why is liberal used as if it is a dirty word?

Question

Liberalism is a wonderful concept, why do right wing fascist moronic bible thumpers use it as a term of abuse?

Answer 1

John Dean's new book discusses this subject. From a recent interview with Dean:

JD: "I ran into a massive study that had really been going on for 50 years now, by academics. They‘ve never really shared this with the general public. It‘s a remarkable analysis of the authoritarian personality, both those who are inclined to follow leaders, and those who jump in front and want to be the leaders.

"It was not the 'opinion' of social scientists, it was information they drew by questioning large numbers of people, hundreds of thousands of people in anonymous testing, where they conceded their innermost feelings and reactions to things.

"And it turned out most of these that came out of the testing were people who had been prequalified to be conservatives, and then they found that this, indeed, fit with the authoritarian personality.

"They found maybe 1 percent of the left, who follow authoritarianism, probably the far left. But as far as widespread testing, it is just overwhelmingly our conservative orientation.

"From best we can tell, the followers (a few of them) will change their ways when they realize what they‘re doing - they're not even aware of their behavior. The leaders, those who were inclined to dominate, are not going to change a second. They‘re going to be what they are.

"The reason I wrote about this is I think we need to understand it. We realize, when you take a certain step and vote a certain way and head in a certain direction, where this can end up. So it‘s sort of a cautionary note. It‘s a warning as to where this can go, because other countries have gone there.

"It is one of the things that, believe it or not, still holds conservatism together, because there are many factions and conservatisms, and their dislike or hatred of those they portray as liberal, who will be anybody who basically disagrees with them, is one of the cohesive factors. There are a few others, but that‘s certainly one of the basics.

"There‘s no question that particularly the followers -- they‘re very aggressive in their effort to pursue and help their authority figure out, or their authority beliefs out.

"They will do whatever needs to be done, in many regards.

"They will blindly follow. They stay loyal too long.

"And this is the frightening part of it.

"What I‘m saying is that there has been fear-mongering, the likes of which we have not seen in a long time in this country. It happened early in the cold war. We got accustomed to it, we learned to live with it, we learned to understand what it was about and get in proportion. We haven‘t done that yet with terrorism.

"And this administration is really capitalizing on it and using it for its political advantage.

"No question, the academic testing shows, the empirical evidence shows, that when people are frightened, they tend to go to these authority figures, they tend to become more conservative. So it‘s paid off for them politically to do this."

In other words, extremist conservatives are frightened sheep who follow authoritarian leaders. Sieg heil, anyone?

Answer 2

I am proud to be liberal, I find no shame in being accused of liberalism.I am a person concerned for other people,the environment,the world. I help anyone and every one I can. I am educated in whats wrong with our nation and working to solve the problems.Call me anything you like . I am doing what my mind,heart and condition's tells me is right . I shall continue to do so.Without fear from the bible thumpers or the war mongers and with great pride in my liberal thinking.

Answer 3

It is part of a plan. First thing that evil does is to try to make good look like evil. Carl Rove has done just that, he is using liberal like it is an evil concept, but for anybody to actually listen to that nutcase and the other evil pundits out there (Limbaugh, Coulter, O'Rielly, Hannity, Scarbourough etc...) takes the cake. The best thing to do is to be liberal and proud, whenever a fool trys to paint you otherwise defend your stand with facts. Facts are the one thing that the other side has nothing to do with, facts confuse them, they have no understanding of what the truth is, unless it agrees with their rhetoric.

Answer 4

Because they are great at spin and have tried to turn it into a dirty word. They have done a good job too! Even liberals don't like calling themselves liberals now.

Answer 5

Dirt is not even considered dirty as long as it stays on the ground. The liberals have made a good descriptive word ugly.

Answer 6

Liberalism is a horrible concept that results in socialism and a nanny state. Fortunately, I consider conservatism to be just as profane, so nobody has to feel left out.

Answer 7

To a right wing conservative "Liberal" means spending money on programs which are not "profitable" in the capitalist sense. It's all about the money and where conservatives feel it should be spent.

Answer 8

What a wonderful hateful attitude from a left wing LIBERAL.

Answer 9

I am not a Christian, but I consider liberal economic concepts socialist, and social concepts misguided.
But I'm not conservative either, it's probably good to be neutral.

Answer 10

right wing fascist moronic bible thumpers suck that is why