Conservative or liberal (politics)

[dmgtz96]

Members of trancefix,

What makes you a conservative? Or liberal?

Was it your upbringing? Country? One side fits better with your personal values? Became disappointed with one side and switched to the other?

I am interested in hearing why you believe in one or the other.

 

[Archon]

I don't really associate myself with one or the other(s), which might indicate that I am somewhere in between and fluctuate a bit depending on the issue. I always try to see from a broader point of view, and usually like educating myself on politics and talking about them with friends who are also not passionately sticking to one side and who can raise some good arguments as well.

Generally though, Serbia is quite a conservative country - a point that one can easily demonstrate by looking at same-sex marriage laws. Only recently a law was suggested that would allow all rights to same-sex "community" (read: couples) equal rights. It's moving slowly towards marriage becoming legal, but still a few years away.

Church holds great power in this country, since it's Serbia's own Patriarchy and Serb's identity is tied closely to religion (a lot of people would say that you can't be a Serb if you're not Orthodox Christian, for instance), plus Church is always conservative by default.

 

[dmgtz96]

I don't really associate myself with one or the other(s), which might indicate that I am somewhere in between and fluctuate a bit depending on the issue. I always try to see from a broader point of view, and usually like educating myself on politics and talking about them with friends who are also not passionately sticking to one side and who can raise some good arguments as well.

Yeah, this is why I don't really go on r/politics or r/conservative, or at least take both with a grain of salt. If I check out one and then the other it feels like I'm staring at two different realities.

 

[Jetflag]

Classical liberal/ leaning liberatarian. which would make me a conservative by American standards

my upbringing was more left leaning liberal. I have however throughout the years become more disenfranchised by the overton window on the left shifting towards less freedom/ social constructivism and hence identify as more liberal right.

that being said I still hold plenty of left leaning positions on a vary of topics. Its just that when you calculate the final political spectrum sum, I end up on the liberal right square.

 

[dmgtz96]

Classical liberal/ leaning liberatarian. which would make me a conservative by American standards

my upbringing was more left leaning liberal. I have however throughout the years become more disenfranchised by the overton window on the left shifting towards less freedom/ social constructivism and hence identify as more liberal right.

that being said I still hold plenty of left leaning positions on a vary of topics. Its just that when you calculate the final political spectrum sum, I end up on the liberal right square.

I think in your case it also makes sense because iirc you have your own business? One of my professors also had his own company doing engineering consulting work, and he was fairly libertarian.

What is your opinion on the stereotypical American conservative, QAnon, flat Earth, anti-vaxx kind of stuff?

 

[Jetflag]

not really, my own business is more of a side thing when it comes to my overall income. 75 to 80% of all of my money from last year was from my job for instance, though this year might see a change in that.

I wouldn't classify those as stereotypical american conservative. Stereo typical American conservatives are people like Tucker Carlson, Larry Elder and Ted Cruz. The main shared attribute of the groups you list would be conspiracy theorist, not conservative perse.. (plenty of very left leaning hippy flat earthers for instance or anti vax naturalists). And my opinion on those is that most of them are probably quite delusional/paranoid and that some of those fears hold more merrit then others.

for instance, on the scale of not-likely to downward delusional/absurd I would place a flat earther below say a QAnon follower. a flat earth is a direct contradiction to the observable natural world, whereas a possible pedophile network in high government or religious realms is not something unheard of (Epstein island, the catholic church, the grove etc.)

