I've never understood what people mean when they talk about left and right wing in politics. What's that all about?
Left is liberal. Right is conservative.
In the US, left is typically assigned to Democrats, right to Republicans.
More than anything I think it's just a way of classifying (dividing?) political ideals.
The naughty greedy guys have to sit on the right.
On the left we put the dreamers who'll never get nuttin and resent those that do.
This thread sounds like a channelling of Father Dougal McGuire.
Quote from: Abletony on July 27, 2011, 11:38:15 AM
I've never understood what people mean when they talk about left and right wing in politics. What's that all about?
I think you need to talk to us about something you know, or something you care about.
You found us, why can't you find answers to such basic things on google?
Quote from: The Magic Pudding on July 27, 2011, 03:44:49 PM
Quote from: Abletony on July 27, 2011, 11:38:15 AM
I've never understood what people mean when they talk about left and right wing in politics. What's that all about?
I think you need to talk to us about something you know, or something you care about.
You found us, why can't you find answers to such basic things on google?
Good point
TMP, I'll even Google it for you, (http://lmgtfy.com/?q=left+right+politics&l=1)
Abletony
According to Wikipedia, the left - ring thing dates back to the French Revolution.
Right Wing wants to keep the established order & hierarchy of Church & State.
Left Wing wants more secularity , a devolution of Church & State, a more progressive system.
I wouldn't count myself either left or right but I do object that Anglican Bishops get a seat in
the British House of Lords, the Upper House of the UK Parliament.
My objection is that they are unelected and therefore non representative of the country as a whole.
The House of Lords does play a part in the passage of new laws into our system therefore
there is clearly no separation of Church & State. >:(
It can get kind of complicated, but this is a pretty good scale
(https://www.happyatheistforum.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2F3%2F36%2FEuropean-political-spectrum.png%2F558px-European-political-spectrum.png&hash=916bf7562cf9f316c08392e9d88d6fc98fc00c20)
I stumbled across this a few years ago and thought it was quite enjoyable to read.
(https://www.happyatheistforum.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Finfobeautiful2.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fleftright_EU_1416.gif&hash=42d895933a3a9b7c418e0ed6d45b01aca79a44bd)
^^^
Crow, that is awesome. Thanks!
Very good Crow. I'm definitly on the left side of that picture.
Its by Information is Beautiful (http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/).
This is another favorite of mine by them Debtris (UK version) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqOJTwI3oVQ)
Uh, say what?
I'm all left. The further from conservative nutholes and the church, the better. Time to evolve.
Nice diagrahm, Crow.
right and left can mean different things.
It can indicate whether the emphasis is placed on the free market and the private sector (right) or the state and the public sector (left).
It can also refer to the more social, political scale of more governing authority (right) vs. less governing authority (left).
Those are two possible meanings. The two scales are separate though, if not exclusive, I think. If you take the 'right' end of the first, economic scale to it's extreme you end up with a pure 'market economy' - leave everything to private industry and dispatch with the whole notion of state control altogether, in a sort of kooky Ayn Rand sort of way - which would be necessarily anarchistic. Yet anarchy would be at the extreme left of the second scale. Anarchy is one of those things that no one can really agree on. I think of it as being essentially right wing, preferring the economic scale over the political one, but others disagree.
I think that in general use, though, they don't mean much at all. "So and so's a right wing %^&%$," "such and such a bleeding-heart leftie" etc. It's only noise.
By the way, @Crow, that chart was very interesting.