Growing up in Oklahoma I heard the term “bleeding heart liberal” as an insult. Caring for other people is a detriment to the conservative life style apparently.
Liberals didn’t do this, it was the working class organizing and banding together that forced their hand. Liberals opposed these measures until they were forced to implement them.
From the suffragettes, civil rights movement, abolitionists, Black Panther Party, trade unions, communists, socialists, and regular working people together, these measures were forced. Social Security was a reaction to revolutionary potential, fearing the working class would overthrow the capitalists like they did in Russia in creating the Soviet Union and implemented sweeping safety nets.
Liberals are not on the left, and trying to take credit for the measures they had to be forced into implementing is peak liberalism.
Please stop trying to split up the left. We need to come together more than ever to defeat fascism.
liberals have far more in common with the fascists they donate to than with the leftists who fought for and won all the things listed in that godawful picture you decided to share here
“The white conservatives aren’t friends of the Negro either, but they at least don’t try to hide it. They are like wolves; they show their teeth in a snarl that keeps the Negro always aware of where he stands with them. But the white liberals are foxes, who also show their teeth to the Negro but pretend that they are smiling. The white liberals are more dangerous than the conservatives; they lure the Negro, and as the Negro runs from the growling wolf, he flees into the open jaws of the “smiling” fox.” - Malcom X
“I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block is not the White Citizen’s Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice” - MLK Jr
Liberals aren’t left. They stab leftists in the back every chance they get. Someone who will stab you in the back at their first opportunity makes a bad ally.
And they fall back to “you’re the problem for dividing the left” when someone validly criticizes them or points out they’re not the left.
Liberals aren’t left, they support capitalism. The left begins at socialism, liberals cannot meaningfully fight fascism because the origin of fascism is capitalist decay.
So it’s fair to say that the Democrats won’t sue to keep other leftist parties off the ballot? They’ll back leftist candidates even when it’s not their “chosen” candidate? They’ll actually oppose fascism rather than continue to pave the way for the facists? That they won’t keep pushing more funding to facist policies and systems, and will actually dismantle the facists’ tools?
Because I continuously see them do the opposite of those things.
Haven’t you heard? Shitting on liberals and not voting is all you need to do to defeat fascism. It’s literally the most important thing.
It’s too bad the Weimar Republic didn’t think of that. I feel like if only the German Communists had been spending all their energy shitting on the center, they might have had a pretty good chance of stopping Hitler from coming to power. Well, at least now we have the chance to try again, with the benefit of hindsight, and make sure we do that known successful strategy…
The KPD was being murdered by the Nazis with the aid of the SPD. The KPD was correct, liberals will side with fascists over leftists when push comes to shove.
I feel like we had this conversation before at some point lol… I will summarize my point of view on it and then probably dip from it:
- KPD in 1917: We’re going to seize all the guns and overthrow you and make Communism because Communism
- German government + German people and unions + SPD: Fuck no you’re not (gunfire)
- KPD in 1918: Wooooooowwwwwwwwww okay fuck you, I see how it is
- Germany: Hey KPD you still can have a seat in government, you have to get the votes though, no shooting your opposition, no seizing
- KPD: Woooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
- SPD in 1932: Hey we’re going to make an alliance with you because this guy is dangerous, we don’t care about the whole “trying to overthrow thing” that happened a generation ago
- KPD: Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
- Hitler: (wins)
And then much later:
- KPD (ones still alive): Hey we’re going to need all the trade unions to do what we want instead of what the workers want, because that’s leftism
- Germany: Lol fuck OFF
That is my summary. I realize you may have a different one but I don’t think I really want to get in an extended argument about it today. But yes, Germany in the 30s is a relevant example on this topic, I absolutely think.
(Oh, also, the KPD was being murdered by the Nazis with the aid of Stalin. The KPD was coordinating with Stalin, and he was selling them out because of course he was. I have absolutely no idea where you got this idea that the SPD was involved in what Hitler was doing to his opposition.)
