Tell me what traits you think constitute Right/Conservative and Left/Progressive

Greetings,

I have read a post that made me think, are peoples definitions of Right/Conservative and Left/Progressive misguided?

So I guess we will soon see.


I will post my take after a few replies.

reply to post by ghostsoldier


Oversimplification in my opinion it is impossible to label right=Conservative and left=Progressive when there are political ideologies which cross the left/right spectrum. Libertarianism for example has several different versions ranging from Left-Libertarianism to Right-Libertarianism. I would actually prefer to reform the system since right-left is two dimensional and as we all know the real world is 3 dimensional.

We could have Right=Capitalism and Left=Socialism but instead of just a straight line we could allow that line to go down or up on that line. For example a Left Authoritarian (Communism) could be Left-Up and Left Libertarian (Anarchism) could be Left-Down and Right Authoritarian (Fascism) could be Right-Up and Right Libertarian (Libertarianism) could be Right-Down.

We must be willing to transcend the established political order to find reality.

reply to post by Misoir


Ofcource, this is just for arguments sake. The reason being:

I have seen posts that express people thinking that Right/Conservative=civil liberties - I am just interested to see where peoples heads are at.

Progressives believe in change for the better. They believe in cooperation. They believe that humankind can improve. They believe in ideals above the behaviors of our animal instincts.

Conservatives believe that most changes cause more problems than benefits. They believe in competition. They believe in tradition and authority.

The most interesting phenomenon I see today is Tea Party types wearing 18th century outfits as if to imply that they believe in the ideals of the Founders. In fact, the Founders were very progressive for their day. The same people who are Tea Partiers today (oh, the irony) would surely have been the Tories of the revolutionary war period.

I am sure that in 1776 some brassy broad loudly proclaimed that "we want our country back," by which she meant a return to the rule of the King.

AH, stimulating indeed.

As if thou have not discovered, I shall reveal this one; easily and briefly:

Conservative: Wealthy-Powerful-Caucasian-Only-Clan, Christian-Influence (a disgusting but powerful tactic to gain the lower classes votes) Anti-disabled, Anti-Senior-Citizen, Anti-Social Security, Anti-Workers-Rights, Anti-Regulation, Anti-environment, to name but a few!

Liberal: DESPICABLE-Middle-Class-And Lower-Class-Lovers, Pro-Employee-Rights-And-Wages, Pro-Environment, Pro-Veteran-Care-Rights-Benefits, Pro-Senior-Citizen--Benefits-Assistance, Pro-American-Workers, to name but a few.

Our fat Elephant shall gain control soon enough and rightfully take from thy middle class. Thou despicable COMMONERS have had enough help from thou LIBERALS. We shall terminate this; for the commoners deserve nothing but ENSLAVEMENT.

We shall win over the despicable liberals and thy despicable commoners. We shall RISE AGAIN!!!

We must rise and destroy the economy again before those Liberals get it back to prospering levels with surplus.

Nothing shall thou commoners do to stop us.

Despicable pheasants are thou and their Democratic politicians shall not win.

Well, my take will be on the implementation rather than the theory. There is a big differance.

Conservatives have shown that they pursue the following ideals:

* Preservation and contribution to large corporations
* Strengthing of Military Assets and Foreign Policy (empire building) at the expense of induvidual welfare
* Supposed reduction of government by way of reduction of funds to social programs
* Implementation of socially conservative policies that prohibit the free expression of self

Liberals have show that they pursue the following ideals:
* Preservation and contribution to populist organizations such as trade unions and civil defense organizations
* Bloating of government through increasingly larger social programs that are tied to complicated regulations.
* Total ignorance (when allowed) or foreign policy (with the exception of Israeli matters) to the point of isolationism
* Implementation of facist like strictures against public expression to "support civil liberties and rights"

In other words, both are basically the same. They bloat government under the guise of "protecting" us. All the while they are fattening their wallets and guaranteeing, in the off chance that they lose an election, that there is a lucrative paycheck as a consultant somewhere waiting for them.

We can divide political spectrum according to stance to personal freedoms (abortions, censorship and freedom of expression, separation of church and state, immigration freedom, use of narcotics..) and economic freedoms (that includes both regulations and level of taxation - wealth redistribution).
This two axes form Nolan chart



Right/conservative advocate economic freedom but are against personal freedoms, Left/progressive have it reversed.

I heard an interesting remark recently:

Two astronauts land on a new planet.

The conservative astronaut worries what about the planet constitues a danger to him.

The liberal astronaut worries what about him constitues a danger to the planet.