "It's a democracy, you can't force me to vote the way you want me to regardless of all your bullying tactics, so here's a nice f*ck you to the lot of ye".

Arghus

I don't think it's that easy to catergorise. One thing I do know for sure is that 90% of the people who talk about "leftists" on boards don't really have a clue what it means either.

Pinch Flat

Someone who’s knob stays left in their trousers when zipped up

RWCNT

Arghus wrote: »

I don't think it's that easy to catergorise. One thing I do know for sure is that 90% of the people who talk about "leftists" on boards don't really have a clue what it means either.

There was some lad in a thread a while ago who thought "left leaning" meant "prone to starting trouble" or something. Was surreal.

bilbot79

A leftist is someone who has perfectly identified the vision of a utopian world of fairness, happiness and harmony among all people.

However when reality bites and unpalatable decisions have to be made you will find them whinging on Facebook about how the government has failed, all the while offering no possible solution

Outlaw Pete

Everybody was once a leftist. Most mature past that idealogic stage. Those that don't I believe have insecurity issues and enjoy the attention that expressing liberal views garners them.

They rarely genuinely believe the views they spout though, which is why most of 'em, under the most basic scrutiny, will not be able to justify espousing the views they do. More often than not such people resort to attempts at discrediting people who disagree with them and when that fails, ad hominems tend to follow.

Which is why silencing of those with opposing views is so import to such people. Debate is not something they tend to ever want to get involved with. With seen it here during the 8th Amendment referendum where leftists had a 'Repeal Shield' on Twitter so that they wouldn't have to engage with those who dared to have views which didn't align with the left.

Dr_serious2

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

The problem here is that a large number of movements which have nothing to do with leftism as previous generations understood it, have tacked themselves on to "the left" in a way which causes fundamental contradictions in terms. For instance, the left in general, at least when I was growing up in the 1990s and 2000s, was always the pro free speech side, while the right wanted to ban and censor a wide variety of stuff on "family values", "think of the children" and "sex is bad" grounds. These days, a very large faction on the right is now in favour of unmoderated spaces and freedom of speech, while large factions on the left oppose them on two main grounds - firstly, the idea that there exists a "right not to be offended", or more accurately a right to be protected from things which might offend one, and secondly (in my opinion more dangerously) the idea that it's acceptable to deny breathing space to political opposition deemed "wrong" (usually "hateful", "violent [even if there's no evidence of this]", etc).

As a lifelong leftist I can give one very concrete example of this shift in paradigms: I was at the meeting back in the mid-2000s at which the People Before Profit (PBP) political party was first created, and at that time, this party was a massive, massive supporter of the concept of unfettered freedom of expression, freedom of speech, freedom of political association, etc. This was a classic leftist position and the party, as a solidly leftist party, was entirely on board with it.

Fast forward a decade or so, and when the referendum campaign on the Eighth Amendment was in full swing, various members of PBP engaged in what I would describe as profoundly undemocratic and inherently right wing behaviour, in the cause of trying to silence the pro-life opposition and starve it of the oxygen needed to mount a legitimate campaign - two specific examples would be (a) individual members of the party tearing down or vandalising "vote no" posters, and bragging about it on social media, and (b) organising a campaign of mass harassment against a Dublin Hotel (I think it was The Gibson, but I could stand corrected on this) which had rented out one of its function rooms to the pro-life campaign, which was going to hold an event inviting women who had been raped and chosen not to abort, as well as their children, to tell their stories. They targeted the hotel's Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc in a co-ordinated and organised manner, leaving bad reviews and posting negative comments all over the various pages until eventually the hotel caved in and announced that they would be withdrawing the booking of the function room from the pro-life movement. My ex-girlfriend was an organiser of this, and this particular incident incensed her more than any other incident during the campaign.

Both of these authoritarian ideologies fall under an umbrella known as "no-platforming". The definition of "no-platforming" is as follows:

NOUN: the action or practice of preventing someone holding views regarded as unacceptable or offensive from contributing to a public debate or meeting.
e.g. "the feminist activist and writer has hit out at the no-platforming of controversial speakers at universities"

Personally, as a '90s / '00s leftist, I regard this as fundamentally contradictory. Leftism and social or civil libertarianism, the idea that civil and human rights are the most important political red lines beyond economic policy, were always one and the same when I was growing up. I regard the concept of an authoritarian or conservative leftist as a nonsensical oxymoron. Of course that's only my own opinion, but I find it utterly bizarre that a movement can on one hand say something like "we fight for fundamental human rights like reproductive freedom and gender equality" while simultaneously saying "anyone who disagrees with us does not have the right to actually participate in the democratic process, and we will do everything in our power to prevent them from setting out their stall".

