Demonizing the word liberal

[Mathematician]

I was watching the Network News, as I do every day when there's nothing else on, when I found another loud-mouth on FOX News boiling over about some "liberal" (I'll give you a hint, his first name starts with a B and there's an apostrophe in his last). The guest he had on was in agreement with the term, and right afterwards declared himself a normal conservative...

Since when was calling someone a liberal, who is liberal, an insult? Is there some double-standard on network news about it being okay to call yourself a conservative, but not a liberal? I ask this because even shows like Olbermann barely touch on the word.

 

[Random]

I suppose that to a conservative "Liberal" equates to inconsistent, wilfully ambiguous and possibly anarchic. The term threatens.

 

[doppelganger]

It's been shorthand for the boogeyman to frightened "conservatives" for quite a while. It is an expression of the refusal to allow questioning of "traditional" ideas (like slavery and degredation of women) that lies at the heart of "conservative" fear and guilt.

Now watch what you say
Or they'll be calling you a radical
A liberal, oh
fanatical, criminal
Oh won't you sign up your name
We'd like to feel you're
Acceptable,
respectable, oh presentable, a vegetable

- Supertramp, "The Logical Song" from Breakfast of Champions (1980).

 

[FerventGodSeeker]

I was watching the Network News, as I do every day when there's nothing else on, when I found another loud-mouth on FOX News boiling over about some "liberal" (I'll give you a hint, his first name starts with a B and there's an apostrophe in his last). The guest he had on was in agreement with the term, and right afterwards declared himself a normal conservative...

Since when was calling someone a liberal, who is liberal, an insult? Is there some double-standard on network news about it being okay to call yourself a conservative, but not a liberal? I ask this because even shows like Olbermann barely touch on the word.

Wait a minute. If the guy is a liberal, and they called him a liberal, then what is the complaint? The "tone"?

 

[lilithu]

Since when was calling someone a liberal, who is liberal, an insult? Is there some double-standard on network news about it being okay to call yourself a conservative, but not a liberal? I ask this because even shows like Olbermann barely touch on the word.

Gene, are you just now noticing that the word has become an epithet? It's been going on for at least a couple of decades. Remember when George the 1st called Michael Dukakis a "card carrying member of the ACLU"? As if caring about civil liberties was somehow wrong? And that was way before 9/11. Haven't you noticed how Clinton and Gore and Kerry have all tried so hard to avoid that term? And the people who get stuck with the word liberal, like Dean, lose any hope of gaining the nomination. That's one of the things that ticks me off about the Left. We've let the Right dictate what is acceptable and what is not.

If anything, I think the word is making a comeback. I never abandoned it but it seems to me that there are more people willing to embrace the term again. Tho network news and especially FOX may be slow on the uptake.

Then again it may just be because I am surrounded by UUs.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

When you have been a Liberal as long as I have you are use to this ....
Of course we liberal think conservatives were born under a stone and were found to be with out morals or sympathy for any one.
To us Conservative is a very dirty word indeed.

 

[Flappycat]

Say nasty things about Republicans because, much as they deny it, the sheeple listen to it. I know it feels weird, but it's the nature of business.

Pathetically enough, moronic posturing actually works.

 

[Booko]

Since when was calling someone a liberal, who is liberal, an insult? Is there some double-standard on network news about it being okay to call yourself a conservative, but not a liberal? I ask this because even shows like Olbermann barely touch on the word.

There's a vast right-wing conspiracy to demonize the term "liberal" that's been going on since Reagan was President.

Well, I don't think it's all that "vast" really, but you could see the genesis in that time period, and the followers picked up and ran with it.

 

[Flappycat]

Conspiracy? Nah. The Republicans just decided they'd lost all hope of attracting people who were interested in hearing reason and just took to polishing off their mud-slinging skills.

 

[Booko]

Conspiracy? Nah. The Republicans just decided they'd lost all hope of attracting people who were interested in hearing reason and just took to polishing off their mud-slinging skills.

OK, so it was a conspiracy to sling mud. Picky picky!

 

[Sunstone]

Didn't Rush Limbaugh start the demonization of the word "liberal" 20 or 30 years ago? I was under the impression that it was him who began the slurs.

