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[RedSwirl]

Maybe I've asked this before, but I still don't understand how split up the US seems to be and how entrenched the divisions have become. What I mainly misunderstand how and why people call themselves "liberal" or "conservative" today.

I was under the impression that we had the Republican and Democratic parties, and that people within them might trend towards the right or left. I was taught in high school that there was a sliding scale between "conservative," "moderate," and "liberal," and that your beliefs came together to put you somewhere on that scale.

What I'm seeing more and more of in the news however is people who seem to stick to conservative or liberal beliefs simply because those beliefs are what's listed under "conservative" or whatever. A little while ago I read a story where a guy was quoted as saying you can't be a conservative gay person, or at least saying you can't be conservative and support gay marriage, even if you hold other conservative beliefs.

What am I missing here?

 

[CHEEZMO™]

Tribalism?

 

[Ushojax]

Dumb/Slightly Less Dumb

 

[The Technomancer]

Tribalism?

Basically. It exists strongly on both sides (I've met very tribalistic liberals, they piss me off to no end) but there's a segment of the "conservative" base that has become incredibly vocal in recent years.

 

[V_Arnold]

The only thing you are missing is that we have an urge to describe someone or something with as little energy as possible. The job is basically done when we arrive at a polarized position, or at most at 4-5 different archetypes.

In reality, there are no "liberals" or "conservatives". There are milliards of different people with a completely different package when it comes to certain ideas. It is just easier to turn people against each other when we use these types of generalizations.

 

[Orayn]

American liberalism is a flawed political position.

American conservatism is a howling void of unrestrained madness and contempt for one's fellow human beings.

 

[Utako]

Bush was voted into office and people realized how different the coasts were from the flyover states. Then religion and environment, rich and poor.

 

[CHEEZMO™]

American liberalism is a flawed political position.

American conservatism is a howling void of unrestrained madness and contempt for one's fellow human beings.

Does this mean I'm allowed to be the typical smug European?

 

[The Technomancer]

American liberalism is a flawed political position.

American conservatism is a howling void of unrestrained madness and contempt for one's fellow human beings.

I'm using this in the future.

 

[daycru]

It's just a team sport. The Patriot Act was evil until Obama started extending it. The deficit didn't matter until the Democrat got elected.

 

[The Albatross]

American liberalism is a flawed political position.

American conservatism is a howling void of unrestrained madness and contempt for one's fellow human beings.

This is the source of the perceived split. The pure vitriol used to describe one side, from another.

 

[rkn]

One shoots blue lasers the other shoots red lasers.

 

[Stumpokapow]

You're going to be very confused if you ever take a Political Science course and find out that "Liberal" and "Conservative" have very well defined historical meanings that have virtually no connection to those terms as used in American politics, adding another layer of definitional mess to the equation.

 

[Eteric Rice]

I personally think we're in an alternate universe. I think there's a universe where US politics aren't completely fucking insane. Where politicians do still work for the people, and money is kept mostly out of it.

We're the alternate universe, where everything is nuts. But in the other universe, Europe is where we are now. Americans look at Europeans like, "You guys are nuts. No socialized health care? Pfffft."

Just my two cents. :<

 

[Gaborn]

Tribalism?

Yep. There is a difference between believing one political ideology is better or worse than the other and what currently happens which often involves people ignoring faults in their own side they'd condemn on the other.

 

[quaere]

There is a subset of conservatives that has become influential that is essentially completely opposed to rational thought, debate, or compromise. This group is large enough that they have elected some of their own, and the sane conservative politicians are forced to pander to them.

There is no equivalency here - there is plenty of stupidity and stubbornness on both sides but a very unusually high concentration of it is in this group.

 

[Silas Lang]

I wish I understood it myself. I find it very strange how people can agree with either side seemingly 100% unquestionably. I don't think there is any person/party/ideology I can agree with 100%. I don't get it.

 

[base shagohod]

One shoots blue lasers the other shoots red lasers.

This is my favorite description.

 

[Wolves Evolve]

Add to this problem the bad behaviour of politicians and a complicit press and it's madness. People struggle to be liberal-minded without saying "these people are insane!", because every iota of liberal information tells them to think that. So there's no respect for the passionate moderate, the socially-minded fiscal conservative, the genuinely empathic small-government thinker (a tradition that nourishes traditions across the spectrum), the genuinely prudent big-government thinker (a tradition that nourishes nations in crisis.). None of these rich veins are being mined any more.

 

[Pollux]

American liberalism is a flawed political position.

American conservatism is a howling void of unrestrained madness and contempt for one's fellow human beings.

I...like this.

 

[Hari Seldon]

Tribalism hits the nail on the head. Also people don't like to think for themselves.

