Why are you Liberal?

My friends, I am a liberal and I need your help. I’m in the process of creating a thread that will be topped in this forum. The thread is all about what it means to be a Liberal in these times, our beliefs and hopes and goals.

I can say I’m a Liberal simply because I’m pro-choice on EVERYTHING. If you have the ass to pay for it then by all means give the world a show.

That simply doesn’t cut it as a statement though. We need something more concise. Besides, it is not my place to lay out just what it means to be a Liberal. I need input from each of you.

After those of us who hold a Liberal belief have discussed this, I will write it out in a statement of what it is to be Liberal, What we dream and hope for and the future we see for our children.

That statement will remain topped in this forum.

I’m sure it will change from time to time and I have no doubt that not everyone will be pleased with it. Still, We have to start somewhere. Could you answer a few questions for me?

1. How should this statement be titled? (Example: Our Liberal beliefs or We as Liberals proclaim or etc, etc)

2. What do you hold dear that makes you consider yourself to be a Liberal? List as many Ideas as you wish.

3. What do you most oppose in the conservative movement?

4. How would you like this presentation to be?

5. Can you share any links or sites that can be informative on that which I plan to compose?

6. Be honest.(And if possible, eloquent)

I will top and leave this thread open for the next few weeks. Then I will begin on the statement that I hope we all can share and believe in.

WARNING! This is a discussion for the Liberal members of this forum ONLY. This will be your only verbal warning not to attempt a disruption. Do not post negative comments here.

mrwupy


[edit on 16-7-2006 by mrwupy]

[edit on 19-7-2006 by mrwupy]

What been liberal stands for and works for me.

As a woman I cherish my rights to chose and for my daughter as well.

I cherish my right to disagree with the government and to be explicit on my opinions of what the government does right without been call unpatriotic and antiamerican.

I like not to be bound by traditions and be able to improvise with the changing society.

I want my children to question anything that they do not agree with be religious, political or social.

I do not like to be a follower or to be told how I should live, believe or hope for.

I want religion away from politics and to stop been use as a political too.

I want limited government, open markets, a free minded society and a government that will respect our civil rights and constitutional rights.

I don't want the use religion and the meaning of patriotism to influence the population for political agendas.

links,
The Proud liberal org.
www.proudliberal.org...

The liberal org.
liberal.org.nz...

Liberal/conservative issues.
www.liberalconservative.net...

I love this link: How to be a liberal

freedomkeys.com...

I want the freedom to express myself without "whispering"

I want the freedom to see my grandchildren grow up and be able to chose for themselves. It is their life, since they only presumably have one, they should have the "right" to make decisions about their bodies, their religions, their sexual preferences.

I want freedom from suspicion. I want to be able to go to Central Park and take pictures. I want to be able to freely take pictures of our wonderful landscapes in America without the FBI/CIA/Homeland Security suspecting me of wrong doing.


I want the freedom to "demonstrate" for any cause, without hearing others utter the words "Anti-American"

I want a government that works for ME. A citizen of the United States. A government that cares for Americans first, then the rest of the world.

I want a government that goes to wars because there is no other choice.

The applauses here are still not working, but I want you both to know I hit the button. Thank you for the contributions and i'm taking note.

I will write something we can all stand behind.

wupy

My goodness, you'd think by now this would be a full thread. :shk:

Are we the only ones with opinions? Come on, help Mr Wupy and post your thoughts.

Thank you!

Perhaps we, as Liberals, are a dying breed. Besides, I just posted this last night and plan on leaving it up for awhile before I attempt to make a statement.

We have time,

wupy

I often find that when I post my view on world events and such I’m called a liberal. When I step back and think about what I said, I can only find it to be compassionate. When I see the inequities in the world, I want to see something done about it. And, I’m convinced that it can be done without violence. For a nation with the power, wealth, and resources that the US has, I know that many problems can be resolved with just a bit of generosity. I count resourcefulness and intelligence as a highly valued resource mind.

Often, I look at the conservative viewpoint, which lately seems to be centered on resolving conflict with further violent conflict, and wonder how someone could believe that violence leads to peace. The example people always use against this point is WWII, but even before WWII, had certain events been identified and resolved peacefully, while maintaining certain universal human rights, the war may never have had occurred.

On a more national level, I grew up in ghettos. I’m poor and black, and have seen the dark side of this nation [/pun]. I know that black and Hispanic people are targeted by police, and beaten regularly without remorse or consequence. I know this because I’ve seen it with my own two eyes. I know that certain neighborhoods are ignored by the state, and their populations are left to their own means to survive.

The conservative viewpoint is often (not always) “they need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and get jobs”. This is a completely unrealistic view, but one that is often held by those who have never experienced it for themselves.

Basically, I’m a liberal because people need help. Even the vilest of human beings deserves compassion. Because those with power have so much, it is up to us who have to give to the ‘have not’. At the very least, allow the ‘have not’ to have a realistic opportunity to have.

First and foremost thank you mr wupy. Secondly you should check out Conservatives without conscience by John dean....he gives HIGHLLY accurate representations of both pre-modern and modern conservatives and liberals....

that aside I am liberal because:

1) I believe that Washington should not legislate morality or religon.