 

[Love Nation]

In my opinion, both are very bad. If i had to choose, then i would say liberal. But liberal means anti-social (capitalistic)
Im radical left. Germany is a conservative country. But i live in Berlin since 10 years, and Berlin is the opposite of germany. Its an oasis. You could walk naked on the street and most people wouldnt be amazed or even notice you. In the underground techno clubs, its normal to see people at the age of 50 or older. There is no concept of being 'old' in Berlin.
Most of my friends in south germany are conservative. After some time in Berlin, i realized, that my mind diverged more and more from their minds. And today, its like two completely different worlds. They all have families and kids and are building houses. And doing their 9 to 5 job everyday, again and again. Im extremely glad, that i dont have such a horrible life. Im free.
Before i came to Berlin, i had a girlfriend and we were about to marry and get kids. But then i went to Berlin for my last year of studies, and changed my decision. That was the best and most important decision in my life

 

[dmgtz96]

In my opinion, both are very bad. If i had to choose, then i would say liberal. But liberal means anti-social (capitalistic)
Im radical left. Germany is a conservative country. But i live in Berlin since 10 years, and Berlin is the opposite of germany. Its an oasis. You could walk naked on the street and most people wouldnt be amazed or even notice you. In the underground techno clubs, its normal to see people at the age of 50 or older. There is no concept of being 'old' in Berlin.
Most of my friends in south germany are conservative. After some time in Berlin, i realized, that my mind diverged more and more from their minds. And today, its like two completely different worlds. They all have families and kids and are building houses. And doing their 9 to 5 job everyday, again and again. Im extremely glad, that i dont have such a horrible life. Im free.
Before i came to Berlin, i had a girlfriend and we were about to marry and get kids. But then i went to Berlin for my last year of studies, and changed my decision. That was the best and most important decision in my life

Interesting bit about the 50 year-olds that still go clubbing.These are the people who became adults when the Berlin wall fell. They probably partied their way through the 90s and just kept going.

You're not interested in a typical 9-5, building a family or owning a house, which is fine. Do you get by with part-time jobs and rent cheap/inexpensive apartments?

 

[Love Nation]

Interesting bit about the 50 year-olds that still go clubbing.These are the people who became adults when the Berlin wall fell. They probably partied their way through the 90s and just kept going.

You're not interested in a typical 9-5, building a family or owning a house, which is fine. Do you get by with part-time jobs and rent cheap/inexpensive apartments?

In Berlin, there are very few people that were born and grew up there. Its always a suprise, when you meet one of them, because i doesnt happen often. Its full of people that came here for studies or some creative or media stuff. Many of them are freelancers, so they can stay in the clubs until monday or or even tuesday. Or they just 'have a project'. That means, they are on welfare and do some creative stuff. Maybe, one day they will earn some money from that project, maybe not. Its not important. Nobody will shame you for that. My friends in south germany always say 'so thats where my taxes go'

I was freelancer and worked as audio engineer. Then i was on welfare for some years because of mental illness. Last year, i decided to just become a DJ. Then i started a job coaching, just for fun. My coach is really cool and i decided to become also freelance teacher for piano and music theory. I will continue being on welfare, until i earn enough money. Dont know, how long that will take, but im not in a hurry

 

[Jetflag]

curious..whats your stance @dmgtz96 what makes you liberal and/or conservative?

 

[dmgtz96]

curious..whats your stance @dmgtz96 what makes you liberal and/or conservative?

I would be democrat in the US, but not Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez democratic socialist. I think that stance is either liberal or conservative depending on the country (as far as I know, "democrat" in the US would be right-wing in some super liberal European countries).

In Mexico we don't really have liberal or conservative as well-defined as in the US. We have three major political parties: PRI, which held the power here for ~71 years and is center/center-right; PAN, center/center-right, and PRD, center/center-left. I'm not too familiar with what they do. What I do know is that my parents and a lot of people who are educated abhor the current president, AMLO, an ultra-liberal/populist. For reference, this guy established scholarships for young people not in education, employment, or training so they could acquire marketable skills. In theory, it sounds "good" like a USA universal basic income kind of system, but in reality it's a giant failure and a waste of funds that should have gone toward better purposes (like infrastructure or any of the million problems the country faces).

