The right-wing "liberty" and "freedom" meme sickens me

[LuckyTheDog]

We really need to take on the right's message that it represents "freedom and liberty" and that progressive ideas lead to less freedom.

Think about the 19th century. That was the absolute heyday of unfettered capitalism, small government and lack of regulation. And can anyone HONESTLY say that the average American was "more free" then than now? Do we really want to go back to the days of the company store, unregulated markets, child labor and the "freedom" to live in squalid conditions, earn starvation wages and live with no social safety net?

Conservatism does NOT bring "freedom." Conservatism, when taken to extremes leads directly to the tyranny of the rich. It brings misery and despair to those unlucky enough not to have made it to the very top.

We need to drive this home. Freedom means freedom from fear, freedom from exploitation, and protection from those who would abuse their authority and influence in order to enrich themselves at the expense of everyone else.

We need to take on the right in the debate over the meaning of freedom and liberty. If we do, we will win the argument.

[The Straight Story]

1. Well it does not help our image when folks support nanny state laws

The right might focus on removing the right to choice when it comes to abortion, but all too often the left has been caught with their hand in the cookie jar when it comes to restricting people's rights in other areas.

The rw claims it is trying to save lives (those of the unborn) and the left claims it is trying to save the earth, our health, money, and so on.

Sometimes I wish both sides would just leave well enough alone.

I want my liberty and my freedom - from other people trying to legislate their beliefs in what is best for me.

[LuckyTheDog]

2. The whole "nanny state" thing is a right-wing meme as well

It feeds into the whole "conservatism equals freedom" thing. It is a canard.

[The Straight Story]

5. I don't care who coined it

the term fits. And It does not make me think for one minute conservatism = freedom. They have their own nanny state laws, but we call them religious state laws.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

3. "... nanny state laws."

Boy, did you nail it. Nanny laws, indeed. I've always called their supporters "The Mother Superiors Of Government."

The PC crap that gets flung in the name of "sensitivity" drives me nuts. I find myself watching "Blazing Saddles" over and over and thinking that Mel Brooks couldn't possibly get any of his genius movies made today - which sucks...............

[LuckyTheDog]

4. What do you consider...

...to be a "nanny state" law? Provide a real example.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

7. Well, here in Virginia,

where the main crop was tobacco for so many years, the legislature just enacted an antismoking law that prohibits - with virulent penalties - smoking in just about every building in the Commonwealth.

The part of the law that was defeated would have prohibited smoking within something like 100 yards of any establishments that served food. An insane provision.

I'm not a smoker, but the laws have gone nuts on the subject, and I think they really should be left to individual landlords and owners. Maybe I'd go as far as to equate the decision on smoking with the standard set in the porn laws by the Supreme Court - local standards.

How's that?

Or are you looking for an argument, because you're not gonna get one here? And what if I had supplied a fake example? What would have happened then, do you think?

Plus, you forgot to say "Please."

So, now you supply one, please.

[LuckyTheDog]

13. Smoking is a bad example, IMO

Nobody can honestly assert a "right" to blow toxic, foul-smelling smoke around in the presence of others.

It's not about the state trying to be a "nanny" over your lungs. It's about forcing smokers to respect the rights of others -- something they shouldn't have to be forced into, but do. There is a sense of entitlement by the tobacco-addicted that I just don't understand. It should not be necessary, for example, to ban smoking in elevators. But if that ban was not in effect, the smokers would light up in elevators and feel entitled to do so.

But... I really don't want this thread to degenerate into a debate about smoking.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

15. So?

You disapprove of my example?

Are you serious? It wasn't about smoking - it was about individual rights v. the intrusion of government, and what limits each side had to observe.

But, since you're obviously not interested in that kind of discussion, and since you started it, where's your example?

[LuckyTheDog]

19. All I am saying is this

In some cases, the "free choice" being defended is merely the so-called freedom to inflict harm on others or infringe on the rights of others to be left alone.