No, this is ridiculous. The KPD correctly warned of the rising threat of fascism, and correctly pointed out the need for revolution. The SPD pushed for Hindenburg, got him elected over Thallman, then Hindenburg gave the seat to Hitler. The SPD murdered KPD members, such as in the “bloody may” incident. Stalin did not “sell out” KPD members and work with Hitler, the negotiations to get Thallman out of prison fell through.
https://www.wsws.org/en/special/library/foundations-ger/10.html
73 - The KPD had been established as a response to the betrayal of social democracy. But it proved just as unable as the SPD to weld together the working class and lead it into a struggle against the Nazis. A ten-year campaign against “Trotskyism” had politically corroded the party and transformed its leadership into a willing tool of Stalin. It repeated all the opportunist and ultra-left errors, against which Lenin and Trotsky had fought ten years before, and hid its paralysis and fatalism behind radical phrase-mongering. Until 1933, Trotsky tried relentlessly to correct the wrong course of the KPD. His writings on Germany from these years, which fill two thick volumes, prove his genius as a Marxist and political leader. Banished to a remote Turkish island, forced to rely on newspapers and reports from political friends, Trotsky demonstrated an understanding of German events and their internal dynamics that remains unparalleled to this day. He foresaw the events clearly and precisely and developed a convincing alternative to the devastating course of the KPD. The KPD responded not with arguments, but with slanders, violence and the entire weight of the Moscow apparatus.
74 - At the heart of the policy of the KPD was the thesis of social fascism. From the fact that both fascism and bourgeois democracy were forms of capitalist rule, the Comintern drew the conclusion that there was no contradiction between them, not even a relative one. Fascism and social democracy were the same―in the words of Stalin: “not antipodes, but twins”―the social democrats therefore were “social fascists”. The KPD rejected any collaboration with the SPD against the rightwing danger and, in some cases, even went so far as to make common cause with the Nazis―for example, when it supported the referendum initiated by the Nazis in 1931 to bring down the SPD-led Prussian state government. Occasionally it called for “a united front from below”. But this was not an offer to collaborate, but an ultimatum to the SPD members to break with their party.
75 - Trotsky decisively opposed this form of vulgar radicalism. He recalled that Marx and Engels had protested fiercely when Lassalle had called feudal counterrevolution and the liberal bourgeoisie “one reactionary mass”. Now Stalin and the KPD were repeating the same error. “It is absolutely correct to place on the Social Democrats the responsibility for the emergency legislation of Brüning as well as for the impending danger of fascist savagery. It is absolute balderdash to identify Social Democracy with fascism”, he wrote. “The Social Democracy, which is today the chief representative of the parliamentary-bourgeois regime, derives its support from the workers. Fascism is supported by the petty bourgeoisie. The Social Democracy without the mass organizations of the workers can have no influence. Fascism cannot entrench itself in power without annihilating the workers’ organizations. Parliament is the main arena of the Social Democracy. The system of fascism is based upon the destruction of parliamentarianism. For the monopolistic bourgeoisie, the parliamentary and fascist regimes represent only different vehicles of dominion; it has recourse to one or the other, depending upon the historical conditions. But for both the Social Democracy and fascism, the choice of one or the other vehicle has an independent significance; more than that, for them it is a question of political life or death.”[3]
76 - Trotsky fought untiringly for a policy of the united front. This would have made it possible for the KPD to use the contradiction between social democracy and fascism to unite the working class, win the confidence of the social democratic workers and expose the social democratic leaders. In an article written at the end of 1931, entitled “For a Workers’ United Front Against Fascism”, he explained: “Today the Social Democracy as a whole, with all its internal antagonisms, is forced into sharp conflict with the fascists. It is our task to take advantage of this conflict and not to unite the antagonists against us.” One must “show by deeds a complete readiness to make a bloc with the Social Democrats against the fascists” and “understand how to tear the workers away from their leaders in reality. But reality today is―the struggle against fascism.” It was necessary to “help the Social Democratic workers in action―in this new and extraordinary situation―to test the value of their organizations and leaders at this time, when it is a matter of life and death for the working class.”[4]
77 - The refusal of the KPD to accept such a policy led to the German catastrophe.
I won’t say I agree with 100% of the analysis on that page but a lot of that last part of analysis seems completely spot-on to me. And, of course, how Trotsky predicted is exactly how it played out.
Trotsky was a wrecker through and through in his later years. Any claims of wanting “unity” are laughable when contrasted with his own anti-unity wrecker behavior within the soviet union. Trotksy himself was no “Marxist genius,” he believed the proletariat should attack the peasantry and hoped the developed countries would rebel and save the Russian proletariat from backlash. Social Democracy had sided with the fascists against the communists, and insodoing ruined Germany.
