I am not a liberal, not a conservative, not a believer in gradual progress, not a monk. I should like to be a free artist and nothing more.
— Anton Chekhov
Western words
I do not like the labels — Liberal, Conservative, Progressive, and other meaningless political titles. I decided long ago to avoid this linguistic swamp.
I know where I stand on certain issues today, at a particular moment, and that is what matters most. I have no idea what the status politically is of my stance. And I also sense that those labels create more confusion and that is the whole point.
Like when the levees in Louisiana gave way and the city of New Orleans flooded, few people were small government libertarians. There were some zombie conservatives still voting against funding the rescue and recovery mission but they were outliers and were mostly dismissed as ideological, heartless idiots.
Then there is the whole notion of what is a liberal or liberalism. The Libertarian economist, and author of The Road To Serfdom, Frederich Hayek always called himself a “classical liberal.”
Hayek meant that the government should let the market dictate the functions and needs of society. He was worrisome about a society planned by the state due to his experience in Europe with the rise of an authoritarian socialist regime in Nazi Germany.
But today, Hayek is considered an economic conservative even though he also believed in a welfare state and a safety net. The most famous conservative economist of all, Milton Friedman, actually was the recipient of aggressive government intervention during the Great Depression.
Friedman’s family received relief and he was provided with a government job as the world economy collapsed. Friedman admitted years later it was very necessary. But, he still became the economic prophet of the anti-government era and ideology.
Ayn Rand, the favorite of conservatives, died on welfare.
I guess you get the point now.
The language of politics
Today, if you state you believe climate change is real and something very aggressive should be done about it to bring about change, you are called a radical. Imagine then for a second that wanting air that is not polluted and an atmosphere that is not overheating and is conducive to human life on earth is radical.
Wanting to live is radical? That’s all we want to do until we are dead.
In April 2020, a Rolling Stone Magazine story referred to climate activists as “eco-radicals.” Most publications refer to those who take the view that a cleaner world and environment is a good thing are radicals. I don’t get it.
If anything, theirs is a conservative position. Conservative, as in wanting to preserve certain values that are best for society. Clean Earth, with clean air and water that is livable and sustainable, is worth preservation.
The radical position is the position of today’s corporate extraction capitalists, fossil fuel companies, and the other investment outlets that continue to support an economy rooted in profit and death. That is radical.
Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations agrees, as you can see in a recent tweet:
This is why these labels being tossed around are useless to me and meaningless. Even in the debate over the reproductive choices of women, the people who want to police women’s bodies and their very personal and private decisions call themselves — pro-life. They regularly ignore the life of the woman right in front of them.
Anyone suggesting that some of the problems in society right now have to and should be addressed by the federal government is called “far-left” or “Marxist.” It is mostly perpetuated by the mainstream news outlets (I also reject mainstream news outlets but I don’t have another term to offer).
But here is one backward conservative voice reciting the party line:
The liberal people are the violent people in this country. The Democrat Party are the violent people.
Messages and Messengers
This does not say much. It is diversionary nonsense, the highest level of divisive, ridiculous message killing. Kill the messenger to kill the message. Call liberals, who aren’t radical at all, “Communists,” and nothing they say will be taken seriously. It is stated for effect, not for truth.
This is how people who support programs from FDR’s New Deal are dismissed as radicals. Yet, to support the New Deal is about as conservative as you get. There is nothing radical about those basic safety net programs of the New Deal. These are the foundation of civic society. Somehow, through semantics, we have lost track of this. No one is really any of these labels. It probably just keeps their associations and friendships intact.
In the end, I think most of these labels are a waste. I refuse to accept any of these labels. I will continue to ignore labels. I do believe in the concept of civic society at a micro and macro level. We are individuals and a collective.
We all, at various times, despite what we believe, embrace both. We have to. Otherwise, we are the Tower of Babel in the Bible. But, judging by the fierce name-calling and political labeling that is the sum of much of our discourse these days, if we somehow became the chaos of the Tower of Babel, that would be some progress.
In the meantime, here are some links to check out that are part of this discussion:
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Previously Published on Medium