I did not provide an example of a "nanny state" law because I think the whole notion is just a right-wing, anti-government meme. You used the term. I merely wanted you to provide an example of what you meant by it. And one of your examples (smoking) is, in my opinion, a bad one. That's because I think I also have a right to be free of foul, toxic smoke that others are addicted to.

There are, indeed, examples of stupid laws. State "blue" laws are an example.

[The Straight Story]

22. And people cannot be free from such things by not going to places that it occurs?

Don't like it, don't go. Like it, go.

How hard is that for people to grasp? These same people are mum when it comes to how their life is adding to the pollution everyday via cars, posting online and using more electricity, etc.

I lived for awhile in Bakersfield, CA. It was hard to breath some days the pollution was so bad. The same people making that pollution day in and day out were the ones passing laws like no smoking in bars because people should not be 'forced' to breath in bad air because of other peoples' addictions.

My bar is not polluting your air, and if you don't want to breath it you have the choice to avoid it. Your addictions to oil, computers, etc don't give me a choice.

Maybe we should all live like the amish :)

[Tangerine LaBamba]

25. You used the term -

check your post. Mine is "The Mother Superior" tag.

People have choices - that's the point you're overlooking. You do not have to go into a bar that allows smoking. You are free to go to another bar, just as the people in the smoking bar are free to go there.

Your characterization of my example as "bad" forces me to tell you to blow it out your judgmental ass.

I do not care for a world where the people who don't like something are the ones who want to make the rules for everyone else. There's room for all of us.

And, really, if you throw down an invitation, and don't reply in kind when your challenge is met, that's poor form .......................

[LuckyTheDog]

31. Look again

"Nanny State" was in your subject line. That is why I asked for a definition.

I sure 'nuff wish all of this could be taken care of with common courtesy. But that has not done the job. The person I used to share a cubicle with in the 80s should have been polite enough to take his smoking outside. But he figured his "rights" were superior to mine. All over that company, smokers routinely refused to be civil and find ways to get their fix without stinking up the place. Eventually, others had to act to get a no-smoking policy enacted. Examples like that happened all over the country. The only shame is that smokers had to be FORCED to take the smell outside when basic manners should have informed their choices.

Again: It is not about the nicotine addiction per se. It's about how far one's "right" to a fix goes. I was always told that your right to swing your fist ends at the end of the nose of the person closest to you.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

32. I was quoting your post -

look again.

You do tend to dwell on irrelevant details while you're missing the big picture.

It's not about smoking. Give the subject matter up, and introduce one of your own. You condemned my choice, which was ill-conceived and badly executed. You asked for an example - you were not recruited to judge it.

If you can't work with what was given, then bow out. You seem to be digging yourself in deeper, and clearly, you're just not understanding what's being given to you.

Best of luck to you.

[LuckyTheDog]

34. If you insist

I already have said that I think the whole "nanny state" meme is a bad idea to buy into.

But I will say that, as a rule, laws designed to protect people from THEMSELVES are usually bad ones (assuming those people are not children or mentally incapacitated). Those intended to protect people from the bad behavior OTHERS are generally (though not always) easier to defend. It all depends on the degree and in each case, the idea can be taken too far.

So, as a rule, I think a law against ingesting nicotine or alcohol would be an intrusion on personal liberty. But, a ban on smoking cigars on the bus or drinking while driving one would be perfectly OK.

On edit: I never intended to be uncivil.

[The Straight Story]

16. Once again - it is NOT about smoking

It is about the rights of people to be able to open a business where folks of a like mind can do something legal.

No one is FORCING anyone to go into a place that allows smoking are they? NO - it is called CHOICE.

Smoking is just an example that is current of others wanting to limit the choice of people.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

28. As I've stated elsewhere in this

increasingly frustrating, yet oddly interesting, thread, I do not want a country - or a world - where the demands of some completely cancel the pleasures of others.

You don't want to smell smoke, don't go where there is smoking. There are a whole lot more places you can go where there won't be smoking than there are places where there will be smoking.

Damn. I don't even smoke, but this thread is making me want to light up ....................