 

[Kosmo]

Same as it has been for the last 30 years, only now people are more entrenched because they can voice their opinions to friends on Twitter and Facebook.

 

[Alvarius]

Also now everyone has media outlets to vividly reinforce beliefs/demonize the enemy that they can attend to 24/7.

 

[Gaborn]

I...like this.

I think the problem with that attitude is it tends to allow liberals, who are perceived as merely "flawed" rather than malicious a pass because the belief is the alternative would be worse on issues that, if a conservative was to support the exact same thing would be perceived VERY negatively and get major push back on.

The truth is whether one side or another is better or worse might be worth noting in terms of observing trend lines, but the IMPORTANT thing is to hold politicians to account when they screw up and to do so on the same terms.

 

[Orayn]

This is the source of the perceived split. The pure vitriol used to describe one side, from another.

And do you think the vitriol is unwarranted? Vitriol towards the party that wants to block access to abortion to female soldiers who have been raped? Strong criticism of modern conservative ideology is founded on the fact that modern conservatives support policies that any reasonable person should find abhorrent.

 

[Alvarius]

The other problem with that POV is that it's easy for conservatives to mock.

 

[RustyNails]

can we get BOTH ARE EQUALLY DUMB DUMB posts out of the way? thanks

American liberal/conservatism comes down to individualism. It further boils down to something even more basic: your instincts, your reactions. Empathy vs Selfishness, and how much stock you have in both. It's really that simple.

 

[Dark Phoenix]

Both can be considered as idiots who think that the other idiots are somehow worse than them.

 

[dave is ok]

Root root root for the home team, if they don't win it's a shame.

 

[Shiv47]

It would be interesting to see where we'd be now if Rush Limbaugh hadn't succeeded so wildly in the early 90s; because from there we had the relentless dogging of Bill Clinton during his administration, which almost seems like a dry run for the dirty tactics of the Obama era. Fox News gave further voice to these people, demonizing the left as un-American and potential communists. All that noise from them and the Hannitys and Coulters and such has led to where we are now: a period where compromise with the other side, especially from the Republican point of view, is seen as weak and giving in to socialism/communism/un-Americanism. So we have radically polarized sides, with no real change in sight, so long as the prevalent form of dialogue is attack.

 

[kaskade]

You're going to be very confused if you ever take a Political Science course and find out that "Liberal" and "Conservative" have very well defined historical meanings that have virtually no connection to those terms as used in American politics, adding another layer of definitional mess to the equation.

This happened to me and we were briefly going over the original ideas. From what I remember it's almost opposite to what it was today. Democrat was more hands off govt.

 

[SolarPowered]

This is the source of the perceived split. The pure vitriol used to describe one side, from another.

Okay

One side is full of pansies and the other one is coco pebbles.

I can't think of a nicer way to describe each party. There are reasonable people on the right, but they seem to be few and far between. Their voices have been marginalized by some really angry people.

 

[Kosmo]

It would be interesting to see where we'd be now if Rush Limbaugh hadn't succeeded so wildly in the early 90s; because from there we had the relentless dogging of Bill Clinton during his administration, which almost seems like a dry run for the dirty tactics of the Obama era. Fox News gave further voice to these people, demonizing the left as un-American and potential communists. All that noise from them and the Hannitys and Coulters and such has led to where we are now: a period where compromise with the other side, especially from the Republican point of view, is seen as weak and giving in to socialism/communism/un-Americanism. So we have radically polarized sides, with no real change in sight, so long as the prevalent form of dialogue is attack.

Funny you left out Presidential criticism from that whole period of 2000-2008.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

here ya go. enjoy:

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/leftright_EU_1416.gif

 

[Alvarius]

Strong criticism of modern conservative ideology is founded on the fact that modern conservatives support policies that any reasonable person should find abhorrent.

"Any reasonable person should find so-and-so abhorrent" is not a strong criticism.

 

[Kai Dracon]

Tribalism, yes. It's just that modern American conservatism, or "neocon", recently struck gold by identifying a large demographic of people who had latent tribalistic anxieties but no giant, clear targets to project their discomfort, fear, and paranoia onto. At least not as a nationally unified group.

So the neocon war machine has done a superb job of whipping those people up with keywords and phrases like "socialism", "progressive", "homosexual agenda", "activist judges", "war on Christianity" and so forth.

I've watched it happen with people I know who are otherwise intelligent, even educated - due to their background, latent biases (and in a few cases, hidden, submerged bigotries), and cultural inheritance, they fell into line with shocking ease once the neocon actors deployed the propaganda designed to hook into the appropriate psychological exploits.

