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Conservatives often speak about wanting their "freedoms." Well, i too am a big advocate of "freedom" yet i consider myself liberal.
Then you aren't an advocate of freedom. Liberalism by its very nature is anti-freedom. Liberalism always and forever advocates for bigger government with more involvement in local affairs, more regulations, more power. That's not freedom. That's central authority.
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Although i haven't checked every thesaurus, i feel confident in saying that "free" is an antonym of "conservative."
Free is an antonym of controlled, confined, enslaved, etc. It has nothing to do with conservatism, for or against. Some conservatives are hardline religious types who want entirely different things than the conservatives who are libertarian types who want different things that the conservatives who are neocons who want different things than the conservatives who are constitutionalists.
The only thing that really unites us is our opposition to you. None of us want the powerful central government in Washington that liberals want.
I personally want gay people to be allowed to get married. I want people to be allowed to use marijuana. But I'll ally myself with someone who opposes gay marriage and supports the war on drugs if it means together we can stop a Democrat from getting elected. Because while I do not agree with the religious right, I view you as more dangerous to prosperity and freedom than I do them.
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Here are some of the freedoms that i cherish as a liberal:
freedom of religion such as Wicca, Muslim, etc
freedom of speech
freedom for women to do what they want with their bodies- including D and Cs (i.e., pregnancy termination)
freedom to use birth control
freedom to engage in prostitution
freedom to marry whomever wants to marry you and vice versa
freedom of information
freedom to put whatever you want in your body such as marijuana
freedom of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
freedom from oppression
freedom of self-protection
And many more . . .
Most "conservatives" that i know believe in "the freedom of the second amendment," and then maybe half of the list above if lucky.
I don't believe you. Being a conservative, having conservative relatives and friends, none of them - not one - can be described this way. What I think is that you have come up with a stereotype of conservatives in your mind and then just add the "most conservatives I know" to it to make it sound better.
The second thing that makes what you said suspicious is that it is liberals who want to control many of the items on your list. The restrictions on free speech we have today were put there by liberals, not conservatives. The initiatives to control information and the internet are put forth by Democrats, not Republicans. The people who want to take the tools for self-protection out of your hands are liberals, not conservatives. And while most liberals will be happy to let you smoke marijuana, if it is tobacco you want to smoke they are more than willing to control that, plus controlling where you can buy Happy Meals, what size sodas you can get at a movie theater, how much salt you have in restaurants, etc.
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In other words, most Conservatives do NOT believe in:
freedom of religion such as Wicca, Muslim, etc
freedom for women to do what they want with their bodies- including D and Cs (i.e., pregnancy termination)
freedom to engage in prostitution
freedom to marry whomever wants to marry you and vice versa
freedom to put whatever you want in your body such as marijuana
I'm not trying to insult anyone, but sometimes i feel like "freedom" is code for "likes guns, may have partial paranoia and doesn't want to pay taxes." But this has nothing to do with ACTUAL FREEDOM.
You're not trying to insult anyone? Then try asking the question straight up without the "most conservatives are gun toting control freaks" attached to it. Sorry, but the way you phrased this post makes your claim of not trying to insult anyone seem pretty suspect.
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How did ONE issue- pro-guns (and i'm not arguing for or against) become the ONLY issue of freedom.
It didn't. You've got it backwards. Sex become the issue of freedom for the left. Birth control, abortion, homosexual marriage - all related to sexual relations. That's where liberals get their claim to freedom. It's not the conservatives who are interested in one issue and try to make it out like they are crusaders for freedom. It's liberals who did that.
It's liberals who wanted the fairness doctrine. It's liberals who established free speech zones. It's liberals who want to mandate insurance coverage. It's liberals who institute affirmative action policies to control who gets hired, promoted, and admitted into schools. It's liberals who support a federally controlled core curriculum to control education throughout the nation. It's liberals who want to use taxes to control wealth distribution. It's liberals who want to set the wage levels.
But since liberals want you to have an abortion and same sex marriage, that makes them all about freedom.
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Again, i am not trying to insult anyone, i just would like to know from all "Conservatives who believe in Freedom," What are the freedoms you believe in besides guns?
How can you even feel comfortable exclaiming that you believe in freedoms when you don't believe in those key freedoms in the second list?
Because they aren't key freedoms. Having the sex life you want is not the be-all and end-all of freedom. If you notice, even your own so-called key freedom list has 3 out of the 5 related to sex.