2) I believe in the right of a person to choose how to treat their body.

3) I believe that the primary function of the government is to improve the status quo for the governed.

4) I do not believe in completely "free markets"

5) I believe that while tradition is important and its is far wiser to make changes carefully change is the natural order of things and to remain intrenched in the past is to repeat the same mistakes of the past.

6) I believe in true Freedom of and from religon

7) I believe in true equity not just political equity.

8) I believe in a fair and balanced judical system that seeks to rehabilitate instead of being purely punitive.

9) I believe that the best foreign policy is diplomacy(not to say that conservatives belive exclusively in non-dimplomatic foreign relations)

10) I believe that science and medication trumps faith. Not to say you have to have medication if you choose not to....but for example Stem cells and thats all i need to say.

11) I believe that if a person has a vice but can control that vice that that person is wholly within thier rights.

12) I believe in activist judges regardless of what side they are on, they play a fundamental roll in ensuring that our judicial system does not become out-dated.

13) I believe in Love and that Love is not excuslive to a man - woman relationship

14) I believe in Freedom of Speech everywhere...not freedom of speech zones.

15) I believe in the right of EVERY man woman and childs right to question thier government.

16) I am against the death penalty

17) I believe it is our duty to be enviromentally aware.

18) I believe in alot of things but most importantly I believe in the idea espoused by the founders, Government derives its powers from the consent of the governed and that without that consent said government is illegitamate.

Im sure that ive missed something but these are more core beliefs.

I would have to say that we should stay away from phrases like " We as liberals..."

I think that labeling is what has caused the problems we have today. As madison warned us we have become a faction. THe liberal faction, but a faction none the less. It might be more accepted if instead we started with something like....These are the beliefs of those whose singular goal is the improvemnt of the political process.....but thats just me and even that phrase is too wordy...i would just stay away from to concrete a label.....It is/was our labeling that did/will bring us down.

[edit on 16-7-2006 by Elsenorpompom]

[edit on 16-7-2006 by Elsenorpompom]

I put this in a second post because i didnt want to water down why im a liberal.

I oppose conservatism on several premises the worst being thier inability to remove thier fundamental and in some cases extreme christians from thier base. Without those groups the Conservative party would not have a goats chance in hell of winning an election, atleast legally.

My biggest beef is just that...there should be a HIGH wall of seperation bewtween church and state and I feel that the conservative movement is looking at the Shieks and the Pope and wondering if they can do it better. Religon has been used for centuries as a medium for control over a population. I believe that the current conservative movement has moved away from its traditional idealogies and has now been overrun with those whose goal is Athoritarian rule.

I disagree with most if not ALL conservative fiscal policy...I do not believe in defict spending...I do not believe that weapons should count as AID.....and i do not believe that the US government should be selling or giving weapons to any nation.

I do not belive in the pull your self up by your boot straps mentality that seems so prevalent in modern conservativism. It seems to me that the reason they have this idea is because mommy and daddy paid for thier schooling, housing, and thier first Hummer.

I disagree with them wholeheartidly on thier vain attempts at control over the middle east soley for control over OIL. I belive that this is a delibrate action by leaders within the Conservative movement to ensure thier own personal power regardless of wether or not they are in office.

And finally I disagree with the conservative movement because I am fundamentally against Buisness being unregulated as it seems to be under conservative leadership.

I am much more sure of why I am a liberal than why i am not a conservative. Maybe this is because not too long ago I was a diehard conservative.....i dont know...but the above is why I will never vote conservative.

Bump*


Anyone else? I'm not trying to interfere, Mr Wupy, i just think this is a very needed thread.

I agree Dg, I know that is many people that feel themselves liberals but still have a conservative approach to things.

Perhaps that is why they are having trouble to see which side they lean the most.

[edit on 17-7-2006 by marg6043]

Something's wrong! Mr Wupy is supposed to be here, and is the last one to post, but i dont see his post!!!

Wupy, are you on Global Ignore by mistake?????

OR am i?

The key to understanding concurrent historical developments of liberalism may be better understood when you trace the COINTELPRO phenomenon. As we may recognize liberalism in earlier days, the process was centered upon better wages and working conditions. The early labor movement was filled with highly intelligent workers who happened to be working menial jobs. The Rockefellers and other wealthy elite industrialists and financiers did not like their intellect, their passion with words and their demands for fairness. Conceding some point of this they began infiltrating the education of youth. John Taylor Gotto could tell you far more than I could about all of this. The net effect of over a century of government and business intervention in education has been a less intelligent country.

People such as Gloria Steinem came along and defined feminism and in the process liberalism. She was funded by the CIA. Industrialists are gloating at us now, because what used to take one paycheck now takes two paychecks. People used to make enough to support themselves and their spouse. Many women considered the life of a housewife as an honorable thing, and that the more intelligent among the women were in far more control of their lives than those who have sacrificed it not for exclusive attention to family, but for careers.