What Trotksy wanted happened: The SPD got what they wanted, and Hindenburg gave the seat to Hitler. Trotksy was wrong, just like the SPD was.
Not really, dude. Civil rights absolutely, social security, kind of, the activists didn’t create the idea but they gave muscle to the labor movement to the point that FDR got elected in the first place and had the momentum so sure, clean air act and clean water act, you must be joking, those were just liberal government things. The things from the “clean air act” end of the spectrum are actually really good examples of why having a functioning government is a good thing even if it means “electoralism,” meaning it can’t all just be people in the streets fighting. You need both sides of the equation: The vigor and blood to push things forward, and then the paper and system to lock it in. Without either side of that, it doesn’t work.
More to the point, stop shitting on people who did good things. If you live in America, you benefit from all of the things on that list. Look for enemies elsewhere. This is the left’s favorite thing, to turn its guns exclusively on its own side, and it’s super good at it.
FDR only implemented the New Deal because social strife was intense, and the soviet union was showing an alternative. Environmental protections were only passed because the working class struggled for them, especially indigenous peoples. Policy that benefits the working class does not get handed down from benign rulers, but is something forced out of their hands.
Liberals are not on the side of leftists. Historically, for these measures, liberals have often opposed them, such as the civil rights movement. Liberalism itself has consistently been wielded in the name of countless atrocities and social injustice since its inception.
Policy that benefits the working class does not get handed down from benign rulers, but is something forced out of their hands.
Absolutely completely correct.
Historically, for these measures, liberals have often opposed them, such as the civil rights movement.
Also correct.
I still feel like someone throwing firebombs at FDR (along the lines of vandalizing AOC’s office because she’s “pro-genocide” if you ignore all the anti genocide she does), because he’s a “liberal” and therefore an enemy and the labor movement were the ones that did all the progress, would be making an error. That is what I am saying.
Not a single person here is advocating for adventurist terrorism, though. When leftists state that liberals are not our allies, the answer isn’t to kill them, but to bring the liberal working class into our ranks through organizing and educating. The liberals who side with capitalism, try to persuade the working class into accepting concessions, rather than revolutionary change and social liberation, who try to box us into the narrow frames of electoralism in a system set up by capitalists, are ideologically the enemy of the working class.
Sure.
I still feel like someone throwing criticism at FDR (along the lines of vandalizing AOC’s office because she’s “pro-genocide” if you ignore all the anti genocide she does), because he’s a “liberal” and therefore an enemy and the labor movement were the ones that did all the progress, would be making an error. That is what I am saying.
FDR was also responsible for expanding the US Empire, putting millitary bases in Antigua, Jamaica, Guyana, and more on 99 year loans from the UK. AOC has caped for Israel and the DNC. These are not enemies because of a label, but because of their actions. In their natural state, without being forced by the working class, they will continue to serve the interests of the US Empire.
AOC has caped for Israel and the DNC
Sure she has lol
Imagine thinking liberals are left wing or didn’t resist all the social advancements you mentioned right alongside the cons.
Yeah I think the wording needs work. Both Democrats and Republicans wanted segregation to continue, it was only after immense pressure domestically and internationally that Democrats changed their tune. The Soviets were pumping out “I thought y’all said all men are created equal in your founding documents” as part of the propaganda machine (which was a legitimate call out).
Its only after getting called out over and over again that these changes happened. That doesn’t mean the people who allowed that progress to happen deserve no credit but I would give primary credit for woman’s suffrage to women and the end of the American race based caste system known as segregation to African Americans. With some of them being liberals themselves and others being supporters who believed in a message of universal humanity.
Where is the meme?
Lol “left unite” no thanks bro, I won’t be working with social fascists.
Hey all you haters, the Americans redefining liberal to mean not liberal is really fucking annoying. Stop it!
There is a need to redefine the qord in the US. Liberals are just right winged politicians. Always have been. In the US they posed as “left”, but the US doesn’t have a left. You can only choose wether you get to use lube when they fuck you.
In europe the “liberals” are economically right and socially “not strongly defined”. They don’tcare about people. They only care about money and free markets. They are capitalists, but they are not nazis. In the Netherlands we’ve had a liberal regime for 20 years. They killed most social institutions by which they’ve paved the road for the rise of the far right, but they are not nazis.
In europe there is no need to redefine the word. We know exactly what it means and we know the stereotypes who vote for them, they are not nazis. They are capitalists.