Mind you, I've seen the same thing happen with people in the 'liberal' direction as well. If anything, some sign waving liberal people I've known have been hard to bear because they believe that they're official Intellectuals (tm) since they use the 'liberal' tag on themselves and that's all there is too it.

In my own estimation tho people who have been duped by neocon propaganda represent, for the moment, the bigger sociopolitical threat to any actual progress for human life, if only because of the specific kinds of damage that can be caused by the agenda of their tribal leaders.

 

[CHEEZMO™]

Root root root for the home team, if they don't win it's voter fraud!!

FTFY

 

[Baraka in the White House]

The split between political philosophies is about the same, the problem is that conservatives have been steadily tugging the political "center" of the country toward the right for the past few centuries and the last decade in particular.

If Reagan were alive today he'd be blasted as a big government moderate. Jesus would be a Muslin communist.

 

[Gray Man]

Sharing viewpoints on both sides is difficult :/

 

[DUFFMCWALIN]

Okay

One side is full of pansies and the other one is coco pebbles.

I can't think of a nicer way to describe each party. There are reasonable people on the right, but they seem to be few and far between. Their voices have been marginalized by some really angry people.

Okay

One side is coco pebbles and the other is pansies.

I can't think of a nicer way to describe each party. There are reasonable people on the left, but they seem to be few and far between. Their voices have been marginalized by some really angry people.[/QUOTE]


See how easy that is? Opinions people, opinions. There is nothing right with either party, they both attribute to this cancer we know as the American political system.

 

[Shiv47]

Funny you left out Presidential criticism from that whole period of 2000-2008.

Bush was criticized of course, in a variety of ways, but nothing like the Republican/Fox efforts against Democrats.

 

[Gaborn]

"Any reasonable person should find so-and-so abhorrent" is not a strong criticism.

I think he's just being tribalistic. It's another way of saying "you're either with me or you're an idiot if you disagree." On a policy matter I certainly agree with him the Republicans are deeply screwed up on issues like reproductive rights, foreign policy, etc, but in my case I'd say the same thing of the Dems on other issues (and in some cases the same issues). But I would never say that any Rep or Dem was not reasonable merely because they didn't agree with me.

 

[dcdobson]

It would be interesting to see where we'd be now if Rush Limbaugh hadn't succeeded so wildly in the early 90s; because from there we had the relentless dogging of Bill Clinton during his administration, which almost seems like a dry run for the dirty tactics of the Obama era. Fox News gave further voice to these people, demonizing the left as un-American and potential communists. All that noise from them and the Hannitys and Coulters and such has led to where we are now: a period where compromise with the other side, especially from the Republican point of view, is seen as weak and giving in to socialism/communism/un-Americanism. So we have radically polarized sides, with no real change in sight, so long as the prevalent form of dialogue is attack.

Today's political discourse is civil by historical standards. Read up on the Adams-Jefferson election of 1800.

http://www.examiner.com/article/rhetoric-of-our-fathers-the-election-of-1800

 

[CHEEZMO™]

Bush was criticized of course, in a variety of ways, but nothing like the Republican/Fox efforts against Democrats.

Incoming false equivalency.

 

[Silas Lang]

It's just a team sport. The Patriot Act was evil until Obama started extending it. The deficit didn't matter until the Democrat got elected.

OMG this drives me nuts. I can't stand the hypocrisy and inconsistency within both of our parties. Ugh, I can't comprehend it.

 

[Sirpopopop]

here ya go. enjoy:



http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/leftright_EU_1416.gif

That chart is wrong.

 

[Orayn]

I think he's just being tribalistic. It's another way of saying "you're either with me or you're an idiot if you disagree." On a policy matter I certainly agree with him the Republicans are deeply screwed up on issues like reproductive rights, foreign policy, etc, but in my case I'd say the same thing of the Dems on other issues (and in some cases the same issues). But I would never say that any Rep or Dem was not reasonable merely because they didn't agree with me.

It's more that I find the issues you mentioned (mostly social) pivotal and think there's still room for healthy debate on other topics. I don't agree with libertarian ideology most of the time, but my feelings towards them don't even come close to being hateful hateful. Republicans have simply based far too many of their talking points on stances over which there should be no controversey in the 21st century.

 

[Xdrive05]

Whatever the split is, the media isn't helping. They jizz out engineered "balance" to every story which is nothing more than two wrong, shitty opinions that happen to be opposed.

Journalism isn't dead, but it's life insurance has been fucking cancelled.

 

[Kosmo]

Incoming false equivalency.

That response is so hilarious, it doesn't even deserve a response.

 

[slit]

A simple analogy is to think of it as a giant football game. Nobody even cares about the issues anymore, they just want their side to win and the other side to lose.