I am sure that many will disagree, but it appears to me that it is an easier stance to be on the political left than on the right. It seems like you hear more people on the left calling people on the right "fascist" and other terms, or tend to think that the right is stifling the "free speech" of the left. People also equate the liberal left as the "humanitarians" of the world, while the right is only out to protect themselves. Draginol has pointed out the many things that Republicans have done for Americans. I wish I could remember the whole list, and I hope that he will enlighten me again so that I don't forget anything. I also notice that a lot of lefts point out what political stance another person has, but not many rights do. Maybe rights are just more open minded than lefts?
But, I'll just leave this disorganized rambling with a definition from www.wordiq.com (I don't know why I find it amusing, but I do.....It may have to do with a line a read on JU where somebody said that they remember when "Liberalism" was called "Socialism") :
| Encyclopedia |
Definition: Left-wing politics | |
In politics, left-wing, political left, or simply the left, are terms which refer (with no particular precision) to the segment of the political spectrum typically associated with any of several strains of socialism, social democracy, or liberalism (especially in the United States sense of the word), or with opposition to right-wing politics.
The terminology of Left-Right politics was originally based on the seating-arrangement of parliamentary partisans, during the French Revolution. The more ardent proponents of radical revolutionary measures (including democracy and republicanism, but often including also governmental terror) were commonly referred to as leftists because they sat on the left side of successive legislative assemblies. As this original reference became obsolete, the meaning of the terms has changed as appropriate to the spectrum of ideas and stances being compared.
The term is also often used to characterize the politics of the Soviet Union and other one-party communist states, although many (perhaps most) on the political left (even including some who call themselves Marxist) would not consider their own politics to have anything significant in common with those of these states. Similarly, most anarchists consider themselves part of the political left, but many others on the left would reject that connection. |