In order for me and everyone else to get clarity or to be perfectly clear what left wing and right wing thinking really are, I would like to dispense with all known labels such as communism, socialism, fascism etc. I need to know what the most far left thinking person would want in terms of a govt and what the most far right thinking person would want in terms of a govt. Again no labels, just define what they would want in terms of a govt and what powers it would have and not have. Just define the most extreme far left and far right. Once this has been defined I will be able to place all known labels with absolute clarity in their respective left or right leaning category based on what those known labels have done and want today. For example: With your definitions I will be able to determine if supporters and members of BLM are left leaning or a right leaning thinking people.
Left and right, I need clarity.
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the far right wants a nationalistically nation with one people, one race,one religion and one identity
the far left wants a socialist utopia full of different people
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@sadolite
The government's main duty is to protect people from enemies and from domestic violence.
The government should have a very limited role in providing safety nets and influencing commerce.
The government should provide a free market in all things to minimize class warfare, including education.
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@sadolite
Good topic. I am happy to help.
Left wing in its pure form stands for safety and harmony.
Right wing in its pure form stands for freedom and chaos.
When I write that, I do not ignore Stalin being pseudo-left nor Hitler being right-wing and yet still using the term 'socialist' to describe his system.
I am going to explain to you that these two things (safety and harmony vs freedom and chaos) are paired values that rest at the core If the wings.
The right wing sets out to unleash everything on the world, both good and bad. Its motive is to enable the most brutal and unrelinquished form of society with each individual taking what they want when they want however they want. This is the pinnacle of right-wing ethos.
The left wing sets out to have a society that is as safe and harmonious as possible, the more left-wing a society is, the less it focuses on retribution and more it focuses on rehabilitation (in all senses, even bad financial decisions).
The right-wing in practise, doesn't enable freedom because it is tyranny by the rich and influential who mercilessly thwart those that stand in their way and whose children unfairly inherit that power and wealth.
The left-wing in practise often devolves if it's extreme, into a situation where instead of safety and harmony being a thing all have, instead none at all have it and it deems that a good solution with a tyrant ruling all.
Neither wing functionally achieves its goal if it is taken to the extrene.
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@RationalMadman
Right wing in its pure form stands for freedom and chaos.
I'm not sure you could be more wrong about this. Conservatism is about order. That comes first. You cannot have freedom without first establishing order.
You may be thinking of libertarians, which I wouldn't consider right-wing.
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@bmdrocks21
Right-wing says it's conservative but how is it so? It is not about discipline but unleashing wrath of rich and powerful on the people.
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@sadolite
In terms of far-right and far-left, you are going to get political systems that in no way resemble our current political ideas of "left" and "right"
For instance, a far-right person generally doesn't care about low taxation and free trade like Republicans do. In fact, being the nationalists they are, they are very protectionist and would like some form of social safety net. They believe that putting the welfare of your people comes first. They believe that there are naturally occurring hierarchies and any radical attempt to close such a gap is a futile goal (referring to egalitarianism). They believe in having a culturally homogeneous population to prevent conflict and preserving their heritage (traditionalist). They believe in maintaining order.
These are just purely right-wing precepts, so to be "far-right" just take them to the extreme. That is why "fascism" is a far-right ideology: it maintains order, by strong force if necessary, super-nationalistic in terms of maintaining cultural heritage, mainly corporatist, etc.
Left-wing is more globalist. They believe in centrally-planned economies with huge social safety nets. They like multi-culturalism, egalitarianism. Going to find a lot more atheists and moral relativists in this camp. They aren't based on the idea of order.
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@RationalMadman
I have never read anything by any right-wing individual that advocates for that. You may be confusing "right-wing" as a whole with corrupt Republican neo-cons.
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@bmdrocks21
Obviously they don't say that. That's not how propaganda works.
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@RationalMadman
And left-wing people don't mention how they want their intellectual elite domineering over us from their bureaucratic throne.
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@bmdrocks21
Left Wing admits it wants authority figures, however the authority must answer to the overall populace and be held accountable. Right Wing denies that it likes authority and the sheep call the left-wing 'sheep'. Even in anarchic left-wing variants, there'd be community figures with authority.
