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Meeting everyone's basic needs isn't even far left. This is how far the Overton window has shifted to the right. Meeting everyone's basic needs is left-of-centre. Far left would be state owned and controlled everything, redistribution of wealth via any means necessary, all public services fully state funded and free for all at the point of use.
Far left would be state owned and controlled everything, redistribution of wealth via any means necessary, all public services fully state funded and free for all at the point of use.
"Socialism is when the government does stuff, and communism is when the government does all the stuff. What is a mode of production?"
God I fucking hate how the capitalist authoritarian states of the last century managed to gaslight everyone into believing this shit.
It's from the USA perspective. People not dying of easily preventable diseases, or children not going hungry, are extreme left for them.
Many of us would disagree with that, but in aggregate we’ve just elected “burn this motherfucker down with us inside” instead of the alternative who was still way too far to the right for most of us here on Lemmy, so you are unfortunately correct.
If you proposed children not going hungry to some of my conservative relatives, even in a room of mixed company they would say out loud something like “why should I have to pay to feed the kids they can’t afford because they can’t close their legs or put down the crack pipe long enough to get a job?” (Racist dog whistle very much intentional)
Narrator: The left did not, in fact, get everyone's basic needs met.
Both Democrats and Republicans have been moving steadily to the right for the last 40 years. So Democrats are now where Republicans were in the 1980s: friends of banks, insurance and pharmaceutical companies. And the right has moved all the way into an insane asylum.
Whoever told you Democrats are leftists told you a big BIG lie. With some exceptions, like Bernie, and maybe AOC, most democrats are centrist, or even "economically right wing".
People not realising this is what's so baffling.
Narrator: The left did not, in fact, get everyone’s basic needs met because it hasn't been in power for nearly half a century. And incidentally, every time it was represented in government there were major strides in "getting everyone's needs met".
Don't believe me? Do a Google search for "most liberal/leftist US presidents", click any of these listicles and try to find the most recent leftist president. Notice how there isn't a single one more recent than 1969?
For most of you reading this, the last actual leftist government predates your parents' birth.
1969
For most of you [...] this predates your parents’ birth.
Why did you have to make me feel old
Centrism doesn't mean that you can't choose between democrats and republicans, it means that ideologically, you believe in a balance between capitalist ideas and socialist ideas. For example, you can believe in the Hayekian idea that the many interactions between individuals in the market is better at creating prosperity than a centralized government that distributes all goods and services. But you can also believe that the market can't do everything on its own due to market failures like monopoly power, externalities, assymmetric information. There exists a compromise between the two that is negotiated through politics. A core necessity for this to happen is that democracy is maintained. Democracy is not maintained when elections are bought by companies.
What is happening in the US now is that politics has been taken over by the private market. No economist would have agreed with this (unless they were paid to). It is against everything that we know. This is not a left vs right stance. It's a democracy vs autocracy stance. Autocracy can happen from both the right and left, and it doesn't matter who.
The one thing I dislike about the idea of centrism is the idea that you can't decide on everything because you remain agnostic about every issue. I think a much better idea to advocate for is pluralism: the idea that your opinion on specific issues is not dependent on your politcal stance. Every issue is unique and doesn't automatically identify you with left or right. You can have different opinions on different issues.
It’s funny because from my European perspective there’s no (visible) left in the USA. Democrats are centrist. Sanders could be social democrat. Otherwise I fully agree with you.
Lately I've caught myself thinking differently. The left is progressive because they want to progress civil rights. The centerists are conservative because they just don't want things to change. The right is regressive because they want to turn back the clock. Honestly I think we need to stop calling people on the right conservative and give them the new label regressives.
Ugh, market socialism exists.
Not all socialism has planned economies. That's communism. A specific subset of socialism.
Capitalism doesn't have a monopoly on market economies. badumtssh
If americans could read, they would be very upset.
Lol that's not the far left's position get the fuck out of here. The first paragraph is describing center/center-left.
Sadly in America meeting everyones basic needs is socialist and too close to Communism for our poor brain washed masses. Sadly the country culture is summarized in "fuck you i got mine" mentality and not community based.
Far left in America just means tax dollars going towards actually helping the people.
Then why anytime we try to do it here in America, we are called progressives, socialists, or communists?
Party A... We want to kill 1.000.000 people
Party B ... We want to kill 0 people.
Centrist.... Lets just kill 500.000 people.
Sometimes there IS no centrist position
Still waiting on that basic need.
Biden built entire wings onto for-profit hospitals during Covid, while ironically being against universal healthcare. Almost like his donors didn't want it or something.
Biden and the democrats are far left? Come on... As a European, that sounds absurd.
In the US political spectrum, democrats are center-left at most. Compared to European politics, they'd even be considered center-right or conservative on many issues.
Americans with their white or black bullshit
Dictatorships are dictatorships, regardless of the political ideology. Both sides did horrible things, like purging intellectuals and anyone seen as a potential threat, mass murder of entire social groups, maintaining informant networks to instil fear etc.
Dictatorships are dictatorships, regardless of the political ideology.
A dictatorship of the bourgeois is radically different from a dictatorship of the proletariat, both in form and in function.
Both sides did horrible things
Guys with their "Ask me about the War of Northern Aggression" baseball caps are constantly saying this
purging intellectuals and anyone seen as a potential threat, mass murder of entire social groups, maintaining informant networks to instil fear etc.
DSA: "We should open up the Medicare rolls to anyone who wants it and grant everyone in the country universal basic income through Social Security"
Libertarian: "This gives the government way too much power. If you can give someone health care or a basic income, you can control who gains access to very fundamental basic human needs. And that will lead to tyranny."
Also Libertarian: "I love the DHS. I love the DHS so much. Strong borders! Private prisons! Deportations without a court hearing! This is the network state I always dreamed of! Can't wait until Trump starts issuing EOs to form charter cities and America is just 1000 Singapores in a trench coat. Also, everything Javier Milei is doing in Argentina is fucking based. I love how MBS is running Saudi Arabia. And I can't wait to join the private mercenary army that reclaims Greenland from those weak-kneed namby pamby socialists in Denmark."