Comments on: Which way is progress?

By: sanbikinoraion

sanbikinoraion — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:34:24 +0000

The Americans have already tainted “liberal” to mean “left wing” for us. God damn repositioning.

By: thomas

thomas — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:24:46 +0000

I’ll match that: ‘libertarian’ is to most right-wingers the best way to decontaminate conservatism.

Question begged, though, does ‘liberal’ need decontaminating from all this right/left/centre nonsense, or indeed, can it, when absolution succeeds where damnation fails?

By: ad

ad — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 19:07:24 +0000

If I was a cynic I’d say that “progressive” is what modern left-wingers call themselves when they believe they need to decontaminate their brand.

By: Bighair

Bighair — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:08:25 +0000

Not sure if what you really wanted was yet another debate on what ‘progressive’ means, Dave, though by starting your blog with that question, that’s what your going to get. Seems the term has come into usage as a way of conflating ‘liberal’ and ‘left’, with a kind of implicit assumption that the two are natural bedfellows, except I’m not so sure that they are. I realise I’m going against what the entire premise of this blog site and also that this is well trodden ground, but hey, you did ask. Although I’m guilty of having used the term ‘progressive’ myself in the past, I agree with sanbikinoraion that the term is fundamentally very silly.

By: sanbikinoraion

sanbikinoraion — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:42:00 +0000

Progressive is a silly nonsense word that no serious person should be caught using. What is “progress”? Well, it depends on your political views, surely. No doubt there are plenty of Tories who would view the deportation of all foreigners immediatesly as progress. Does that make them progressive? Of course not.

My definition of progress certainly wouldn’t encompass any more “economic leftism” thanks.