This, though, is fundamentally I think why so many people are now vehemently and bitterly opposed to "leftism". I told my fellow Repeal supporters as well as my fellow Marriage Equality supporters many, many times during both campaigns that we risked alienating the undecided and causing a blowback "protest vote" of people voting no just to say, in the words of Zack de la Rocha, "F*ck you, I won't do what you tell me". I am fully convinced that this type of blowback played a large - certainly not defining, but large - part in the results of both the 2016 US Presidential Election which elected Donald Trump, and the Brexit referendum that same year which resulted in a Leave victory. In both cases, the mainstream left was so utterly intolerant and vitriolic towards anyone with even the slightest reservations or differences of opinion, that in my opinion, many voted the way they did just to say "It's a democracy, you can't force me to vote the way you want me to regardless of all your bullying tactics, so here's a nice f*ck you to the lot of ye".

That's a really excellent post. The Left had some brilliant ideas, including free speech and liberalisation of some of our archaic laws, but they have turned into a very angry, intolerant bunch. I find it strange that they genuinely believe they are tolerant when they have to be some of the least tolerant people in the world. They are the modern day incarnation of the rosary bead clutching set from yesteryear shouting down all those who dare to object to their ideas.

Birneybau

Leftists drive like "Doo bee Doo bee doo"

Whereas Rightists drive like "Do bi do bi do"

super_furry

People who don't use YouTube and Chan sites as their primary source of news and information.

Patty Hearst

super_furry wrote: »

People who don't use YouTube and Chan sites as their primary source of news and information.

People who use the mainstream media who for over two years have been lying every single day and spreading wild conspiracy theories about Trump-Russia collusion.

RWCNT

Birneybau wrote: »

Leftists drive like "Doo bee Doo bee doo"

Whereas Rightists drive like "Do bi do bi do"

It's true!! We're so lame!

Your Face

People who laugh a bit too loud at Stewart Lee gigs

bnt

My personal definition: a conservative thinks people are bad until proven otherwise, and a liberal thinks people are good until proven otherwise. The consequences of this can be seen in political positions e.g. your position on unemployment benefits is related to whether you think people genuinely need it (liberal) or whether it's likely to be abused (conservative).

biko

When your feels guide you.

Dr_serious2

bnt wrote: »

My personal definition: a conservative thinks people are bad until proven otherwise, and a liberal thinks people are good until proven otherwise. The consequences of this can be seen in political positions e.g. your position on unemployment benefits is related to whether you think people genuinely need it (liberal) or whether it's likely to be abused (conservative).

I disagree, a liberal thinks everyone from a different background to themselves (ie not white) is good no matter what. They also think that anyone who is white and isn't liberal is the worst person on the planet.

super_furry

Dr_serious2 wrote: »

I disagree, a liberal thinks everyone from a different background to themselves (ie not white) is good no matter what. They also think that anyone who is white and isn't liberal is the worst person on the planet.

That's just nonsense.

Skylinehead

Dr_serious2 wrote: »

I disagree, a conservative thinks everyone from a different background to themselves (ie white) is bad no matter what. They also think that anyone who isn't white and isn't conservative is the worst person on the planet.

Fixed. Well no, it's equally as nonsense as your nonsense.

Patty Hearst

Former KGB operative and defector Yuri Bezmenov had an interesting take on leftists, worth watching to see the parallels today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4kHiUAjTvQ

hatrickpatrick

Dr_serious2 wrote: »

That's a really excellent post. The Left had some brilliant ideas, including free speech and liberalisation of some of our archaic laws, but they have turned into a very angry, intolerant bunch. I find it strange that they genuinely believe they are tolerant when they have to be some of the least tolerant people in the world. They are the modern day incarnation of the rosary bead clutching set from yesteryear shouting down all those who dare to object to their ideas.

I'd categorise the contradiction in terms using a classic meme about God, and religious contradictions in general:



The Left was all in favour of political freedom, free speech, etc - when the left was fighting to become mainstream and a lot of its ideals were still the minority view and not being implemented at the policy level.

Now that the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction, many (not all, but many) of these people have shown that they never believed in these core ideologies to begin with - they needed them in order to succeed in becoming the dominant political ideology, but now that they have achieved that, they are more than happy to deny them to others in order to maintain that dominance in society's political and ideological narrative.

I can point to another amusing U-turn from the mainstream left in the last few years (United States centric in this case, but I feel it applies broadly to the Western left in general at the moment) - when Wikileaks was leaking information about recently-ended George Bush Administration in 2010, on the back of Chelsea Manning's document dump of primarily pre-Obama era classified military documents, the left was completely on board and was happy to use these documents as a stick to hit the Republican Party with. Wikileaks, by leaking political and military secrets (from a war started by a right wing ideology), they were the most exciting, explosive, heroic trailblazers of the internet era, showing how the internet could be used to further democracy.

When Wikileaks published classified documents exposing scandals within Democratic Party leadership in 2016, they suddenly became public enemy number one. Right wing, ultraconservative, authoritarian, Russian agents, Trump stooges, etc.

In other words, the Left loved militant transparency when it was targeting a right wing movement. As soon as these same tactics were turned upon a left wing movement, they became unacceptable tools of tyranny.