The city right across from us in the US is heavily liberal, as is much of the region nearby. However, I would not be able to tell you precisely this is why I am liberal/conservative. It's more like, the goals of the Dems are better aligned with my personal values: make the country a bit better by improving infrastructure and education (instead of slashing funds), pro-abortion, rejecting trickle-down economics, calling out police brutality, keeping religion and politics separate, and so on. That being said, there have been a few uncomfortable instances, like Trump being banned from Twitter ("good," but speaks volumes of the power of technology companies), the obviously unfair trial for Derek Chauvin, and gun control laws targeting minorities. I still have to do a bit more research about gun control laws, but so far the biggest culprit is the Mulford Act (California) that restricted gun access after the Black Panthers movement. This happened during Republican control of California, but the Democrats never took it away even though they've had California for a long time. No clue why it still exists, and it being there makes me cast doubt on people pushing for gun control, as if they had an ulterior motive instead of making the country safer.

 

[Jetflag]

I think you and I are sort of political in agreement in the sense that we're both liberal. We differ in the sense that i'm more classical- anti government liberal, and you're more of a progressive, pro government liberal.


Concerning motivated gun laws targeting minorities, you might also want to take a look at planned parent hood as you mentioned being pro abortion earlier, as its is currently under scrutiny for potentially racially motivated policies. this is something Powell and Owens are currently adressing in their "blexit" movement. The idea basically being that the combination of a set of crimebills, who ended up disproportionally incarcerated black and brown american men by its profiling setup, and a targeted distribution of planned parent hood clinics in (as a concequence of the 1994 bill) "problematic" neighboorhoods keeps quote on quote "a brotha down" by not only undermining stable family units in those areas, but procreation numbers in those communities aswell.

 

[brandonl]

I'm a socialist. I support democratic socialism, eco-socialism, alil bit of libertarianism. I absolutely hate our neoliberal, capitalist system.

 

[Love Nation]

Yesterday was 1. May. A very important day in Berlin. I was on an antifacist demonstration. It was like an action horror movie. Or a drug overdose, but i was completely sober.

At the beginning, it was quite chilled. There were also music concerts and stuff. Then it was a bit escalating. At some point, we were boxed in by the police and there was no escape. A that moment, i was already quite afraid. Then twilight came and the action started.
There were sudden chases of screeching people all the time. And much hard violence and pepper spray. I got panic attacks all the time. After some time, i was like on a hard drug rush. Just tried to survive and dont loose my friends. It felt like a festival on 5 pills. That was super nice

 

[Jetflag]

Riot police fights can be pretty intense alright..

I've been in a couple of protests involving M E over the years and about 4 training sessions with them involving live targets.
its a bit like cage/ring match martial sports in the sense that you're not so much fighting your opponent(s) as you are fighting with yourself and your own hide-flight fight-responds. Its great indeed. Even if you lose (which in the end usually ends up happening) you're still left with a sense of gratification/ reward.

I've never managed to hold my own/ stand my ground against the K9's though. Fak me those things are terrifying.. I'll take a punch from the weapon stick or a handfull of arrest-team-cops over those menacing things any day..

 

[Love Nation]

Riot police fights can be pretty intense alright..

I've been in a couple of protests involving M E over the years and about 4 training sessions with them involving live targets.
its a bit like cage/ring match martial sports in the sense that you're not so much fighting your opponent(s) as you are fighting with yourself and your own hide-flight fight-responds. Its great indeed. Even if you lose (which in the end usually ends up happening) you're still left with a sense of gratification/ reward.

I've never managed to hold my own/ stand my ground against the K9's though. Fak me those things are terrifying.. I'll take a punch from the weapon stick or a handfull of arrest-team-cops over those menacing things any day..

What do you mean with M E and live targets? I think we didnt even experience the real 'action' of what everybody was talking about a the beginning. I think its when the cops are undercounted somewhere at some point... In the news, they said that 93 cops were hurt, but for me it seemed like the opposite

 

[Jetflag]

What do you mean with M E and live targets? I think we didnt even experience the real 'action' of what everybody was talking about a the beginning. I think its when the cops are undercounted somewhere at some point... In the news, they said that 93 cops were hurt, but for me it seemed like the opposite

Sorry, M E means "Mobiele Eenheid" in Dutch and isn't an international abriviation. They're basically the branch of the police specialized in riot and riot control (Shields/weaponsticks, Teargas, watercannon, special undercover arrest teams etc.) aswell as (armoured) mounted horseback and K9 squads.

