Is it possible to get more left wing as you get older ?

[Citizen66]

Well yes; but if you want me to list everything, we could be here all day. My list was not exclusive - hence the 'And others'.

Don't worry, I've got all day. Which things are your left wing views and which are your right wing ones?

 

[trevhagl]

i don't think i'm quite as extreme as i was in the 80's but still left wing by a mile compared to just about all around here

 

[Fedayn]

I'm markedly less 'liberal' than I was 10 years ago let alone 20.

 

[Citizen66]

i don't think i'm quite as extreme as i was in the 80's but still left wing by a mile compared to just about all around here

You think you're the furthest left on here?

I never had you down as a commie let alone an anarchist.

Or by 'here' do you mean where you live?

 

[trevhagl]

You think you're the furthest left on here?

I never had you down as a commie let alone an anarchist.

Or by 'here' do you mean where you live?

Here as in Sun reader central. Where people used to have pride and working class solidarity, now just bitch amongst themselves, worrying about poeple on the dole getting more than them etc

 

[trevhagl]

You think you're the furthest left on here?

I never had you down as a commie let alone an anarchist.

Or by 'here' do you mean where you live?

i'm not and never will be a label, as all political systems have their faults. A geezer at work called me an anarcho capitalist cos i sold records !

 

[Quartz]

you're a liberal

While it's true that at the election I went off to vote for them, they don't tick all my boxes. They've had the luxury of occupying the wishy-washy ground. And I have definite views. And the major reason I didn't vote Labour was because the local Labour lots were utter cunts. Need I say more than "Margaret Moran"?

 

[BigTom]

yes, but I'm probably not in the age range you were thinking of - I would say that I was a centre-left liberal in my early teens, moving to a reformist-socialist position in my mid-late teens then a revolutionary marxist position by my early twenties.. now (31) bumble around between revolutionary marxist/socialist/communist/anarchist with no real idea of exactly where I am, but definitely further left than I was in my teens - not sure if I'm further left than my early twenties, more inclined to anarchism than a statist marxism, but both revolutionary positions rather than reformist, not sure if anarchism would be considered further left than statist marxism

 

[JimW]

Just started reading Li Minqi's 'The Rise of China & the Demise of the Capitalist World Economy':

He has this in his preface (long-arsed quoting ahoy):

...How did I arrive at my current intellectual position? I belong to the “1989 generation.” But unlike the rest of the 1989 generation, I made the unusual intellectual and political trajectory from the Right to the Left, and from being a neoliberal “democrat” to a revolutionary Marxist. I was a student at the Economic Management Department
of Beijing University during the period 1987–90. This department has now become the Guanghua Economic Management School, a
leading Chinese neoliberal think tank advocating full-scale market liberalization and privatization. At Beijing University, we were taught standard neoclassical microeconomics and macroeconomics, and what later I learned was termed “Chicago School” economics—that is, the theory that only a free market economy with clarified private property rights and “small government” can solve all economic and social problems rationally and efficiently.
We were convinced that the socialist economy was unjust, oppressive, and inefficient. It rewarded a layer of privileged, lazy
workers in the state sector and “punished” (or at least undercompensated) capable and smart people such as entrepreneurs and
intellectuals, who we considered to be the cream of society. Thus, for China to have any chance to catch up with the West, to be “rich and powerful,” it had to follow the free market capitalist model...


... The politically active intellectuals no longer borrowed discourse from Marxism. Instead, western classical liberalism and neoliberal economics, as represented by Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, had become the new, fashionable ideology.
Liberal intellectuals were all in favor of privatization and the free market. But they disagreed among themselves regarding the
political strategy of “reform” (that is, the transition to capitalism). Some continued to favor a call for “democracy.” Others had moved further to the Right by advocating neo-authoritarianism, the kind of authoritarian capitalism that existed in South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore, which denied the working class democratic rights but provided protection of the property right (or “liberty”). Many saw Zhao Ziyang, then the general secretary of the Chinese Communist
Party, as the one who could carry out such an “enlightened despotism.” Such were the ideological conditions in China before the emergence of the 1989 “democratic movement.”

