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Henbane
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11 Jul 2011, 6:33 pm

Mine came free in a cereal box.





Actually my Dad is as socialist as they come, and has been very active in the Labour Party since his teenage years. He knows lots of Labour MPs and ex MPs, but only the socialist ones. The rest are 'beyond the pale'. He also taught politics at university.

So my starting point is left wing, but I have quite a lot of views that he would probably not agree with. He's much more authoritarian than I am for a start. But he started my interest in politics as a child.



ruveyn
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11 Jul 2011, 6:57 pm

Henbane wrote:
Mine came free in a cereal box.





Actually my Dad is as socialist as they come, and has been very active in the Labour Party since his teenage years. He knows lots of Labour MPs and ex MPs, but only the socialist ones. The rest are 'beyond the pale'. He also taught politics at university.

So my starting point is left wing, but I have quite a lot of views that he would probably not agree with. He's much more authoritarian than I am for a start. But he started my interest in politics as a child.


When I was young, I was somewhat of a socialist also. What was it the Churchill said? If a man is not a socialist when he is young, he has no heart and if he is still a socialist when he is older, he has no brains. Or something like that.

ruveyn



Philologos
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11 Jul 2011, 7:08 pm

ruveyn wrote:
Henbane wrote:
Mine came free in a cereal box.





Actually my Dad is as socialist as they come, and has been very active in the Labour Party since his teenage years. He knows lots of Labour MPs and ex MPs, but only the socialist ones. The rest are 'beyond the pale'. He also taught politics at university.

So my starting point is left wing, but I have quite a lot of views that he would probably not agree with. He's much more authoritarian than I am for a start. But he started my interest in politics as a child.


When I was young, I was somewhat of a socialist also. What was it the Churchill said? If a man is not a socialist when he is young, he has no heart and if he is still a socialist when he is older, he has no brains. Or something like that.

ruveyn


As to the first proposition, I cannot speak. I know only one person who was a socialist young, but I cannot speak to the hearts of any of them. That one was a socialist old as well - but his brain was good enough to falsify the second proposition.



marshall
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11 Jul 2011, 7:22 pm

ruveyn wrote:
When I was young, I was somewhat of a socialist also. What was it the Churchill said? If a man is not a socialist when he is young, he has no heart and if he is still a socialist when he is older, he has no brains. Or something like that.

ruveyn

I'm pretty sure it wasn't Churchill. It was someone else though it always gets falsely attributed to Churchill.



WilliamWDelaney
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11 Jul 2011, 8:06 pm

People who try to style themselves after historical figures are silly because they fail utterly to take into account how those people might have evolved over the course of their lifetimes. Good men become bitter, evil men see the light of wisdom and compassion, geniuses often abandon perfectly good ideas for foolish and stupid ones, and fools occasionally get an education and start thinking clearly.

If I had to pick a favorite historical figure of late, it would be Martin Luther during his early years as a reformer. Later in life, he became a total dick and an anti-semite, and I'd like to go back in time to bust him in the chops.

And Winston Churchill was one of the finest politicians of all time; however, like all great men do especially if they pursue habits of drinking and smoking as he did, he did wane later in life. I would not say that he became precisely a bad politician, per se, but he was a pale shadow of what he was at his height. Of course, we all are.

But I cannot begin to illustrate my contempt for people who justify their views based on the fact that so-and-so once expressed an opinion of the kind. I am sure that Winston Churchill said things in his lifetime that would give us due cause to laugh loudly in his face, and he would probably have deserved it richly at the time.

Besides, I never hear anyone claiming to model themselves after General MacArthur. I dare say that he, if anybody, probably had the best ideas of any political figure who was active during the 20th Century. He helped revolutionize our entire culture. By golly, he practically created modern Japan.

And he was extremely progressive, by the way.

So take that!



Philologos
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11 Jul 2011, 9:03 pm

I think you are rambling. Who exactly claims to be channeling Churchill?



GreySun369
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13 Jul 2011, 8:24 am

I think my political views were pretty much self-taught. I don't side with Conservatives because they're against homosexuality and I dislike the way they look down on the poor class and the non-Christians, and I don't support the Liberals because they're against the death penalty and want to take away our right to own guns legally. I consider myself a Rational Anarchist because even though I don't willingly support my government I still obey the law and I still have strong morals.



WilliamWDelaney
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13 Jul 2011, 2:08 pm

Philologos wrote:
I think you are rambling.
Perhaps, but I tend to ramble with better style than most people talk to the point.

Quote:
Who exactly claims to be channeling Churchill?
I stopped caring about halfway through the tirade.



Philologos
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13 Jul 2011, 10:48 pm

WilliamWDelaney wrote:
Philologos wrote:
I think you are rambling.
Perhaps, but I tend to ramble with better style than most people talk to the point.


One of my own best-loved traits. Not that I never criticize it in others.

Quote:
Who exactly claims to be channeling Churchill?
I stopped caring about halfway through the tirade.[/quote]

See - if you want to succeed in academia you have at least to fake interest throughout the tirade, AND remember what the point was when someone asks you the followinng week to explain your remarks. It is an acquired skill.



Dox47
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13 Jul 2011, 10:59 pm

I came to the basic framework of my views through a gradual process of what I call rational oppositionalism, or negative role models. Basically, I was exposed to a lot of political views that I disagreed with, and used them as a starting point for forming my own opinions and viewpoints and molding them into a semi-cohesive philosophy. I've only started using the libertarian label in the last few years after realizing that there was a significant overlap in my self created ideology and general libertarian principles, but I still mostly use the label merely for convenience as I do diverge with mainstream libertarians in some areas.

Central tenets of my philosophy would be a reliance on rational analysis vs emotion, a great deference for personal liberties, respect of the non-initiation of force principle, and a broad rejection of generalizations. Many of these things can be traced to my distaste for specific entities and individuals, such as religions, nannies, bullies, ideologues, collectivists and manipulators. Sure, there are elements drawn from people and organizations I admire, but in general I'm more likely to be influenced by those I dislike.


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18 Jul 2011, 12:22 am

I don't know exactly. I was raised as a moderate social liberal and remain one, although maybe a bit more radical than my parents. But I'm not sure how I became an ecosocialist/democratic socialist. I guess when I was younger I began to really think about the (horribly incomplete) stuff I knew about communism and thought that it contained some good ideas. Then I learned more about communism and realized what a god awful system it was/is and that the things I thought were good about it were largely absent. After leading up on various socialist philosophies I felt that democratic socialism best matches my gradualist views on how stuff should be done. But my upbringing among the bourgeois means that I hold no truck with the "capitalists are the source of all evil" sort of world view. Capitalists can be good, hard-working, but misguided people in my mind. My Green politics leanings come from the fact that when you look at the science you see that we really need to be taking better care of the environment and now other ideologies are really emphasizing that.