OK, but that’s not what the word liberal actually means to most people in my experience. Or perhaps another way of saying it is that a lot of people I see getting angry on Lemmy read the word “liberal” and assume economically liberal, whereas every person I’ve ever encountered IRL would use it to mean socially liberal.
Comment on Funny, those guys don't usually agree on that much
Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one 7 months agoLook rather than dunk on you, I’m going to recommend Mike Duncan’s Revolutions podcast, because it gives a fair overview of what the liberal revolutions were about, why socialism grew out of that moment, and how there came to be this irreconciliable beef between liberalism and socialism. The whole thing is great, but 1848 is the real crisis point if all you care about is the schism.
FozzyOsbourne@lemm.ee 7 months ago
ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
In the US political media ‘Liberal’ is deliberately used to reference the policies of the Democratic Party, which is demonstrably Neoliberal. This confusion is working as intended.
Thanks Rush Limbaugh and all the hellspawn you’ve enabled.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 7 months ago
This confusion is working as intended.
And is exploited by tankies/fascists. By making “liberal” an insult from both the right and the left, using different definitions, they solidify in the mind if low information voters that Democrats are bad. Republicans, by being left out of this insulting, sound better by comparison.
ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
It doesn’t even need to be an insult. It was and is an inherently anti-left strategy to correlate ‘Liberal’ to the Democratic Party and it is exactly what American political media does. (Hence my reference to Rush Limbaugh.) The goal is to inject confusion into the terminology to the point where your average low information voter/liberal can’t differentiate between the left and the right: or a tankie and a fascist.
Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one 7 months ago
With respect, if you describe yourself as liberal, vote for an economically liberal party, and refuse even to accept economic policy as part of the question, I think the “authoritarian leftists” have your number tbh
dudinax@programming.dev 7 months ago
The very idea that a liberal can’t be socialist and a socialist can’t be liberal is nonsensical. They are orthogonal concepts.
The division between liberals and socialists is plainly promoted in order to divide people.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml 7 months ago
Liberalism supports Capitalism, Socialism supports Socialism. They are incompatible.
dudinax@programming.dev 7 months ago
That’s ridiculous. Some of the liberal socialist societies have been and still are the best to live in.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 7 months ago
That’s because the socially liberal definition is almost exclusively American, and lemmy has a large number of EXTREMELY Eurocentric users. Almost like a weird mirror world of the typical “everything is assumed to be American until proved otherwise” in most social media.
According to lemmy, there’s the American definition, and then there’s the correct definition. And they’re not being tongue in cheek about it, they’re serious.
satansbartender@lemmy.world 7 months ago
First time I’ve heard of that podcast and it sounds interesting. Is there a season that touches on it more than others or is it just an overarching theme throughout the different seasons and revolutions covered?
gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I’m going to echo everyone else recommending this podcast, it’s absolutely incredible non-fiction story telling and it will really deepen your understanding of how we all got to this point in history.
To answer your question, I actually think season 8 (all about the French Commune in 1871 and how external pressures can end up causing liberals and socialists to go to war with each other) is the best one for explaining it, but it will be really confusing if you don’t listen to season 7 first (which is all about 1848, when France revolted against a liberal monarchy and most of western Europe went “hey, we should do that too, but differently”), which will be really confusing if you don’t listen to season 6 first (all about France 1830, when the people who would be overthrown in 1848 came to power) and all its supplemental episodes (all about different western European leaders who would see rebellions in 1848).
Season 3 (all about the French revolution everyone knows about in the 1790s) will help understand a few things going on in 6 and 7, and is also worth listening to just to understand why and how liberalism got going, but I don’t think it’s strictly necessary to get seasons 6-8, and 3 is ridiculously long season because the French revolution is just an insane series of back and forth plot twists that doesn’t let up.
That all said, if you’re prepared for something ridiculously long, the final season (all about the Russian revolutions, 1905 and 1917) is an incredibly informative and interesting listen too, and kind of completes the series (this is extremely reductive, but season 1-3 are sort of the “liberalism was a big improvement over what came before it” seasons, 6-8 are sort of the “but liberalism had its problems, which socialism tried to answer” seasons, and 10 is the “but socialism has its problems too” season).
Lastly, it doesn’t really touch on the liberalism vs socialism thing, but season 4 (a history of the Haitian revolution that highlights how incredibly destructive racism and colonialism are) is probably the one season I would make everyone in the world listen to if I could.
Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one 7 months ago
Yeah agreed, Haiti really opens your eyes to how race and class intersect imo — and the potted history at the end to bring us up to the present is absolutely heartbreaking.
gastationsushi@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I highly recommend this podcast. He does a great job of differentiating what the different authors say and what are his own opinions. And he adds corrections to the episode when listeners point out his mistakes. The French, Haitian, 1848, and Russian revolutions really changed how I see the world. Be warned, they can hit dozens of episodes each.
The American and English civil war are OK, not Duncan’s fault, it’s just the non Anglo revolutions were better material IMO.
Atin@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I recommend Revolutions too. Mike Duncan is an awesome researcher and writer.
daltotron@lemmy.world 7 months ago
added, should I begin at the beginning or are there recommended episodes I should listen to first over others?
Anamana@feddit.de 7 months ago
Pff… you’re way too nice to not be a liberal
Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one 7 months ago
There’s a difference between ideology and affect. I’m sure plenty of Nazis are “nice”
Ragdoll_X@lemmy.world 7 months ago
For a more succinct answer:
Image
It’s obviously tongue-in-cheek, but it gets the point across lol
Glytch@lemmy.world 7 months ago
A liberal believes capitalism is broken and needs to be fixed.
A socialist believes capitalism is working as intended and needs to be destroyed.
db2@lemmy.world 7 months ago
What’s someone who believes capitalism is broken and needs to be destroyed?
grue@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Confused.
mhague@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Someone who doesn’t have conspiracy-brain. The people that say capitalism is working as intended seem to live by the inverse razor of “never attribute to collective stupidity of the implementors what can be attributed to deliberate malice by illuminati-like mechanisms.”
sukhmel@programming.dev 7 months ago
Anarchist, maybe?
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Zoomer
Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one 7 months ago
Liberals are, to quote Phil Ochs: “ten degrees to the left of center in the good times, ten degrees to the right of center when it affects them personally”