My reason to walk away

I honestly do not know what happened to the left that made them a bunch of authoritarian and puritanical religious conservatives following the church of Marxist dogma.

I used to be a liberal because I cared a lot about certain causes. But when the dogmatic puritanism and wokeness took over, what alternative was there for a free-thinking, rational human being? It's not like I gave up on those causes. But those causes have become an opinion-galvanizing collectivist vote factory for the left to seize more power, and nothing more.

I was on the left and I used to view people on the left as people who held onto youthful idealism and then tried to make it happen in their adulthood through thoughtful policy. But this isn't the left. The older I get, the more I see them for what they are. Authoritarians with an inflated ego and no self-awareness.

Was it always this way? I don't know. I really don't. It feels like this is a new phenomenon, but it isn't like the warnings haven't always been there. Maybe it was a set of blinders put on by the ignorance of my youth. But it feels like this veil came off suddenly. I don't know what happened or necessarily why, however, I do know I don't like it and want no part of it.

a reply to: projectvxn

There is nothing wrong with holding leftist (i.e. more socially liberal) views. The problem becomes when a person becomes so convinced those views are the only way that they go on a religious crusade over them. It shuts down dialogue.

The best way to solve problems is to brainstorm and come up with many different possible solutions, but each of those solutions has to be weighed practically against criteria that exist in your real world and then you either have to adjust what you have to make it workable or, yes, find another way that is a better fit to what you have.

All of this assumes that everyone involved is more concerned with finding real answers over dogmatic group think.

When I was in school, I used to participate in a team competition called creative problem solving that used this approach, and it was a lot of fun.

a reply to: projectvxn

Fortunately, you're echoing what the rest of the world is saying. Look at Italy, Hungary, Poland, and now Australia.

People are slowly realizing that globalism is an elitist scam regardless of how it's packaged.

The common link with all of these ATS rants:

Never in these rants do we get to read what the OP plans to do about it themselves.

Why oh why do all these OP rants exclude a plan of personal action?

a reply to: ttobban

What do you do?

You can't talk to people who don't listen. Right now, we're all so busy blaming this or that for the problems, that no one wants to solve the problem. Or if we're talking about the problem, there's too much finger pointing over who can or cannot talk about what we do about it so that only one answer comes out.

a reply to: AgarthaSeed

I think I've known that for a long time.

But I'll admit to struggling with the "how" aspect of this. How is it that such irrational behavior and immoral permissivity can be viewed as a legitimate political position? How is the abandonment of logical thinking and scientific rationalism in favor of ethnocentric identity discrimination and sexual amorphism considered a legitimate social policy position-so much so that corporations have begun to adopt this nonsense?

It's enough to confuse anyone. I'm guessing that's the idea. But to see so many get suckered into it is the real tragedy.

a reply to: ttobban

Why oh why do all these OP rants exclude a plan of personal action?

This post seems very out of place. What plan of action do you seek?

a reply to: ttobban

I don't know, to me it is refreshing to see people at least pick their heads up and look at the world around them for what it is, and more importantly who it is. I think this is important.

I don't think it's critically important to have someone suddenly shout out..."I've been reborn and found salvation in (x) political party!" What is really important is to just see people realize they need to be objective and critical of their political beliefs, to not blindly follow a party moniker just because. I don't care what party they are, blind obedience is never good.

I openly identify with most conservative ideals, but there are many which I take strong exception to. If those issues were to become the main platform of conservatives I would question the same things as the OP does. And, I would gladly switch if that were the case. I am always of the belief, we shouldn't fit IN a mold, we should be MAKING the mold. Political parties are what the constituents make them. When they go astray and run amok they should be abandoned like the misguided organizations they are.

The simple awareness that change is required is a great start in my opinion. No matter if liberal, libertairian, conservative, democrat or republican.

S&F to the OP

a reply to: ketsuko

Stay centered... realize and understand that I may be talking to myself, but am willing and able to take a step in any direction I want without the aid or support of a faction or group that clearly needs the help or assistance of others.

Worrying about what others think and do keeps a good stall on movement, whether that be progress or regress... that's for sure.

It's okay to rant... people need to get their frustrations out in the open... it's healthy. It's the removal of a plan of action in and around the rant that's flawed... it's no different than a toddler whining until someone pacify's their noise making.

I believe there's a difference between leftism & liberalism. Liberals are for liberty (freedom with non-oppressive governmemt) & leftists are for facism (unlimited forceful government).

Imo, the only way to stop the decay of our country is to stop voting for career politicians on both sides of the aisle & implement term limits so politicians can't stay in politics for decades. Political office is a service, not a career.

a reply to: JBIZZ

No, I think you are confusing "liberals" with "libertarians".

They are not the same at all. In fact, in many respects they are polar opposites of each other!

Liberals believe in big government. Libertarians believe in the exact opposite.

a reply to: projectvxn

Movement somewhere... anywhere.

If anything my action here is to beg the whiners to at least offer more to their rants than is offered typically.