Lol. right-wing are not the anarchists.
Well so far No one seems to agree on anything. LOL I am not one step closer to any definitive definition that even half the people could agree on.
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@sadolite
Closest thing so far I can get out of the comments is that left-wing wants an egalitarian system forced upon society by the government and the right wants an organic class system where people are free to move up and down the ladder, as they choose.
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@Greyparrot
Except that in practise there is barely any freedom at all to climb classes in right-wing societies.
I agree. There are all sorts of systemic cronyism from both political parties that prevent us from being like Hong Kong and make us more like India.
But those are the ideals on the right and the left.
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@Dr.Franklin
As long as people on the left claim to advocate a whole society of different people, as stated in your #2, I will refute the claim by one example: the people on the left who advocate a green new deal of net-zero emissions ignore that they also advocate windmills in any yard but their own, thus are in denial of their net-zero claim because a windmill in anyone's yard will still emit GHGs because they all use petroleum as lubricant and for the fabrication of plastic parts, as do the turbines of every other green energy source. They goose themselves going and coming. It is the same with every other progressive line of thought. A basket of distinctions without a difference.
The new 2019 survey puts New Zealand at the top, and America at #15.
If only we could learn to trim our government down to a manageable size... Ahh to dream.
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@RationalMadman
Except that in practise there is barely any freedom at all to climb classes in right-wing societies.
Oh, but there is nothing but freedom. The problem on the left is arguing for limitations, which they are free to do; they are their limitations, self-imposed, beginning with "I can't."
Far left and far right as it was explained to me as a child at about 13 years of age. The most extreme left thinking is total control over everything. The govt decides everything that an individual can and cant do, wear they live, where they work, and so on. Everything is rationed based on what the govt thinks you need to survive. Govt controls all production of everything. The individual lives only to serve the state, the individual is completely expendable, individual rights do not exist. Extreme right thinking is basically anarchy. No laws, no rules, no govt. The wants of the individual are all that matter.
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@Greyparrot
These life style studies are worthless. If new Zealand had to pay for its own standing military to defend it's country they would not be able to be the giant nanny state that they are. Just like the US, 50% of all their revenues or more would have to go to fund a standing military and even then that wouldn't even be enough to protect their country from a country like Iran in a conventional war. All nanny states would crumble into third world shitholes if they couldn't rely on the US military for protection.
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@sadolite
These life style studies are worthless. If new Zealand had to pay for its own standing military to defend it's country they would not be able to be the giant nanny state that they are. Just like the US, 50% of all their revenues or more would have to go to fund a standing military and even then that wouldn't even be enough to protect their country from a country like Iran in a conventional war. All nanny states would crumble into third world shitholes if they couldn't rely on the US military for protection.
This isn't a "happiness" lifestyle survey. It's a survey that measures how much or how little government gets in your way from going up and down the economic ladder. It's saying essentially New Zealand's government won't regulate or tax the shit out of you if you wanted to start a business there. That's a metric separate from a welfare state.
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@sadolite
In order for me and everyone else to get clarity or to be perfectly clear what left wing and right wing thinking really are, I would like to dispense with all known labels such as communism, socialism, fascism etc. I need to know what the most far left thinking person would want in terms of a govt and what the most far right thinking person would want in terms of a govt. Again no labels, just define what they would want in terms of a govt and what powers it would have and not have.
If one goes by the original, simplest, intended and most cogent left-right delineation then "left vs. right" = "democracy vs. god & king"
The terms "left" and "right" appeared during the French Revolution of 1789 when members of the National Assembly divided into supporters of the king to the president's right and supporters of the revolution to his left. One deputy, the Baron de Gauville, explained: "We began to recognize each other: those who were loyal to religion and the king took up positions to the right of the chair so as to avoid the shouts, oaths, and indecencies that enjoyed free rein in the opposing camp" Just define the most extreme far left and far right.