[The Straight Story]

8. See much of California :)

But here are some:

Boston's ban on blunt wraps stands
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5336763&mesg_id=5336763


"After hours" lighting ban
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5330429&mesg_id=5330429

Proposed Smoking Ban in All CA State Parks And Beaches
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5330048&mesg_id=5330048

And look through my posts from the last few years or so. Everyday I check the words Ban and Legislation on google news. And I post results here.

When you start to tie everything I do in my life to yours then make laws over it to restrict me that is nanny state.

Here is a google search on the term which has a lot of examples
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=nanny+state+laws&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f&oq=

[LuckyTheDog]

10. In the case of smoking

I don't see how anyone can claim a "right" to put toxins and bad smells into the air others have to breath.

[The Straight Story]

12. That is because of how you are framing it

You are free to go to a bar that allows smoking, or one that does not. You are free to work at one which allows it or one that does not.

Therefore, you have a CHOICE. And freedom is based on choice. Remove choice, you remove freedom.

Cars, the electric generated by DU being online, etc puts out toxins and bad smells.

It is an attempt to control the behavior of others we don't approve of. Almost religious in it's fervent ways.

Don't like it, don't do it - but don't stop others from doing so or being able to congregate with others who want to.

No one forces you to go to places that allow smoking - but plenty of people force me to breath polluted air from their cars, pollute my world with their trash from electronics, etc and so on.

[LuckyTheDog]

14. So, bartenders and wait staff...

... have a lesser right to a safe work environment than others? I think not. Nobody would say that construction workers should have a "right" to work at sites without safety equipment.

[The Straight Story]

17. It is about choice

If no one wanted to work in such a place, then no one would.

It is like telling people we should get rid of the morning after pill because some people who work in a pharmacy don't want to dispense it and why should they have to work at a place that makes them do it.

You CHOOSE which jobs to take, where to eat, drink, etc.

People limiting the choice of others based on their own personal preferences is anti-choice.

[LuckyTheDog]

20. So a no-hardhat construction company...

would be OK with you? I mean, hey, the workers could always just quit, right? What if I decided to run a meatpacking plant without any safety equipment on the meat slicers? I'll bet I could get some people to work in such a place. Should I be "free" to do that?

I just think there is a difference between protecting freedom per se and protecting the "freedom" to intrude on the rights of others who have less power in a given situation than you do.

State "blue" laws make no sense at all. It's just an attempt to impose morality on personal behavior. But smoking restrictions are not about the smoker. They are about the rights and safety of the NONsmokers.

[The Straight Story]

24. To take that a step further

Should a company make me drive across town and sit in polluted traffic to get to my job when I can do most of my work from home (I am a programmer and business analyst)? I risk my life everyday on the road, look how many accidents there are.

Safety starts with personal choice.

THERE is a common sense line where I think we can agree, and that is where I think most of us truly want to be. That common sense line though is being erased as we find more and more ways to connect what you do to how that affects my life.

Life is a risky business. If NO line is drawn we get sucked in more and more to control of our lives and choices, and that to me is dangerous.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

18. Bingo!!!

Ding! Ding! Ding!

We have a winner.

Can't make much discussion with someone who disapproves of smoking and fails to acknowledge the greatest principle at work there.

My favorite example of an initiative that failed - thankfully - was a local Maryland suburb that wanted to outlaw smoking in the whole place. In private home, in your car, on your front lawn, everywhere.

I was with a friend once in a park in that particular jurisdiction. My friend smoked cigarettes - he was also curator of primates at the National Zoo, so he knew a lot about the behavior of the species - and guy walks over to us from a long way over. It was a clear day, not windy, and this guy went so nuts on my friend because he was smoking a cigarette and he and his wife could smell it, that I really thought he might stroke out.

My friend just listened to him and smiled and kept on smoking.

It was absurd.

