A serious post about 'liberal' sterotypes ......

[Stinky The Clown]

In this response post to a larger discussion on another topic, the notion that the old labels may no longer be operative was mentioned.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2640658#2640689

And I agree with that.

The most glaring example is fiscal 'conservatism'. The general concept is that we need to live within our means. The RW has successfully staked out this territory for themselves, even in the face of three Republican presidents' running up obscene deficits and the one intervening Democratic president making serious progress on balanced budget governance.

What other stereotypes are associated with 'liberal' that are no longer operative .... and likely were never true?

[Ravenseye]

1. Party of Death

Even though we're against the iraq war and the death penalty and we're for universal health care for all, we're the party of death simply because we are pro choice (which can and does save lives from backroom abortions, as well as threats to the mothers health).

The Republican party is pro-war, anti-health care, pro-death penalty....they're the party of death.

[union_maid]

2. Elitism

To expand on my post in the other thread: Once, a number of years ago, I was talking to a relative of my husband's. She's a Democrat. The whole family is Irish Catholic, New York style Kennedy Democrats. But at the same time, she's not very political. She lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Prices for brownstones there were just starting to go up. It was just the very beginning of the housing bubble. She said, "I hope the liberals don't move in." At that point, to me, liberal and Democrat were synonyomous except for a few anomolies. She didn't really mean anything political, though. She meant Starbucks and boutiques replacing the shops they were used to and an intellectual, artsy culture both driving up the prices and devastating the old neighborhood feeling. Of course, in her mind she's right. That's what happened and liberals suck. It still doesn't equate to all Democrats in her mind, because Democrats are part of the city machine to her, but that's what she thinks about when she thinks of liberals.

[Stinky The Clown]

5. I can see someone taking that view

I understand what you're saying.

If I had to close my eyes and envision a 'liberal', I'd see the wild-eyed youth of the left. This is probably left over from my own 50s-60s youth. It is likely not even a stereotype as much as a nostalgic look back at what once was.

[orwell]

3. The terms are...

...meaningless distractions used by the ruling elites to divide and conquer. They have obviously been very effective.

The basis of the term liberal is the root liber, or free. Ask any of the people who rail against liberals or liberalism if they hate liberty. Most would look at you with a shocked look on their faces.

These are branding strategies for the purpose of marketing, nothing more. The universe is a complex set of interactions that must be reduced to simplicities to engender an emotional response in the target audience (usually fear) so that rationality can be overcome. That is the essence of marketing. It is also why we now find ourselves in such a fucked up situation.

Game, set, match....ruling class.

[Warpy]

4. Limousine liberals

Yeah, a few liberals have money, but most of us have had our class defined downward with everybody else.

We're lucky to be paid off car liberals.

Granola liberals. Well, sometimes we eat it as a snack, but once we got out of college and had kids, we started to eat Cheerios and cornflakes just like everybody else.

Latte liberals. Sorry folks, but the people I see lining up in overpriced chichi coffeee bars are all in power suits. That doesn't exactly say "liberal" to me.

Godless liberals. This one was never true since liberals are overwhelmingly Christian. Liberals have just read the words and try to live them, unlike their Calvinist brethren.

[union_maid]

6. It's the "leftwing" meme that's concerning now

It's the idea that anyone with ideas that benefit pretty much anyone except a very affluent demographic are far left. The idea that critics of this war are some kind of leftwing extreme when in fact they're the majority of the country now is pecular, too. The marginalization of ideas whose time has clearly come is annoying. To be totally fair, the idea of universal healthcare did once seem to be pretty far to the left but now it just seems like the only rational solution to a crisis. Most of the other positions that get called leftwing seem fairly moderate to me. I also wonder why we're calling fiscally conservative Democrats "moderates". Now, among liberal Democrats, "moderate" is a bad word and it shouldn't be. It should never have been allowed to take on a new meaning. If some Democrats want to be conservative, OK, but that's not moderate and it's not centrist. The whole free trade thing is very conservative. That's more than just words. That's an ongoing and very successful effort to push the center ever rigthward.

[bunkerbuster1]

7. Permissive Parenting

It's such a bullshit stereotype.

[MrPrax]

8. Paradigm breakdown...

Like language and alot of things are breaking down in a more obvious relationship of ruled and rulers.

The 'codes' tend to come from the Cold War and two party systems tend towards bipolarity on certain issues, while ignore others.

Political parties generally don't have the time or money (or role) to do anything else but use the same oppositional lense that is understandable to the biggest voter block; the baby boomers. They lived their entire lives under the mirage of the Cold War and much of their own hopes and failures are wrapped up in that old 'fear factory'. The temptation to keep the simple language of the Cold War alive for political and media uses is too great to simply jettison as those institutions would lose a great part of their audience and message.

[applegrove]

9. That regulations are bad on the whole. On the whole they step in where

markets fail. We were not put on this planet to be markets. We were put here to live in communities. Markets are good when they work - bad when they don't (ie access to market be it job market or capital investment in your community or the best example which is health care and how awful it works in the private sector because it doesn't then promote preventive medicine.. but promotes serious & long term illness - which is a market failure if ever there was one).

Markets work best with transparency as in a good basic public education for all. That is the story of the 17th, 18th and 19th century... where public education expanded.. markets bloomed. Which was good for 1) markets 2) jobs 3) people being able to buy beyond just the basics 4) banking & savings which allowed for loans and things like home-ownership and education based on future earnings.. 5) good strong government to regulate and perpetuate the new cycle of middle class based on reasonable taxes to spread the wealth and keep elites from destroying good government.