Well if you really want to go there you could argue that nobody currently is living under communism, just a transitional state at max.
But that doesn't matter to them.
I wish I could take people like that with me to our festival this weekend. Just to show them how many people around this world are invested in this communism thing, and how much they achieved by not being a little shit on X.
As an actual person living under actual capitalists, I declare that capitalism is shit. Since I am an actual person living here my opinion is now representative for the entirety of the US.
Can confirm, also live in the US. Anyone who wishes to differ may reply to this comment.
Since nobody has replied at the time of writing, we have sampled the entire US population (N = 335 million) and can confirm that 6 * 10^-7 % hate capitalism and the rest of the silent majority abstained for fear of imprisonment by the evil US dictatorship
Folk who still ascribe to Lil B's definition of 'based' is the only way I can understand that tbh
There is A Cool Dude in lemmy.ml comics community and he's cool with how he frequently make libs absolutely mad with his posts.
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Nevermind that every time former Soviet citizens are polled on it, they overwhelmingly agree that the fall of the Soviet Union was a bad thing and they want to return to communism.
You forget that everything good in China is because of capitalism, and everything bad is communist. If you ask people there anything and they respond positively, it is actually the miracle of capitalism!
Well you see, the capitalists kill anyone who doesn't complain about communism under communist governments
rest of the political world
"political" doing a lot of figurative lifting there lmao. The rest of the actual world has over a billion communists who know liberals are right wing. Then there's the non-comminists who know liberals are right wing (such as the libs who identify with the right).
Americans have zero understanding of anything outside our borders.
By strict definition, "left" means anti-capitalist and "right" is (pro)capitalist
Liberals believe in capitalism just with some guardrails. Emphasis on civil liberties and such. But heavier emphasis on the rights and validity of private property ownership (key to capital accumulation, after all)
To be "on the left" you absolutely have to reject that latter part. You don't believe in private property ownership for the purposes of enriching individuals/small groups of owners of property. You believe in more equal distributions of property whether it's shared worker ownership where everyone is "invested" in the company and there's less of an owner dynamic more of "guy who leads" but isn't a dictator. Co-operatives basically. Or you believe in more radical, even further anti-capitalist things like there is should be no ownership of private property at all by anyone even the workers. It all belongs to everyone and is held in common by a central power, a state government, that doesn't seek profits but only the production of commodities for survival and betterment of the citizens' lives.
Obviously there's room for muddying things because there's a lot of ideas on how to run shit, whatever, but ultimately any dipshit America (always Americans for some reason...) who goes on about "Kommunist Kamala" or "Chairman Joe" is dumber than rocks or just trying to score easy rhetorical points. FDR was the most anti-capitalist US president and he was still right wing. A liberal through and through. He was never going to seize entire industries, all of them, and put capitalists out on the street or make them work for a living.
These Nazis, because that's what they are let's just be honest, are so insanely far right that in their view anything, literally anything, that is done by the government is communism. Or rather, they want people to think they believe that. Basically libertarianism or "absolute minimum government regulations and controls on everything." They pretend to believe that, usually, yet support tons of government organizations or agencies. Just the anti-labor, anti-human rights ones like cops, US military, intelligence agencies, law enforcement generally, stricter judicial system with open discrimination against non-whites and non-US citizens, etc. All government powers, but somehow not communism when it benefits capitalists. The irony being this stuff also harms these hogs, but, they won't figure that out until it's far too late.
The truth that the commenter doesn't want to accept, but I point out whenever I can, is they are also a liberal. They're much further right wing, they would flip to fascist at a finger snap, but they're core beliefs are absolutely just liberal regarding the economy and how the government should interact with the private sector, etc. I just call "conservatives" and republicans "far right liberals" because 1) it's totally accurate and 2) it pisses them the fuck off. The truth hurts I guess. Maybe they'll go read some shit in their anger to "prove" me wrong and accidentally learn something. Doubtful, but who knows.
By strict definition, “left” means
By whose strict definition? Pretty sure "left and right" refer to seating arrangements in the 1789 French National Assembly and every other use since has been vibes.
The actual origin, in this case, is irrelevant. We all understand that, I think. Unless you're talking to someone who supports French monarchy, I dunno, maybe then it matters.
Anyway, removing American-centric politics from the discussion which defines "left" as anything that helps people and right as anything that harms... or pro-business as they'd prefer to define that. Both are extremely far right wing, pro-capitalist...
It's just the definition that has emerged over time. Again, ignoring the irrelevant jabbering of US and other western ally media bullshit, it's extremely clear that the US state and allies actually agrees with the generally understood definition. The republicans and such will call Harris a commie or whatever, but the US state loves someone like her in power elsewhere if she can hold the power. Typically it requires more militaristic, further right wing leaders unafraid to do horrible things. However, the moment someone who is "left wing" aka anti-capitalist/anti-imperialist comes along, well that's unacceptable obviously, and opposition mounts. Not because of their "woke" beliefs (or lack thereof) but always always always because of their anti-capitalist beliefs. Specifically the abolition of private property and land ownership being huge "no nos" to capitalists.
So it's a definition that has arisen due to reality. The further you are from supporting capitalism, supporting private property ownership and capital accumulation, the further left wing you are understood to be and the more the forces of capital will oppose your existence as a implicit threat to their own existence.
It's more than just vibes. It's backed up by the reality. I could also define it as "left wing means anti-US imperialism." The more left wing you are considered to be, the more you oppose the US due to imperialism (capitalism), thus you are an anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist.
Right wing is an alignment with capitalism and imperialism. Devotees and adherents to the US as it exists and has existed since the beginning but especially the last 100-150 years or so are absolutely pro-capitalist, pro-imperialist, opposed to the left wing (they say this themselves) communists or anti-imperialists.
That's how I see it anyway. My view isn't unique or special. Maybe the word strict wasn't the best, but, it's a comment made on my phone when I should be doing other things. I'm willing to insert the word "general" or "understood" or whatever in its place, but I maintain the original thoughts. Which was more of a rant/stating the obvious anyway.
Liberalism doesn't believe in guardrails for capitalism. That would be socialdemocracy or specifically social liberalism.
Liberals as a whole refer to uncontrolled economics, at most having some tax funded social policies.
Which is just more-left liberalism (to the socdems part). They still believe in capitalism.
I will concede, however, that perhaps my own bias slipped in because I consider socdems to be "the ideal liberal". But of course that's my own personal belief and doesn't define the entire spectrum.
I think the issue we often find is most people (in the first world anyway, voices I hear all the time) are liberals. They believe firmly in capitalism and most of them believe in some social safety nets- the dispute is how much and what type of nets. Never a dispute of support of capitalism though. Even amongst the people like Bernie or whatever
well...they think that there was a moment when america was "great" just because, and they think that they can recreate the conditions that made america great in their minds