From the internet: What many of us believe. Including me.... “I'm a liberal, but that doesn't mean what a lot of you apparently think it does. Let's break it down, shall we? Because quite frankly, I'm getting a little tired of being told what I believe and what I stand for. Spoiler alert: not every liberal is the same, though the majority of liberals I know think along roughly these same lines: 1. I believe a country should take care of its weakest members. A country cannot call itself civilized when its children, disabled, sick, and elderly are neglected. PERIOD. 2. I believe healthcare is a right, not a privilege. Somehow that's interpreted as "I believe Obamacare is the end-all, be-all." This is not the case. I'm fully aware that the ACA has problems, that a national healthcare system would require everyone to chip in, and that it's impossible to create one that is devoid of flaws, but I have yet to hear an argument against it that makes "let people die because they can't afford healthcare" a better alternative. I believe healthcare should be far cheaper than it is, and that everyone should have access to it. And no, I'm not opposed to paying higher taxes in the name of making that happen. 3. I believe education should be affordable. It doesn't necessarily have to be free (though it works in other countries so I'm mystified as to why it can't work in the US), but at the end of the day, there is no excuse for students graduating college saddled with five- or six-figure debt. 4. I don't believe your money should be taken from you and given to people who don't want to work. I have literally never encountered anyone who believes this. Ever. I just have a massive moral problem with a society where a handful of people can possess the majority of the wealth while there are people literally starving to death, freezing to death, or dying because they can't afford to go to the doctor. Fair wages, lower housing costs, universal healthcare, affordable education, and the wealthy actually paying their share would go a long way toward alleviating this. Somehow believing that makes me a communist. 5. I don't throw around "I'm willing to pay higher taxes" lightly. If I'm suggesting something that involves paying more, well, it's because I'm fine with paying my share as long as it's actually going to something besides lining corporate pockets or bombing other countries while Americans die without healthcare. 6. I believe companies should be required to pay their employees a decent, livable wage. Somehow this is always interpreted as me wanting burger flippers to be able to afford a penthouse apartment and a Mercedes. What it actually means is that no one should have to work three full-time jobs just to keep their head above water. Restaurant servers should not have to rely on tips, multibillion-dollar companies should not have employees on food stamps, workers shouldn't have to work themselves into the ground just to barely make ends meet, and minimum wage should be enough for someone to work 40 hours and live. 7. I am not anti-Christian. I have no desire to stop Christians from being Christians, to close churches, to ban the Bible, to forbid prayer in school, etc. (BTW, prayer in school is NOT illegal; *compulsory* prayer in school is - and should be - illegal). All I ask is that Christians recognize *my* right to live according to *my* beliefs. When I get pissed off that a politician is trying to legislate Scripture into law, I'm not "offended by Christianity" -- I'm offended that you're trying to force me to live by your religion's rules. You know how you get really upset at the thought of Muslims imposing Sharia law on you? That's how I feel about Christians trying to impose biblical law on me. Be a Christian. Do your thing. Just don't force it on me or mine. 8. I don't believe LGBT people should have more rights than you. I just believe they should have the *same* rights as you. 9. I don't believe illegal immigrants should come to America and have the world at their feet, especially since THIS ISN'T WHAT THEY DO (spoiler: undocumented immigrants are ineligible for all those programs they're supposed to be abusing, and if they're "stealing" your job it's because your employer is hiring illegally). I believe there are far more humane ways to handle undocumented immigration than our current practices (i.e., detaining children, splitting up families, ending DACA, etc). 10. I don't believe the government should regulate everything, but since greed is such a driving force in our country, we NEED regulations to prevent cut corners, environmental destruction, tainted food/water, unsafe materials in consumable goods or medical equipment, etc. It's not that I want the government's hands in everything -- I just don't trust people trying to make money to ensure that their products/practices/etc. are actually SAFE. Is the government devoid of shadiness? Of course not. But with those regulations in place, consumers have recourse if they're harmed and companies are liable for medical bills, environmental cleanup, etc. Just kind of seems like common sense when the alternative to government regulation is letting companies bring their bottom line into the equation. 11. I believe our current administration is fascist. Not because I dislike them or because I can’t get over an election, but because I've spent too many years reading and learning about the Third Reich to miss the similarities. Not because any administration I dislike must be Nazis, but because things are actually mirroring authoritarian and fascist regimes of the past. 12. I believe the systemic racism and misogyny in our society is much worse than many people think, and desperately needs to be addressed. Which means those with privilege -- white, straight, male, economic, etc. -- need to start listening, even if you don't like what you're hearing, so we can start dismantling everything that's causing people to be marginalized. 13. I am not interested in coming after your blessed guns, nor is anyone serving in government. What I am interested in is the enforcement of present laws and enacting new, common sense gun regulations. Got another opinion? Put it on your page, not mine. 14. I believe in so-called political correctness. I prefer to think it’s social politeness. If I call you Chuck and you say you prefer to be called Charles I’ll call you Charles. It’s the polite thing to do. Not because everyone is a delicate snowflake, but because as Maya Angelou put it, when we know better, we do better. When someone tells you that a term or phrase is more accurate/less hurtful than the one you're using, you now know better. So why not do better? How does it hurt you to NOT hurt another person? 15. I believe in funding sustainable energy, including offering education to people currently working in coal or oil so they can change jobs. There are too many sustainable options available for us to continue with coal and oil. Sorry, billionaires. Maybe try investing in something else. 16. I believe that women should not be treated as a separate class of human. They should be paid the same as men who do the same work, should have the same rights as men and should be free from abuse. Why on earth shouldn’t they be? I think that about covers it. Bottom line is that I'm a liberal because I think we should take care of each other. That doesn't mean you should work 80 hours a week so your lazy neighbor can get all your money. It just means I don't believe there is any scenario in which preventable suffering is an acceptable outcome as long as money is saved.” Internet attributed to Ron Howard But I'm not sure But it's accurate to me Rocket River
I honestly don't believe the cost to taxes would be more than the cost of paying health insurance premiums.