... As the student demonstrations grew, workers in Beijing began to pour onto the streets in support of the students, who were, of course, delighted. However, being an economics student, I could not help experiencing a deep sense of irony. On the one hand, these workers were the people that we considered to be passive, obedient, ignorant, lazy, and stupid. Yet now they were coming out to support us. On the other hand, just weeks before, we were enthusiastically advocating “reform” programs that would shut down all state factories and leave the workers unemployed. I asked myself: do these workers really know who they are supporting? Unfortunately, the workers did not really know...

...While the students themselves peacefully left Tiananmen Square, thousands of workers died in Beijing’s streets defending them. Two years later, as I read Marx’s The Class Struggle in France, 1848–1850 in prison, I was struck by the similarity between the French petty bourgeoisie in the mid-nineteenth century and the Chinese liberal intellectuals in the late twentieth century in their political ineptitude, which was ultimately a reflection of the social conditions of their lives and class interests.

... In my case, soon after the failure of the 1989 “democratic movement,” I reflected upon this failure and tried to understand
the underlying causes. I became a leftist, a socialist, a Marxist, and eventually, a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist. A year later, I gave a political speech on the campus of Beijing University, which cost me two years of imprisonment. However, there were two advantages concerning incarceration. For the first time in my life, I had the opportunity to live with people from various underprivileged social strata. This experience was of immeasurable value. Secondly, in prison, I had ample time to read, a privilege I have not been able to enjoy since then. I read Marx’s three volumes of Capital three times, in addition
to many other classical writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Mao, Baran and Sweezy’s Monopoly Capital, Arghiri Immanuel’s Unequal Exchange, G.A. Cohen’s Karl Marx’s Theory of History, and Bertrand Russell’s A History of Western Philosophy...

Whole preface is a great read and what I've seen of the book itself well worth it.

 

[Captain Hurrah]

For the first time in my life, I had the opportunity to live with people from various underprivileged social strata. This experience was of immeasurable value.

<vomits>

 

[The39thStep]

I'm markedly less 'liberal' than I was 10 years ago let alone 20.

same as

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

Of course not. We all start out as Communists but by thirty we are tories and by the time we die we should have been shot as nazi war criminals 10 years previously.

You can't actually change your mind from viewing what actually happens in the real world.

 

[Citizen66]

It feels like I've moved further left throughout time. But it could be that was just the process of me understanding my position over time slowly ticked off boxes that moved that direction. Hard to tell.

Was definitely more right wing as a kid though. Couldn't see beyond my immediate circle of friends and family.

 

[Captain Hurrah]

Of course not. We all start out as Communists but by thirty we are tories and by the time we die we should have been shot as nazi war criminals years previously.

You can't actually change your mind from viewing what actually happens in the real world.

You come across as a liberal.

 

[Citizen66]

I don't think it is no. You start where you end - the world changes.

Actually there's a lot to be said of this I think. Some of the old boys at work when challenged on some of their shit would spout "you get more right wing as you get older'' but, thinking about it, their views probaly weren't that controversial in the 50s; it was just they couldn't move on from them. Obviously this is social conservatism I mean here.

 

[PlaidDragon]

The more I learn the more left I go. I've veered from wishy washy 16 year old liberal, to Socialist, then I went left again. I don't even know what I am at the moment, I see more to agree with from the Zapatistas than anything else.

 

[Yu_Gi_Oh]

I think I've become more Left in the sense of knowing why I believe what I believe, and maybe a little more aggressive in my arguing and tolerance of capitalist roaders ( ), but my parents are pretty fucking left-wing and brought me up to be so too, which in a way was detrimental as it has taken me until my late twenties to really think about it, rather than just following what my parents taught me.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

depends how successful you are job-wise, if you've done well, then you may say a lot of left -wing things, but you have a lot more to protect. If you have kids, that can change things too, schools, crime, child-care all become more important.

luckily, I haven't got kids, and my career hasn't set the world on fire

The counterpoint though is that if you have kids, you don't want to see them ending up living in some fascist zombie-state.