How about freedom to oppose gay marriage without being fired from your job the way the Mozilla CEO was? How about the freedom to choose your own health insurance instead of having to take what the federal bureaucrats in Washington want for you? How about the freedom to sing Christmas carols at a Christmas concert? How about the freedom to say what you want outside a designated free speech zone? How about the freedom to choose a car with low gas mileage if that's what you want to drive? How about the freedom to smoke? How about the freedom to order whatever size soda you want in a movie theater or have as much salt as you want in a restaurant? How about the freedom to hire and promote the people you want in your business regardless of their gender or race? How about the freedom to have a conservative speaker on a college campus without them needing bodyguards to escort them to the auditorium?
Your "conservatives only care about the 2nd amendment" thing is utterly and completely false. You've got the freedom to do what you want in the bedroom covered just fine. We conservatives want freedom outside the bedroom. We want to choose the health insurance we want, we want to choose the food we eat, we want to choose the car we drive, we want to run our businesses according to what we think is best, we want to spend our money ourselves rather than giving to the government, we want to choose where to educate our children, we want to choose what speakers to listen to, we want our state and local governments to have the freedom to set the law within our own state and city instead of being overruled by Washington, etc. You know, all the things that don't involve making or not making babies. there is a difference between liberty and libertine.
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Thank you for helping me understand.
I'll be quite surprised if you understand. The tone of your post does not indicate a sincere desire for understanding. It sounds more like a request for confirmation bias.
freedom to put whatever you want in your body such as marijuana
- liberals don't believe this. They may with marijuana, but they don't even believe we can eat sugar or hamburgers
Waaaa?! lol. Who is stopping you from eating sugar or hamburgers? Where is that illegal? And who is trying to outlaw it?
Statements like that are proof that some people are so politically biased, they can't see reality anymore.
How about freedom to oppose gay marriage without being fired from your job the way the Mozilla CEO was?
That was a private business decision. He had the freedom to oppose same-sex marriage, and Mozilla had the freedom to fire him. There is nothing to protect employees of private businesses when it comes to freedom of speech.
Then you aren't an advocate of freedom. Liberalism by its very nature is anti-freedom. Liberalism always and forever advocates for bigger government with more involvement in local affairs, more regulations, more power. That's not freedom. That's central authority.
Free is an antonym of controlled, confined, enslaved, etc. It has nothing to do with conservatism, for or against. Some conservatives are hardline religious types who want entirely different things than the conservatives who are libertarian types who want different things that the conservatives who are neocons who want different things than the conservatives who are constitutionalists.
The only thing that really unites us is our opposition to you. None of us want the powerful central government in Washington that liberals want.
I personally want gay people to be allowed to get married. I want people to be allowed to use marijuana. But I'll ally myself with someone who opposes gay marriage and supports the war on drugs if it means together we can stop a Democrat from getting elected. Because while I do not agree with the religious right, I view you as more dangerous to prosperity and freedom than I do them.
I don't believe you. Being a conservative, having conservative relatives and friends, none of them - not one - can be described this way. What I think is that you have come up with a stereotype of conservatives in your mind and then just add the "most conservatives I know" to it to make it sound better.
The second thing that makes what you said suspicious is that it is liberals who want to control many of the items on your list. The restrictions on free speech we have today were put there by liberals, not conservatives. The initiatives to control information and the internet are put forth by Democrats, not Republicans. The people who want to take the tools for self-protection out of your hands are liberals, not conservatives. And while most liberals will be happy to let you smoke marijuana, if it is tobacco you want to smoke they are more than willing to control that, plus controlling where you can buy Happy Meals, what size sodas you can get at a movie theater, how much salt you have in restaurants, etc.
You're not trying to insult anyone? Then try asking the question straight up without the "most conservatives are gun toting control freaks" attached to it. Sorry, but the way you phrased this post makes your claim of not trying to insult anyone seem pretty suspect.
It didn't. You've got it backwards. Sex become the issue of freedom for the left. Birth control, abortion, homosexual marriage - all related to sexual relations. That's where liberals get their claim to freedom. It's not the conservatives who are interested in one issue and try to make it out like they are crusaders for freedom. It's liberals who did that.
It's liberals who wanted the fairness doctrine. It's liberals who established free speech zones. It's liberals who want to mandate insurance coverage. It's liberals who institute affirmative action policies to control who gets hired, promoted, and admitted into schools. It's liberals who support a federally controlled core curriculum to control education throughout the nation. It's liberals who want to use taxes to control wealth distribution. It's liberals who want to set the wage levels.
But since liberals want you to have an abortion and same sex marriage, that makes them all about freedom.
Because they aren't key freedoms. Having the sex life you want is not the be-all and end-all of freedom. If you notice, even your own so-called key freedom list has 3 out of the 5 related to sex.