[LuckyTheDog]

23. No, I get it.

In the minds of some people, the "right to smoke" is greater than the right to be free from foul-smelling toxic smoke. But I think there should be some balance. I also think smokers bring this on themselves, to some extent, when they refuse to be reasonable about where they blow their smoke.

I don't care if you put nicotine into your body. Really. Go ahead. But why do it in such a way that requires me to take some in, too? Nicotine gum is widely available. Why not use that?

The greater principle at work here is that this is not about "picking on smokers" or others who do rude things. It's about the rights of everyone else.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

26. No, you don't get it -

you are not forced to go where smokers go. You have the right exercise that choice.

Your dislike does not trump the free choice of others.

That's the part you simply are not grasping.

[The Straight Story]

27. I guess that is what I don't get - WHO is forcing you to inhale smoke?

Are they coming in to your house or something? Are they going to your bar or to the one where smokers go (or used to be able to go).

It is that whole notion of forcing people I don't get.

You are not forced to go into any place that allows smoking, you have a choice.

And last time I checked, the folks on the left were pro-choice.

[LuckyTheDog]

33. Until laws were passed...

... I could not ride a train, fly on a plane, or go to my job without smelling foul, toxic smoke. Now that is illegal. You call that "nanny state tyranny." I call it a relief. I cannot reconcile the idea that flight attendants, office workers and commuters are worthy of protection, but bartenders, waiters and restaurant customers are not.

[SeattleGirl]

52. Good grief! Smoking on planes and trains has been illegal for the

longest time. And as far as I know, it is now illegal in many, if not all public buildings. It's even illegal in many bars and restaurants.

All this damned outrage over something that doesn't even happen in as many places as it used to just boggles my mind.

Lemme tell you a little secret: A total cessation of smoking by every smoker on earth will NOT end poverty, strife, racism, misogny, bank failures, tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes, or anything else. And you know what, it won't even end air pollution.

I have no problem with people who prefer not to be around cigarette smoke. But the rabid up-in-arms-ness that I often see sets my teeth on edge.

[Hannah Bell]

53. smoking is illegal in restaraunts in 35 states, with various local bans in the rest.

[LuckyTheDog]

55. You missed my point

The point was that it actually took the force law to get smokers to stop lighting up in those places. It never should have been that way, had common sense and basic courtesy prevailed. It didn't. Eventually, the legislative process had to be used.

Smokers can complain all they want about the "tyranny" of smoking laws. But those laws would not be necessary if smokers could just learn to respect the space of others.

The question is not why we should make laws against smoking in restaurants. The question is: Why does anyone have to be forced to not smoke in a restaurant when people should know better?

[Hannah Bell]

54. smoking is banned statewide in restaurants in 35 states, with patchworks

of local restrictions in the remaining 15.

[Chulanowa]

46. Well, let's stop and think about others who's freedoms are oppressed!

You think you have it bad?

Heroin addicts aren't allowed to shoot up in government buildings and then leave the needle on the floor.
If I get shitfaced and then chuck my lunch all over the restaurant I'm in, I can get in trouble!
Those poor sex addicts can't just get it on wherever they like.
Hell, they can't even rub one out onto the wall of most bars.
And can you believe that going over to someone and farting in their face is considered assault? GOSH!

I think all of us, smokers and non alike, should work to free our brothers from the oppression of not being able to exercise their freedoms as they please!

[LuckyTheDog]

47. Thanks for that (nt)

[ixion]

11. yep, I agree

freedom and liberty from both social conservatives and nanny staters. :applause:

[Tommy_Carcetti]

37. Ahhh, libertarians. You have to love em.

:eyes:

[pnutbutr]

40. couldn't have been said better

:fistbump:

[JanMichael]

6. What nobody ever gets is the "freedom" FROM or the "liberty" FROM

As in the freedom to make a buck and not the freedom from being exploited by some dickhead wanting to make a buck.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

9. Or (my personal favorite, so often overlooked),

freedom from religion................

[Echo In Light]

39. Have your read Marcuse' One-Dimensional Man?

[ColbertWatcher]

21. What would be interesting to see would be ...

... when the President of the United States holds a rally people would chant "USA! USA!" instead of his name.