It was pretty terrible. I was going to reply until I realized it was a copy and paste (in other words, its not the OP's original thought - needed someone else to tell him how to think). But basically, its a bunch of nonsense that promotes socialistic/party principles over country.
I don't necessarily agree with it 100% but I think it is a nice jumping off point for conversation Rocket River
Its very flawed logic. Bottom line, we live in one of the most capitalistic countries. There are plenty of countries out there that are more socialistic. Emigrate there. I am not advocating we needlessly run over everything in the name of capitalism. We need to protect the general well being of our people and workers and promote prosperity and equality. We should take care of our environment. However that doesn't mean we strangle ourselves in bureaucracy and social justice, which is exactly what has happened in the last couple decades under the Democrat vision. Technology is deflationary. Technology drives down the costs of goods and services across the entire spectrum. If we drive out the capitalist, innovation will weaken (just look at europe). You wouldn't have the massive farming equipment harvesting crops, which drives down the cost of food. Most medications would be 10x more or simply not exists. All because you think billionaires are hoarding their money in big vaults under their houses. Meanwhile, you sit in your nice little 3/2 house in a comfy safe neighborhood crying about how its just not enough because some rich guy can afford a billion dollar yacht.
Capitalism comes to a point were it is anti-innovation where companies buy tech and sit on it because it would hurt profits What will we do when the work of our civilization only requires 10% of the population Tech can and will be THAT GOOD at some point We simply allow the other 90% to starve out? Rocket River
Companys sitting on patents is not a reason to go full socialist. That is a completely different topic. Do you really believe that everyone born before us was stupid and we only now live in a glorious technological boom which has never happened before? There are multiple technological revolutions that have put large groups out of work. New innovations lead to new products, that require new workers and a different type of work. We dont stop innovating because we are afraid people will be put out of work. If we stopped innovating, most of us would be out in the fields trying to grow food so we literally didn't starve to death.
Buddy technology is cool. It advances society. The modern tech industry is not that. It's a industry of bubbled speculative gambling with salesmen trying to make your dishwasher have "AI" The streaming media industry is a very obvious example of how capital stagnates creativity. Publicly traded companies cannot take risks on 100 million dollar projects so they only reuse old IPs and make generic safe content. You see this in the tech industry also. Just look at the stagnation of smartphones. We are in the iPhone 16 or whatever. Companies have maximized their efficiencies to extract maximum wealth. Economy of scales have been maximized. These tech oligarchs are stuck and are trying to find a way to go to another level of wealth and power and the next step is literally control of nation states where the capital class becomes the governing state. Modern capital tech innovation centers around extracting data from humans to maximize value for shareholders. That's all the modern tech industry is. The tech industry is nothing more than ad agency. It now just makes money off of ad revenue and speculative gambling in the stock market. The tech industry has just turned into a data mining racket for ad revenue. That's it. That's all modern tech is in capitalism.
The innovations of the 21st century are not even technological they are financial / economic We invented new ways to make money without making anything GIG economy is a example of innovation - Ubers are taxi service without the guardrails or assuring you that the person is a trained professional. -- AirBNBs are hotels that may or may not be cleaned to a standard. (just examples but not to get too side tracked) corps buying up houses and land is an innovation - able to drive up cost that normal people cannot meet. they always been around but they have ramped up We are creating a society were the common man can be priced out of everything Most billionaires are about the levels of financial manuevering than actually innovating anything physically Amazon is walmart but in a new way Facebook is yahoo groups in a new way SpaceX is privatized Nasa - which means that those innovation don't necessarily come to the people I agree with alot of this Rocket River
Government does tend to get too big for it's own good and it leads to a lot of inefficiencies. It's a necessary component of our society, otherwise we'd private corporations doing whatever they wanted in the name of money, but I'll be damned if it gets in the way of things waaaay too much. Overregulation is bad, it's a waste of money, a waste of time, and sometimes it leads to common sense being thrown out the door because government employees are trained to operate off a checklist. Unfortunately, government doesn't pay enough, so in many careers, all the smart individuals are in companies that pay a **** load more for their talents and it leads to having less talented individuals in government that mean well, but just aren't suited to be making decisions.
It's a good litany of what makes a modern-day liberal. And I suppose most of them describe me as well. I find it amusing that our board's conservatives see that and somehow conclude that it is anti-capitalist and would wreck our economy.
It means you can always fall back on calling white people, who disagree with you, fascists and nazi’s. If a POC disagrees with you, you can just call them “misinformed”.
1. I believe that we should not punch down on anyone for any reason. It is not a Constitutional or G*d given right. 2. I believe in science and facts. 3. I believe that we as a society should have a social safety net for everyone ... not just white "christian" men. 4. I believe that a optional second year law class should not be taught to elementary school children. 5. I believe that history and all of its warts should be taught in K-12.
Most of that list in the op is stuff a country like Singapore follows. They peach multiculturalism and giving people a fair shake despite it's cutthroat hyper capitalism. Maybe not the aspects of LGBT and wealth redistribution to oppressed groups, but that's probably a different discussion between liberals and "woke" leftists.
If you copy and paste something without your original thoughts it can't be taken seriously. Just like the woke garbage
Please tell Os. This is no worse than -- and in fact not as bad as -- the deluge of tweets and op-ed pieces that Os and many other people litter the board with on the regular.
in my case it's mostly because there are very few people posting in this forum that are worth the time to respond to . . . much easier to simply pass things along to those who appreciate them. I do not believe everyone here considers what I post to be "litter."
