From: Damien Sullivan (phoenix@ugcs.caltech.edu)
Date: Fri May 16 2003 - 01:10:34 MDT
On Thu, May 15, 2003 at 07:23:24PM -0700, Lee Corbin wrote:
> 3. Drugs: new modes of consciousness and new thoughts
>
> Yes. Liberals are indeed almost as much in favor of abolishing
> laws against drug use as libertarians tend to be.
Well, I'd like to say that. Back when I was more libertarian I tend to think
of myself as "classical liberal", thanks to Friedman and Hayek and to
'libertarian' being too f-ing long. And we've got the wave of
decriminalization going on, yay. But most elected politicians called
"liberal" wouldn't say they were for legalization.
> 5. Pornography: new modes of sexuality besides the heterosexual missionary
> position within a traditional family unit
>
> Yes. Liberals favor freedom on this one too (in general, liberals
Except for some twisted but vocal offshoots of feminism. Or the Soviet Union,
for that matter, for whatever that might be worth. I really do think
'liberal' and 'left' can be usefully disassociated, even before we properly
break things up onto multiple axes (is socialist-left the same as Green-left?
No.) A crude divider might be "liberal is about individual freedom, plus these
days some governmental monetary policy and safety nets, which arguably
increase real freedom by increasing stable growth" vs. "left is a bunch of
idealisms variously about increasing some idea of fairness or justice, usually
free of ethnic or traditional bigotry, but often willing to sacrifice
individual choice and freedom".
I'd be happy to grant, nay encourage, a distinction between 'conservative' and
'right-wing', although I'm not sure what it'd be. "Conservatism is about
small government and individual freedom while right-wing is a bunch of
idealisms variously about religious rules or ethinic bigotry"? The fact that
certain definitions of 'conservative' and 'liberal' back into each other is
something I've observed for years, and might actually make sense if you think
of a tree of politics diverging from Revolutionary times.
> go for social freedoms, except for freedom of association, and the
> freedom to discriminate).
The second one is affirmative action and bans on workplace racial
discrimination, is the first anything else?
There's also "gun control", a limitation on individual choice currently
considered liberal, although I have a book called _The Liberal Case for
Handguns_ or (maybe _against Gun Control_) with a bunch of essays by
self-claimed liberals opposing gun control, some of them claiming to be civil
rights workers who wouldn't be alive had they lacked guns to scare violent
Southerners off with.
> 7. Environmental Laws: new restrictions based on the idea that the
> environment is being changed
>
> Hmm? But liberals *like* the laws to prevent environmental change, and so
> keep the status quo. Conservatives are much more in favor of economic
> development (i.e., change).
The root of environmentalism isn't about preventing change, although I'm sure
that's around too now, but about preventing damage. Or conserving ecological
capital, in economic terms.
> be forced to be civilized by a petulant and irascible U.S. Here, it's the
> conservatives who are all for change!
Neo-cons, I think. US conservatism has tended to isolationism more than
anything else.
-xx- Damien X-)
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