I wish people would start treating him like the president of the whole country, instead of some celebrity.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

29. Maybe during his second term?

But, right now, I think people are just so relieved at having been rescued from the world of Chimpy Fucknuts, they're sort of worshiping Obama right now.

I confess to feeling that way. I get teary every time I see or hear him, and I know it's just a relief reaction ..................

[deaniac21]

30. We should kill all of them.

[NYC_SKP]

35. I agree. I think we need to own the word, "patriot", too. nt

[Naturyl]

36. Yeah, it's garbage.

Fascism is not freedom.

It's just not.

[Echo In Light]

38. The FASCISTS always use projective euphemisms because it's effective with the ignorant

[Faryn Balyncd]

44. Apt term - - - - - - "Projective Euphemisms"

Thanks.

[Echo In Light]

45. It's fairly simple psychology

The Right tends toward suppression/repression/authoritarianism, and such individuals fear their own 'other' within, and so lash out at those who they perceive embody that which they deny.

Basically it imputes to others that which one is most guilty of, or more fully represents.

Example: listen to almost any American propaganda re the phony "war on terror," and pretty much any negative characteristic ascribed to "the terrorists" is something that can equally - and far more accurately - be used to describe US foreign and domestic policies.

[baldguy]

41. The liberty of ignorance, the freedom of the poor house.

[MonteLukast]

42. Freedom of the corporation to screw us over.

That's a Sartre kind of "freedom"... a twisted, jaundiced "you are condemned to be free"; meaning, of course, you fend for yourself, bucko.

The Republicans' tack is one that counts on us being taken in by words. "Change your words and change your life", they'll say: borrowing from religious and spiritual tracts, overhyping the power of choosing your words carefully, turning it into another example of magical thinking. Their biggest example, in fact.

The Republicans count on us being too busy, tired, stressed or confident in the soundness of our instincts, to look beyond words to see if the actions match. Or if the words are being used in a context that drains them of their original meaning. Their success demands they muddy the water, so it's difficult for us to have any context.

[LuckyTheDog]

49. It's all about manipulation...

... that they dress up as "debate." They don't really have ideas. They merely USE whatever ideas that they think will help them in their quest for power and money. It's sick and kind of sociopathic.

[Faryn Balyncd]

43. These RW demagogues who wanted to END HABEAS CORPUS have the gaul to claim "limited government" is..

what they are about.

The sad truth is that whenever they come up with a meme ("liberty", "freedom", "moral values", "advancing democracy", "supporting the constitution", "limited government"............) the current ideology that now has usuped the label of "conservatism" always stands for the OPPOSITE of what is claimed.

[LuckyTheDog]

48. Yep

And so far, they are getting away with the "freedom and liberty" thing,

[eridani]

50. They mean the "freedom" of the ubermenschen to do whatever they jolly well please--

--to the untermenschen.

[rampart]

51. "freedom, in the slogans of the strong

usually means unfettered liberty to exploit the weak"

will durant

[LuckyTheDog]

56. That is very true

There is no such thing as a natural freedom to exploit others.

[ShadowLiberal]

57. You forgot the big one, freedom from discrimination, the GOP is clearly against that now

What pisses me off more then anything when hearing the GOP talk about being the party of 'freedom' is how how horrible they are on civil rights issues. I mean sure 100 years ago they used to be the social liberal party of more tolerant people, but not anymore.

Who's standing up for the rights of persecuted minority groups who aren't so liked by a majority right now? Obviously not the republicans, they use hatred of those persecuted minority groups for political gain. It's democrats who are willing to stand up and take political heat for defending the rights of gays, Muslims, Hispanics/immigrants (most of them are Hispanics who suffer discrimination), etc.

We need to call out the GOP on not being for the freedom of those who suffer from being discriminated against.

[LuckyTheDog]

58. The GOP actually

seems to stand up for the "right" to discriminate. They would like to see all nondiscrimination laws go away.