How about freedom to oppose gay marriage without being fired from your job the way the Mozilla CEO was? How about the freedom to choose your own health insurance instead of having to take what the federal bureaucrats in Washington want for you? How about the freedom to sing Christmas carols at a Christmas concert? How about the freedom to say what you want outside a designated free speech zone? How about the freedom to choose a car with low gas mileage if that's what you want to drive? How about the freedom to smoke? How about the freedom to order whatever size soda you want in a movie theater or have as much salt as you want in a restaurant? How about the freedom to hire and promote the people you want in your business regardless of their gender or race? How about the freedom to have a conservative speaker on a college campus without them needing bodyguards to escort them to the auditorium?
Your "conservatives only care about the 2nd amendment" thing is utterly and completely false. You've got the freedom to do what you want in the bedroom covered just fine. We conservatives want freedom outside the bedroom. We want to choose the health insurance we want, we want to choose the food we eat, we want to choose the car we drive, we want to run our businesses according to what we think is best, we want to spend our money ourselves rather than giving to the government, we want to choose where to educate our children, we want to choose what speakers to listen to, we want our state and local governments to have the freedom to set the law within our own state and city instead of being overruled by Washington, etc. You know, all the things that don't involve making or not making babies. there is a difference between liberty and libertine.
I'll be quite surprised if you understand. The tone of your post does not indicate a sincere desire for understanding. It sounds more like a request for confirmation bias.
End of thread....
kidkaos2 has won this thread hands DOWN!!! No one else even needs to elaborate further.....
I particularly agree with the bolded text above.
Last edited by WhipperSnapper 88; 08-10-2014 at 11:37 PM..
Waaaa?! lol. Who is stopping you from eating sugar or hamburgers? Where is that illegal? And who is trying to outlaw it?
Statements like that are proof that some people are so politically biased, they can't see reality anymore.
Tell that to the likes of Michael Bloomturd who tried to ban sodas over 12oz, or that congresswoman being talked about in another thread who wants to tax every teaspoon of sugar in a drink....
They may not ban it outright, but they try to control peoples behaviour with legislation.
Then you aren't an advocate of freedom. Liberalism by its very nature is anti-freedom. Liberalism always and forever advocates for bigger government with more involvement in local affairs, more regulations, more power. That's not freedom. That's central authority.
Free is an antonym of controlled, confined, enslaved, etc. It has nothing to do with conservatism, for or against. Some conservatives are hardline religious types who want entirely different things than the conservatives who are libertarian types who want different things that the conservatives who are neocons who want different things than the conservatives who are constitutionalists.
The only thing that really unites us is our opposition to you. None of us want the powerful central government in Washington that liberals want.
I personally want gay people to be allowed to get married. I want people to be allowed to use marijuana. But I'll ally myself with someone who opposes gay marriage and supports the war on drugs if it means together we can stop a Democrat from getting elected. Because while I do not agree with the religious right, I view you as more dangerous to prosperity and freedom than I do them.
I don't believe you. Being a conservative, having conservative relatives and friends, none of them - not one - can be described this way. What I think is that you have come up with a stereotype of conservatives in your mind and then just add the "most conservatives I know" to it to make it sound better.
The second thing that makes what you said suspicious is that it is liberals who want to control many of the items on your list. The restrictions on free speech we have today were put there by liberals, not conservatives. The initiatives to control information and the internet are put forth by Democrats, not Republicans. The people who want to take the tools for self-protection out of your hands are liberals, not conservatives. And while most liberals will be happy to let you smoke marijuana, if it is tobacco you want to smoke they are more than willing to control that, plus controlling where you can buy Happy Meals, what size sodas you can get at a movie theater, how much salt you have in restaurants, etc.
You're not trying to insult anyone? Then try asking the question straight up without the "most conservatives are gun toting control freaks" attached to it. Sorry, but the way you phrased this post makes your claim of not trying to insult anyone seem pretty suspect.
It didn't. You've got it backwards. Sex become the issue of freedom for the left. Birth control, abortion, homosexual marriage - all related to sexual relations. That's where liberals get their claim to freedom. It's not the conservatives who are interested in one issue and try to make it out like they are crusaders for freedom. It's liberals who did that.
It's liberals who wanted the fairness doctrine. It's liberals who established free speech zones. It's liberals who want to mandate insurance coverage. It's liberals who institute affirmative action policies to control who gets hired, promoted, and admitted into schools. It's liberals who support a federally controlled core curriculum to control education throughout the nation. It's liberals who want to use taxes to control wealth distribution. It's liberals who want to set the wage levels.
But since liberals want you to have an abortion and same sex marriage, that makes them all about freedom.
Because they aren't key freedoms. Having the sex life you want is not the be-all and end-all of freedom. If you notice, even your own so-called key freedom list has 3 out of the 5 related to sex.