Okay, we get it, people are butt hurt. So, now that we all know you're upset, what can we do about it?

People will have to take a step out of their comfy zones for ANY change at all to happen.

a reply to: projectvxn

I'm on the same boat. And even now, I still consider myself a "liberal", just not one of the totalitarian-leftist flavor.

I'm an individual first and foremost, that believes in the simple philosophy of live and let live -- pretty simple at face value. But what these lefties have created (both in philosophy and those who devoutly follow it) is anything but that, and I want absolutely no part of it.

But you're right that these are nothing more than egotistical, no self-awareness having, completely feeble-minded and pathetic authoritarians.

It's baffling to me they've yet to realize they're no better, and in most cases a lot worse, than the "monster" they're trying to defeat in the name of some pseudo-moral crusade.

If this was a decade ago, and I still didn't know any better, I'd most likely be right beside them echoing their sentiments.

a reply to: projectvxn

Your issue is really pretty simple.
You think of yourself as a Liberal.
The US "Left" is NOT Liberal. They are Facists. Which is pretty rich considering they have a group called "Antifa".

I never considered myself a "Liberal". But that is beside the point.

Hope it all works out for you, but honestly, there isn't any political movement remaining in the US that is acceptable to a huge number of us. For my part, I watch from the sidelines as the two partisan sides battle it out for control of a hopelessly immoral and decadent population in a country without borders that is rapidly being hollowed out. The US today is really just administered as a Colony of the Corporate Interests.

a reply to: projectvxn

The goal is the same on both sides at the higher levels. To take any side is ludicrous because both are flawed. People know that both parties are one in the same (at higher levels), yet fall for it when someone different comes along. People tout Trump as someone different because he isn't a career politician, yet fail to address just WHO has been backing and creating him from day one. The truth is the truth and has no side. They want you to be in one category or the other. That is the game. They really do not care which side it is because the goal is the same.

The fact that people think REAL decisions even come from people in politics is scary. They fail to acknowledge the overwhelming evidence that a President has no power whatsoever in the grand scheme of things. No one will save us, that is not how it works. People need to change themselves on a collective level before real change can occur. You all are wasting your time. Call me arrogant I care not because it is the truth.

I always see people talking trash about politicians being insane by doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.... Just think about that for a second about who else that can be applied to. Each and every one of us.

a reply to: TonyS

That last part is a tough nut to swallow, but I fear you are correct.

The world is crazy.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Whining and complaining is only a benefit to the psyche when a WHOLE LOT is on the line. Outside of life and death measures, it's each owns actions that spark movements. It's okay and healthy to rant when the consequences of ignoring the concerns are extremely detrimental.

When concerns are more about how one fits in and around a spectrum of other concerns, the need for AT LEAST a proposed plan of action is imperative.

Rants would find more support if they included thoughts and reflections beyond the scope of their personal being... that's all I mean here. We have to take step one before we find further steps...

a reply to: ttobban

Movement somewhere... anywhere.

Seems like you trying to find an avenue by which to discredit my posts. But you haven't found any.

If anything my action here is to beg the whiners to at least offer more to their rants than is offered typically.

I think you're missing the point of a rant. But I'll bite. What is it that you are looking for exactly? What solution to the left's lunacy do you believe there is? Why would you believe that I can offer a solution to their lunacy? That has to come from them.

Okay, we get it, people are butt hurt. So, now that we all know you're upset, what can we do about it?

Butt hurt?

Butthurt is the left throwing a temper tantrum for nearly 3 years because they lost an election.

As a result of that butthurt, we are now dealing with a soft coup attempt, massive corruption, and infiltration by communists into our intelligence agencies to spy on US citizens illegally and with international support.

What do YOU suggest we do about that?

Excuse me, but the adults are talking, and the only thing I see here is your refusal to address any points I made in favor of namecalling.

a reply to: projectvxn

Good post project. I can relate. Especially when you say

authoritarian and puritanical religious conservatives following the church of Marxist dogma.

Being a free thinker is not easy. Our thinking is primed by our surroundings from birth onward. It is guided by our parents and families and only when we begin to grow as individuals do we manage to break away from at least some of that early mental training. I say ''some'' because even now as an old man it is easy for me to see that some of who I am, some of what I think has no real conscious inception on my part but is only remedial neural sparkings from my early years.

And that to me is not being a liberal, it is being a conservative. Pushing past the purely political catagorizations of liberal and conservative a real liberal to my mind is one who is willing to look beyond the box of their early programming and a conservative who insists that that box is exactly the way the world is. Maybe another way of putting that is that a person who is really liberal prefers to learn about what they don't already know where as a person who is a conservative prefers to learn more about what they ''already'' know.

So from this standpoint both the political left and the political right share both aspects of information gathering.
The left that we see not is not really liberal but more like you suggest above, conservative, though I would bet that most of them have no real knowledge about Marxist dogma, rather it's just a sense of life established in them by the social mores and fantasies of the last 50 years.