Whenever I watch a YouTube video made by an American conservative criticizing the social justice ideology or the Democrats (which often greatly overlap), almost invariably there will be conservatives in the comment section disparaging and demonizing "liberalism". In fact, there even is a particular conservative YouTuber whose main slogan and catchphrase is "liberalism is a disease, we are the cure". This author in particular tends to go into long rants against "liberals" and "liberalism", instead of talking about Democrats or "the left" (which would be more accurate), but he's by far not the only American conservative creator who talks about "liberalism" in such a manner.
I always shake my head at these videos, and the comment section of such videos.
American conservatives are liberals! In particular, they are classical liberals, to a tee.
I sometimes write a comment in these videos, or respond to other people's comments (who are disparaging liberalism) challenging them to go and look up the core tenets of classical liberalism, and tell me even one single thing that they disagree with. So far I have got no responses.
"Classical liberalism" is not just a colloquial expression meaning something like "liberalism that was prevalent some decades ago" (which some people mistakenly use it to mean). It is an actual term in sociopolitical terminology. It is a political ideology developed in the early 19th century as a response to the industrial revolution in the west, and can be contrasted with other similar political ideologies such as social liberalism (while there's a lot of overlap between these two brands of liberalism, there are also many differences).
These are some of the fundamental core tenets of classical liberalism:
In fact, classical liberalism opposed pure democracy in favor of republicanism (although this is largely just serendipitous naming, as "democracy" and "republicanism" does not mean the same thing as "the Democratic Party" and "the Republican Party" in this context. But it's still ironic and fitting.)
Is there a single thing in these core tenets that an American conservative Republican would oppose?
That fact is that, once again, American conservatives are classical liberals, to a tee. Classical liberalism is not what could nowadays be considered a left-wing position. Thus it's rather idiotic for them to disparage and attack liberalism so fervently.
I always shake my head at these videos, and the comment section of such videos.
American conservatives are liberals! In particular, they are classical liberals, to a tee.
I sometimes write a comment in these videos, or respond to other people's comments (who are disparaging liberalism) challenging them to go and look up the core tenets of classical liberalism, and tell me even one single thing that they disagree with. So far I have got no responses.
"Classical liberalism" is not just a colloquial expression meaning something like "liberalism that was prevalent some decades ago" (which some people mistakenly use it to mean). It is an actual term in sociopolitical terminology. It is a political ideology developed in the early 19th century as a response to the industrial revolution in the west, and can be contrasted with other similar political ideologies such as social liberalism (while there's a lot of overlap between these two brands of liberalism, there are also many differences).
These are some of the fundamental core tenets of classical liberalism:
- The rights of the individual should be protected. Individual rights should be preferred over group rights.
- The rights of corporations should be protected.
- Negative rights should be preferred over positive rights.
"Negative rights" in this context means rights that stop others (including the government) from doing something to the individual, while "positive rights" means rights that mandate others, such as the government, to do something to the individual.
Freedom of speech (which forbids the government from restricting speech), freedom of religion, freedom of the press, the right to life, the right to private property, and habeas corpus are examples of "negative rights".
Free healthcare, free education, social services and a minimum wage are examples of "positive rights". - The economy must be run by free-market capitalism with minimal government intervention and minimal taxation.
- Minimal government. The role of the government should be:
- Protect individual rights and provide services that cannot be provided in a free market.
- Maintaining a national defense system to protect against foreign invaders.
- Create laws to protect citizens from wrongs committed against them by other citizens.
- Building and maintaining public institutions.
- Creating and maintaining a stable currency, build and upkeep infrastructure, and offer communications and postal services.
In fact, classical liberalism opposed pure democracy in favor of republicanism (although this is largely just serendipitous naming, as "democracy" and "republicanism" does not mean the same thing as "the Democratic Party" and "the Republican Party" in this context. But it's still ironic and fitting.)
Is there a single thing in these core tenets that an American conservative Republican would oppose?
That fact is that, once again, American conservatives are classical liberals, to a tee. Classical liberalism is not what could nowadays be considered a left-wing position. Thus it's rather idiotic for them to disparage and attack liberalism so fervently.
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