 

[Ciscokid]

I thought the term "liberal" got it's negative ring to it when liberal minded people starting thinking that poor unfortunate murderers and rapists needed to be put into therapy and "rehabilitated".

Or the liberal types that thought welfare was a great idea etc.

I don't think the word conservative goes w/o a stigma myself.

Thought a cartoon would cheer you yellow bellied liberals.

 

[Sunstone]

You're way too happy for a conservative, Cisco. Repent!

 

[Flappycat]

I thought the term "liberal" got it's negative ring to it when liberal minded people starting thinking that poor unfortunate murderers and rapists needed to be put into therapy and "rehabilitated".

It's true, though. Some violent crimes are the result of treatable psycho-social disorders, and capital punishment doesn't work.

Or the liberal types that thought welfare was a great idea etc.

It is. I generally consider it a good thing for nobody to really have to go hungry. What's your problem with it?

 

[Ciscokid]

You're way too happy for a conservative, Cisco. Repent!

Well my father is a born and bred Canadian. So I'm a half breed. : hamster :

 

[Gentoo]

I don't like it very much when someone brands me a title based on how I think, even if it's the truth, the only one to give me a title is me. I call myself a liberal, I also call myself an environmentalist (which, like the term liberal, has a very negative sting to it now, so I care about the planet and act to help it, how is that a bad thing...?) I get a little (read: very) worked up when I hear someone using either of these terms in a bad way. My thought: "Why to generalize you ::insert insult here::"

But then, I stop, and think. The people who are usually against these are the radical conservatives. These people belong to a political party. A POLITICAL PARTY. What good does it do me to start generalizing about them?

I heard my neighbor listening to a conversative talk radio show. I don't know exactly what station or who it was, but they said "Liberal agenda". Are they that paranoid to think that we liberals are secretly acting against them? I stop, and think, and answer yes, some of these people really are.

 

[Booko]

Didn't Rush Limbaugh start the demonization of the word "liberal" 20 or 30 years ago? I was under the impression that it was him who began the slurs.

That's why I made my tongue-in-cheek reference to Hillary Clinton's comment from years ago.

Because it was not an accident that "liberal" came to become an insulting term. There was a concerted effort on the part of several Republicans to make it so, largely through the up-and-coming conservative talk radio of the time.

It's been a PR effort on behalf of conservatives for years now. If you can control the meaning of language, you can change how people think without having to present any logical argument or any evidence.

There's nothing particularly unusual about Orwellian maneuvers like this. If it means anything at all, it's probably just that the Republican Party has been more politically astute for the past 30 years. Considering their political success, that would seem rather obvious, no?

 

[Flappycat]

Well, the Republicans aren't inhibited by morals. Unfortunately, this is an advantage.

 

[Booko]

Well, the Republicans aren't inhibited by morals. Unfortunately, this is an advantage.

Actually, the ones I'm best acquainted with are.

But then, I've observed that Republicans on the local scene where I'm from don't seem to have a lot in common with the shenanigans of the national level organizations beside the name.

I don't think that one's political orientation has much to do with being or not being moral.

One's attachment to power is the thing that counts. Those that will do anything to win an election are the most dangerous, regardless of political views. And those are exactly the people who should not be allowed to have any power at all. But alas, people do get bamboozled by the PR and vote for them anyway.

 

[Ciscokid]

It's true, though. Some violent crimes are the result of treatable psycho-social disorders, and capital punishment doesn't work.

I'd like to see a repeat offender after capital punishment has been dished out. Now let's see if we can see the same results after 12 step programs.

It is. I generally consider it a good thing for nobody to really have to go hungry. What's your problem with it?

I don't have a problem with food stamps. I do have a problem with able bodied people getting cheap housing and a check just cause they had a few kids and they didn't want to bother learning any trade.

I work in a city that is not in the best of shape. I drive by a government housing community every single day and I'm never ceased to be amazed at the kind of cars these people drive. I swear on my mothers grave the one house has a fairly new white Dodge Durango with 22" rims parked out front.

Welfare should be abolished, it is NOT helping anyone, just giving people excuses to sponge off the government.