Live target training involves them (the riot police) training on live targets (such as myself and a couple of friends) in a controlled environment. Upside for them: they learn to train/restrain themselves for the real deal. Upside for me: I get a day of free fitness and the opportunity to legally, without consequences: Kick, Hit, insult, Cuss, throw stuff and generally be an annoying pest to the police, which believe, is great fun, despite the bruises,
oh there's also free lunch so. win win.

 

[dmgtz96]

This whole situation with the Italy prime minister has been interesting @jetflag. I'm liberal (obviously) but the optics are odd when you have feminists criticizing a female prime minister. Then again, there's no shortage of right-leaning wackos who just happen to be women, like Sarah Palin and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Based on the NYT article, Italy is not a good place for women, so I don't know what to expect of Giorgia Meloni, if she is just a far-right puppet or someone who will actually help the women of her country.

 

[Jetflag]

This whole situation with the Italy prime minister has been interesting @jetflag. I'm liberal (obviously) but the optics are odd when you have feminists criticizing a female prime minister. Then again, there's no shortage of right-leaning wackos who just happen to be women, like Sarah Palin and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Based on the NYT article, Italy is not a good place for women, so I don't know what to expect of Giorgia Meloni, if she is just a far-right puppet or someone who will actually help the women of her country.

Fun fact: Our au pair is actually a (young) italian women and quite centre left, so before I give you my view on it, I’m going to talk to her about it and how she sees things.

better to get it straight from the source.

 

[Jetflag]

So to kick of with her point of view:

Basically she didn't and wouldn't vote for her since, well. she's more center left. But as far as women's rights go she's not all that worried. 1 there's enough political pushback from the opposition íf Meloni where a woman hater, which she isn't, wouldn't (whilst still remaining priminister) get a lot of anything íf anything through. So there's that. and 2: Meloni's pro-family policies, which is an important thing culturally for Italians who are, and rightly so, quite keen on their (ancient) traditions actually ensures that taking care of the kids whilst being a working mom should at the very least become less cumbersome.

so basically "meh, it'll be ok" from her.


Now, since you asked for it (dundunduun) my point of view:

First of the NYT article: I admit I didn't read it beyond the first paragraph seen as its paywalled and i'm not going to spend money on the NYT.. But if you already have to, (as an increasingly more to the left leaning newsoutlet) kick of your title with "some women" as opposed to "most" or "all women" That should speak bookmarks as to italy actually being a good place for women in general, (which it is).

I find this trend in newspapers both left and right to polarize instead of objectively reporting the facts increasingly worry some to be honest, its like their all screetching hardest for attention and outrage and something like Fox news is by no means an exception to this. This example I actually find to be a nice one and something I for once actually agree with Piers Morgan on, for a change...Left wing journalism and politics label everything and their mom that is slightly right of center as "far right!!" nowadays its like:

No. Far right = far right (so say the in our previous discussion mentioned Spencer, áctual white supremacists/facists)

being pro family, regardless of what race that family consists of in my view (but that's me) isn't that.

Meloni is basically just trad-wife politics. so, mainstream conservatism if you will

and even íf her views on say, Gay marriage as a Catholic and all are not in line with what I believe. She'll probably recieve such a political pushback from all that is the rest of italy that she'll be out of office before the document is signed. I think the only thing she wants to actually do on that front is making it possible for individual doctors to conscientiously object to say: carrying out an abortion of a hysterectomy. Which, you know, fair enough. That's actually a liberal position as far as I'm concerned. No doctor should be forced to preform surgery if he doesn't want to (and there's plenty of doctors in Italy who want/ will so..)