Some of us on the left maintain our pre-existing ideology - and because of that, we actually get regularly and repeatedly lumped in with the alt-right. Believing that the internet shouldn't be censored, that social media shouldn't discriminate on the basis of political speech, etc - these are now far-right positions, apparently. Believing that corporations have rights and should be allowed to do whatever they want, on the other hand, is now a left wing ideology - anyone complaining about Facebook or Twitter censoring conservatives is met with "private companies can do whatever they like". From the Left. The same left which vehemently opposed private companies doing whatever they liked when domain registrars and web hosts declined service to Wikileaks in 2010!

It's completely mad. That so many former leftists don't understand that they have fundamentally crossed the aisle and teamed up with the right wing authoritarians they claim to oppose is something which genuinely scares me. I don't see how it's possible for people to have such a profound lack of self-awareness, but it's obviously very dangerous for democracy if principles such as free speech and freedom of political association are so easily dumped and vilified by their former supporters once a few elections go the "wrong" way.

Maurice Yeltsin

A leftist is an ardent fighter for women's rights, as shown by the way they chased those posh bastards out of the country after they were acquitted by a jury of their peers.

Just don't mention Cologne. Or Rotherham. Or 20 other North of England towns. Because there's rape and there's RAPE.


Frankly I believe a good percentage of lefties are closet nonces, waiting for the day when paedophilia is introduced into the social discourse as something that can be accepted between adults and "consenting" children. They believe a 5 year old can consent to changing gender so it isn't a huge leap, is it.

Vela

Murray TheDemonic TalkingSkull wrote: »

Writes with left-hand but is somehow better with kicking using the right foot.

I instinctively did a kicking motion with both feet to check.

demanufactured

kunst nugget wrote: »

I see a lot of people complaining about leftists on boards. To the people that complain about leftists - what is a leftist? What social, political and economic values do you associate with a leftist and what makes a person a leftist in your eyes.

Left handed people?

Fukt if I know.....stupid labels.

Patty Hearst

Maurice Yeltsin wrote: »

A leftist is an ardent fighter for women's rights, as shown by the way they chased those posh bastards out of the country after they were acquitted by a jury of their peers.

Just don't mention Cologne. Or Rotherham. Or 20 other North of England towns. Because there's rape and there's RAPE.


Frankly I believe a good percentage of lefties are closet nonces, waiting for the day when paedophilia is introduced into the social discourse as something that can be accepted between adults and "consenting" children. They believe a 5 year old can consent to changing gender so it isn't a huge leap, is it.

You would have to wonder about the push to teach 'Consent' classes in Irish primary schools.

I would've thought the only thing to teach is "No means no"

There is no consent when it comes to children.

riffmongous

NIMAN wrote: »

Famous quote:

"If you're not left-wing in your 20's you've got no heart. If you're not right-wing in your 40's you've got no brain"

Plenty here that love that quote but doesn't the research say that it's more to do with your intelligence as a child.. That dumb children grow up to be right wing while the smart ones are left?

Maurice Yeltsin

Patty Hearst wrote: »

You would have to wonder about the push to teach 'Consent' classes in Irish primary schools.

I would've thought the only thing to teach is "No means no"

There is no consent when it comes to children.

I make no apologies for it.

Plenty of leftists are closet nonces or other ranks of pervert. There is simply no other way to explain how women's rights protestors can favour a Germany and Sweden style refugee policy despite the jaw dropping amount of sexual assaults it has resulted in. I think some of the men are deviants and the women, who often aren't the most attractive, think some Irish women deserve a good seeing to.

Plenty of leftists tacitly support ISIS, at least from an anti imperialist viewpoint.

Maurice Yeltsin

riffmongous wrote: »

Plenty here that love that quote but doesn't the research say that it's more to do with your intelligence as a child.. That dumb children grow up to be right wing while the smart ones are left?

Until circa 2009 the vast majority of Irish children didn't grow up to have any political leanings.

I'm 34. The most political I ever knew anyone to be was one arsehole in the class who was a member of Young FF and a smattering of howiyas who idolised the Provos but were more interested in the guns, violence and criminality than truly giving a ****e about the North. The generation that reached adulthood during the receession really took to the left.

Of course, a lot of these kids will now be approaching 30 and wondering why they're paying 1600 per month with no chance of saving a deposit while the government has an unemployed family of Roma next door who seem to have no worry about accommodation for themselves. Nobody remains a leftist unless they remain unemployed.

Cienciano

It's what racists call non racists

rossie1977

Online right now anyone left of Trump is a leftist

I have seen strong conservatives like Merkel and May described as liberal and left wing on here.

The Democratic party in the US are not left wing. A handful of their members like AOC and Bernie Sanders are social democrats but the party as a whole is centre right.

People were pissed at WikiLeaks because it was obvious they went out of their way to favour Republicans over Democrats in 2016 election.

riffmongous wrote: »

Plenty here that love that quote but doesn't the research say that it's more to do with your intelligence as a child.. That dumb children grow up to be right wing while the smart ones are left?

Its also wrongly attributed to Churchill despite him never saying it..