I am a liberal because I think of better wages and working conditions. I do not care about the social problems that did not exist until social controls and a police state tended to grow with the same lust as the extremely wealthy elite. Now consider this, why am I a liberal who supports the constitution, say gun ownership and the like? Well liberalism has been redefined as supporting "gun control," when in fact liberals did not care about gun control because no one was controlling it. They wanted better wages and working conditions, not having to drain their energy and time with "gun control," another COINTELPRO syndrome. Face it, people call themselves liberal but are going along with elite plans for civilian disarmament. Historically if they take away your guns, the next state is slavery, or worse, the Stalin syndrome, they the elite and the state will take your life. They will take it when you ask for better wages and working conditions in such as dystopia as a gun free Stalinist tyranny.

Liberal means fighting for freedom, not fighting for the veiled plans of industrialists, and even today post industrialists. Look at the trends, classic liberals are getting their definitions removed, when everything is outsourced at pennies to the dollar. Question authority here, because when you study where many of the “liberal issues,” proceeded, you will find under a rock, or in a library, or on many well checked websites, an elite financier removing your core issues. Those issues create an opposition, where there was none in the past, and “conservatives,” who take away rights along with liberals who do the same. When you think about the liberal you might also think about freedom. Research everything, and know your own issues, who sponsored "your issues," and why.

Most women might rather have a solid economic base, rather than the desperate economics and sociology that creates a need for "pro-choice," that did not largely exist when needs were filled. Add up other things you regard passionately? Do they add to your economic base, or subtract from it? This is not about greed, it is about survival for those that have hundreds of times less things to be greedy about than the big money people who don't want to pay a fair wage.

Again, I am a liberal because I think of better wages and working conditions.

Originally posted by dgtempe


Something's wrong! Mr Wupy is supposed to be here, and is the last one to post, but i dont see his post!!!

Wupy, are you on Global Ignore by mistake?????

OR am i?

As a mod I can simply bump the thread to the top and my name shows up even though I didn't actually post anything. It was just a bump

wupy

Liberal & conservative are ideologies, while democrat & republican refer to political parties. Should I presume that (liberal=democrat and conservative=republican) for the purposes of this thread?
.

Not at all. I'm very liberal, but I'm by no means democrat. Dems are just another finger on the HAND.

Very good thread idea.
Now, to answer the questions asked (starting with 2).


Why am I liberal?
Because;

-I believe in freedom of choice.

-I believe in the freedom to one's own body,
and that ones body is ones own, and that no
one should be able to dictate what you can
and can't do with it.

-I believe in free speech.

-I believe in freedom of religion.

-I believein equality for all, not just rich, white,
republican, christian conservatives.

-I believe in the furtherment of knowledge.

-I believe in peace.

-I believe in a government of the people,
and for the people when it's required.


What do I oppose about the conservative movement?
Well, just about everything, but the main things are;

-Limiting freedoms.

-Basing there political decisions on religion.

-Trying to make everyone the same.

-Disallowing scientific research based on warped religious beliefs.

-Telling people what they can and can't do based on there own idea of "morality".


Something that's very sucky, is the term liberal has been thrown around so much in the last several years, that it's true meaning is lost on alot of people, and alot of slander libel and slander has benn thrown at it/us, especially since 2001.

Anyways, sorry to say I don't have any good links to share, not that many that I've ever visited, or particularly liked.


Oh, and when it comes to political parties, I'm not a democrat, and I'm definately not a republican, I, for the time being am a Libertarian...Libertarian Librarian, thats fun to say.

[edit on 7/30/2006 by iori_komei]

Originally posted by df1
Liberal & conservative are ideologies, while democrat & republican refer to political parties. Should I presume that (liberal=democrat and conservative=republican) for the purposes of this thread?
.

Presume whatever is comfortable with you. I'm just gathering information at this point and as long as your in the spirit of the thread you can't go wrong.

Hope that helps,

wupy

To start i would like to say im democratic socialist. In the terms of social policy i am a complete liberal. I believe I have the right to decide what is best for me, aslong as i do not harm anyone in making of the decision or in the action that decision creates. I am completely pro-choice with one exception, gun laws. I do not believe i have the right to own a arm that has the capability of killing or injuring mass amounts of people. Firarms only breed more violence, you can not protect oneself with a firarm, only harm another. Lets say if i walk down a street that i am likely to be shot, i am forced to stay indoors to protect myself which refrains me from making the choice to go outside or to stay indoors. No matter how many guns you have you will not be able to over throw (american) government with force, and i believe as SkipShipman pointed out that it is the government that keep you in a certain amount of fear of it that creates this thought that you must keep your arms (kill each other) to protect yourself from the government. Times have changed since the time of the forefathers, a gun will not overthrow the government anymore, only knowledge has the ability to topple the government.

[edit on 053131p://upMonday by wang]

Originally posted by wang
I believe I have the right to decide what is best for me, aslong as i do not harm anyone In making of the decision or in the action that decision creates.

This doesnt sound liberal, it sounds libertarian.

No matter how many guns you have you will not be able to over throw (american) government with force...

I agree that one man or handleful of men with guns can not overthrow the government, however I also believe that the sheer number of guns in the US does create some limits on how far government is willing to go in testing those limits. Imho our freedoms are better off with armed citizens than without armed citizens.

[edit on 31-7-2006 by df1]