 

[JimW]

<vomits>

He's just being 'honest before the class' . Not sure of his whole biography but it was true that cadre kids didn't really mix with the w/c. Recon he does speak well of him that he took the turn he did at the time and was willing to go to prison for it. Still enjoying his book about halfway in; he's clearly intent on defending the Maoist and Leninist legacy but not blindly so.

 

[Captain Hurrah]

I could be thinking of someone else, but wasn't it partly his time behind bars, put to use for the purpose of intellectual nourishment, that saw Paresh Chattopadhyay read Marx more and come to reject Maoism, or its Indian Naxalite variant? But not the fucked over poor who have taken it up.

 

[JimW]

I could be thinking of someone else, but wasn't it partly his time behind bars, put to use for the purpose of intellectual nourishment, that saw Paresh Chattopadhyay read Marx more and come to reject Maoism, or its Indian Naxalite variant? But not the fucked over poor who have taken it up.

Not heard of them, will look them up. Tend to only read up on India sporadically when someone points something out to me.

 

[Captain Hurrah]

Indian prof. He did The Marxian Concept of Capital and the Soviet Experience.

BTW, I've got a copy of that Rise of the Red Engineers, but haven't got round to reading it yet.

 

[JimW]

Indian prof. He did The Marxian Concept of Capital and the Soviet Experience.

BTW, I've got a copy of that Rise of the Red Engineers, but haven't got round to reading it yet.

I enjoyed it, but it does get into fairly nitty-gritty detail of the history at Qinghua. Think I never finished the last chapters though - just got a second-hand kindle off a skint mate and am loading up all these fat PDFs I've not got round to for ages. Good times!

 

[Captain Hurrah]

I read this a while ago. It's old (early 1980s), but very good, and dry as fuck. Very detailed look at the formation of Red Guard groups in one area, by individual schools, districts, with the class background of middle school students in particular helping to determine their choice of rebel or conservative factions. My tagline comes from one poor elementary school group, who got a bit carried away in their antics.

 

[toggle]

Actually there's a lot to be said of this I think. Some of the old boys at work when challenged on some of their shit would spout "you get more right wing as you get older'' but, thinking about it, their views probaly weren't that controversial in the 50s; it was just they couldn't move on from them. Obviously this is social conservatism I mean here.

i've always tended to interpret that as attempting to claim that left wing views are a sign of immaturity.

 

[Citizen66]

i've always tended to interpret that as attempting to claim that left wing views are a sign of immaturity.

Yeah, student lefties etc. Also (and i think this can be true to a certain degree) having kids can make people more reactionary and protectionist.

 

[biggus dickus]

Yeah, student lefties etc. Also (and i think this can be true to a certain degree) having kids can make people more reactionary and protectionist.

I do wonder if I had a kid and someone raped and killed them if I'd still be against the death penalty (assuming it wasn't me....)

I'd like to think I would be, but I don't have a kid

edit: I know that isn't really a 'left wing' view but just an example of how getting older can affect people.

 

[toggle]

Yeah, student lefties etc. Also (and i think this can be true to a certain degree) having kids can make people more reactionary and protectionist.

alternatively, it can make people more wanting to change society.

 

[toggle]

i tend to discount that arguement because it relates to another that iv'e heard a lot. that is the idea that women who have had children will become anti abortion. the idea that having children will make us all maternal and protective to the point we will ignore the rights of others. i really dislike the idea that breeding makes you think of no one other than your own, and become selfish and this is manifested in suporting right wing authoritarian politics. not only does it assume that we take a position from immaturity and ignorance, but it also assumes that there's some kind of maternal groupthink thing going on, and that when we've bred, there isn't another thought in our heads other than that protection instinct.

and yes, some of these arguements are applied to blokes as well, but i think the expectation of groupthink is applied a lot more to women.

 

[Citizen66]

I was more thinking of strikebreakers who use use the excuse of 'food needs to be put on the table'. Whilst short sighted imo, it's certainly not a position a guy with only his dick to keep has to consider.