How about freedom to oppose gay marriage without being fired from your job the way the Mozilla CEO was? How about the freedom to choose your own health insurance instead of having to take what the federal bureaucrats in Washington want for you? How about the freedom to sing Christmas carols at a Christmas concert? How about the freedom to say what you want outside a designated free speech zone? How about the freedom to choose a car with low gas mileage if that's what you want to drive? How about the freedom to smoke? How about the freedom to order whatever size soda you want in a movie theater or have as much salt as you want in a restaurant? How about the freedom to hire and promote the people you want in your business regardless of their gender or race? How about the freedom to have a conservative speaker on a college campus without them needing bodyguards to escort them to the auditorium?
Your "conservatives only care about the 2nd amendment" thing is utterly and completely false. You've got the freedom to do what you want in the bedroom covered just fine. We conservatives want freedom outside the bedroom. We want to choose the health insurance we want, we want to choose the food we eat, we want to choose the car we drive, we want to run our businesses according to what we think is best, we want to spend our money ourselves rather than giving to the government, we want to choose where to educate our children, we want to choose what speakers to listen to, we want our state and local governments to have the freedom to set the law within our own state and city instead of being overruled by Washington, etc. You know, all the things that don't involve making or not making babies. there is a difference between liberty and libertine.
I'll be quite surprised if you understand. The tone of your post does not indicate a sincere desire for understanding. It sounds more like a request for confirmation bias.
This is probably the most helpful post so far. So basically, we have different definitions of "freedom" and the conservative definition is cost based.
What i'm most surprised by here though is not the personal attacks or that it took so long to get a decent answer, but that there is so much misunderstanding about what liberals believe. I'm glad that you added some additional criteria for defining freedom. FYI-
How about freedom to oppose gay marriage without being fired from your job the way the Mozilla CEO was? Don't know the specific case well enough to comment. In general, i'm against people being fired over free-speech.
How about the freedom to choose your own health insurance instead of having to take what the federal bureaucrats in Washington want for you? This is not what happened w the ACA yet this is what the rhetoric was. But i am in favor of Medicare.
How about the freedom to sing Christmas carols at a Christmas concert? PRO
How about the freedom to say what you want outside a designated free speech zone? PRO
How about the freedom to choose a car with low gas mileage if that's what you want to drive? PRO
How about the freedom to smoke? PRO
How about the freedom to order whatever size soda you want in a movie theater or have as much salt as you want in a restaurant? PRO
How about the freedom to hire and promote the people you want in your business regardless of their gender or race? AGAINST, once a company gets to be a certain size, then the "job creators" should take some responsibility for getting the "takers" to work. You can't have it both ways. (i.e., ***** about welfare costs yet not hire qualified candidates.)
How about the freedom to have a conservative speaker on a college campus without them needing bodyguards to escort them to the auditorium? HUH?!? IDK why someone who would need to be escorted if invited. But PRO, i want people to be safe so i'd authorize an escort if i needed to do so. From your explanation/logic, it would be fiscally irresponsible to do that.
The original list i made might have had 3 out of 5 points related to sexual freedoms. But they ARE FREEDOMS nonetheless and most, if not all, the conservatives i know are against these freedoms.
And what about the liberals who try to take away the Christmas trees? That happened at Seatac Airport. And the liberal atheists at the Washington State capitol who couldn't stand there being a Nativity Scene:
That was a private business decision. He had the freedom to oppose same-sex marriage, and Mozilla had the freedom to fire him. There is nothing to protect employees of private businesses when it comes to freedom of speech.
No, you can't weasel out of it. It was a private business decision made because of pressure from left wing groups. Does the position of CEO of Mozilla have anything whatsoever to do with gay marriage? No, it does not. His political views were entirely irrelevant to his job. Yet liberals protested him having his job because of those political views. That is absolutely an example of liberals wanting to force people to think the way the liberal wants them to think.
Lol. No actually, i am just really saddened that i did not get one intelligent answer. . . . Lots of anti-abortion rhetoric, plus paranoia and assumptions. But Not. One. Intelligent. Answer.
I was (am still am) seriously seeking an intelligent answer without insults, liberal bashing, abortion or gun debates.
Anyone?
You have received many good posts - but you can't read them through your bias. You associated liberals with freedom. Many here have shown that is as much a myth as conservatives and freedom.
Liberals, through their view of an activist government, have many anti-freedom positions. They don't trust people to do the right thing so they want to control us.
Conservatives, especially social conservatives, support intrusion of government into personal lives.
Your own examples have been shown to be largely false. Most conservatives strongly support freedom of religion. They are becoming indifferent to gay marriage and many support legalization of marijuana.
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