That's it. Let's recall that the French Revolution was a direct response to the American Revolution in multiple ways. The left wing of the National Assembly was explicitly seeking an American style republic. When the term was coined, Leftism explicitly meant American-style government and Rightism was explicitly opposed to American-style government. Extreme Leftism was represented by Jefferson, Franklin, Adams. Extreme Rightism was represented by George III, Louis XVI, and Pope Pius XI
The Scottish sociologist Robert M. MacIver noted in The Web of Government (1947):
The right is always the party sector associated with the interests of the upper or dominant classes, the left the sector expressive of the lower economic or social classes, and the centre that of the middle classes. Historically this criterion seems acceptable. The conservative right has defended entrenched prerogatives, privileges and powers; the left has attacked them. The right has been more favorable to the aristocratic position, to the hierarchy of birth or of wealth; the left has fought for the equalization of advantage or of opportunity, for the claims of the less advantaged. Defence and attack have met, under democratic conditions, not in the name of class but in the name of principle; but the opposing principles have broadly corresponded to the interests of the different classes.
Once this has been defined I will be able to place all known labels with absolute clarity in their respective left or right leaning category based on what those known labels have done and want today.
Generally, the left-wing is characterized by an emphasis on "ideas such as freedom, equality, fraternity, rights, progress, reform and internationalism" while the right-wing is characterized by an emphasis on "notions such as authority, hierarchy, order, duty, tradition, reaction and nationalism".
Political scientists and other analysts regard the left as including anarchists, communists, socialists, democratic socialists, social democrats, left-libertarians, progressives and social liberals. Movements for racial equality and trade unionism have also been associated with the left.
Political scientists and other analysts regard the right as including conservatives, right-libertarians, neoconservatives, imperialists, monarchists, fascists, reactionaries and traditionalists.
For example: With your definitions I will be able to determine if supporters and members of BLM are left leaning or a right leaning thinking people.
Not much room for discussion there. All civil rights movements and appeals for increased equality are leftist by definition. Those who advocate for the government's right to strangle less desirable citizens at will or the right of government to tear-gas lawful assemblies so that our present king and all his heirs and entourage can take a bible-waving publicity stroll to church are right-wing by definiton.
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@sadolite
Dr. Franklin's division is right on point
the far right wants a nationalistically nation with one people, one race,one religion and one identity
Indistinguishable from the domestic ambitions of Nazi Germany or the American Confederacy.
the far left wants a socialist utopia full of different people
America is chock full of different people, more different people than any other nation on Earth. The word "utopia" means an imaginary place but our present day America is full of different people and that is not imaginary. Right-wingers are clear on the point that they want to remove all that different-ness from the United States but they seldom look you in the eye when the discussion turns to how to remove all those people. One race, one religion, one identity- that is the true and horrifying utopia. There are lots of countries in the world full of different people. There never has been a nation of one race, religion, and identity and most Americans would fight another Civil War, another World War II to ensure there never will be.
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@oromagi
You don’t necessarily have to remove the people to make a homogeneous society. Putting an emphasis on tradition and patriotism in schooling and naturalization to make sure people conform is a perfectly peaceful way of accomplishing it.
A melting pot assumes people conform by respecting and promotIng our traditional American ideals in the Bill of Rights, learn our language (English), and appreciate our heritage.
Multicultural lefties are trying to create a country in which people don’t conform. They don’t want a homogeneous society. Putting people with radically different ideals and cultures in close proximity is a recipe for disaster.
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@bmdrocks21
learn our language (English)
The US doesn't have an official language (as much as some on the right try to insist that it does).
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@bmdrocks21
Multicultural lefties are trying to create a country in which people don’t conform. They don’t want a homogeneous society. Putting people with radically different ideals and cultures in close proximity is a recipe for disaster.
They want a tribal salad bowl, not a homogenous melting pot.
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@PressF4Respect
When a hyper majority of people in this country have spoken a certain language well over a century, you have a de facto official language.
Whether it is official or not is irrelevant.
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@Greyparrot
And we all know that salads are icky, so therefore lefties bad.
#FactsDontCareAboutYourFeelings
#TruthBomb
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@bmdrocks21
Are you saying that everyone should be forced to learn the language that most people in the US speak? Sure, not learning English would make some interactions more difficult, but why should everyone be forced to learn it?