Why do Americans consider Canada to be a left wing country?

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This is why I decided that I disliked both of those terms.
They can mean anything whatever a person wants them to mean.

So, you believe that the Democrats aren't fighting to restrict or even outlaw guns?

So first you said I made no point, and then you said you made the same point. Well if you made that point too then obviously there is a point?

Or are you saying that you don't like that I repeated your point? Well, in this case you also repeated hers. Its a normal trend of discussion, sometimes people agree and they might make the same point due to different angles.

Okay can you HONESTLY tell me. Are you just having an issue with me personally? If the same exact post wasn't made by me but was made by someone else isntead, would you have said what you just did?

Well, US is left compared to Russia and the rest of Eastern Europe for that matter. You are using Western Europe as a baseline, but actually Western Europe is far left compared to Eastern Europe, let alone most of human history.

Actually I'm using Western and Central Europe along with the Americas, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia and New Zealand.

I'm also not including more backwards nations for my comparisons because the US likes to imagine themselves as part of the developed world and not part of the same bloc as Moldova and Belarus.

I am pretty sure that Americas (if you mean latin America), South Korea and Taiwan are more conservative than the US. The liberalism is almost exclusively European/Canadian thing.



Moldova and Belarus are not backward nations. Look at their education system. In their high schools calculus is mandatory. In the USA its optional. Same goes for relativity and quantum mechanics. And, unlike the US, their history classes study the world history that they have to take throughout the duration of their studies. In the US they just do American history with only one year of World History.

Oh okay, so how is it determined which issues of freedom are the left issues, and which issues of freedom are the right ones?

That's complicated since, a lot of issues embraced by 'left' and 'right' parties aren't inherently either, and often it's the framing of the matter that's more important for who embraces it. Look at the ACA in the US, it's largely based on ideas from the Heritage Foundation, but Obama embraced it believing it would get Republicans on board. From that moment on it's been viewed as 'left wing' even though it was basically devised by people who would view themselves as conservatives.

If you want some basic ideas for what might make an issue more likely to be embraced by the left or right look into the nature of the freedom. The right tends to be more supportive of understandings of rights that lead to hierarchical outcomes; the left tends to be more supportive of understandings of rights that diminish hierarchy and privilege.

This isn't 100% how things play out in the real world though, because at least with Marxist- Leninists, often what happens is that one established hierarchy is crushed but a new one replaces it. The new one potentially offering more folks an opportunity to get in on the ground-floor so to speak, but also generally becoming just as cloistered, corrupt and detached as the one it replaced. That outcome also appears to be typical of reactionary/far-right states though and might help with defining where to split extreme conservatives from reactionaries. The latter are usually fixated on building their ideal image of the 'the old utopia' so firmly they will tear down the remnants of it to do so, and this plays into why historically conservatives have been skeptical of reactionaries. Not that that necessarily applies to the American right, America has always been a republic without any legally recognized nobility even if some portions of American society have had what amounted to an aristocracy (plantation owners being the earliest example, even more so when they started receiving an extra 3 votes for every five people they kept as property). That might play a role in why in the US the line between reactionary and conservative isn't as clear as late 1800s/early 1900s Europe.

Right is often identified with "conservative". Now, the root of the word "conservative" is "conserve". In other words, preserve things the way they used to be. Back in 19-th century people used guns, thats why "conservatives" are in favor of gun use. On the other hand, back in 19-th century homosexuality was illegal, thats why "conservatives" are opposed to homosexuality.

Left, on the other hand, is identified with "progressive". Progressive means "progress", that is, change over time. So "progressives" are in favor of whatever changes the society is currently going through. One such change is gun control increases over time. Thats why "progressives" support gun control. The other change is gay marriage is legalized, thats why "progressives" support legalization of gay marriage.

I think this definition assumes a leftist position of the speaker, as opposed to a neutral position. Because debate goes along the following lines:

Left wing position: People on the right want hierarchy while people on the left want equality

Right wing position: People on the left want "reverse discrminination" while people on the right want equality

So you can't, while remaining neutral, define either side as "wanting equality", since both of them self-evaluate this way.

Besides, the issue of equality vs inequality doesn't even cover all the topics they argue about. Like the topic of gun control, or the topic of global warming, I simply don't see why taking either side would result in either equality or hierarchy. Or perhaps you see something that I don't? If so, please let me know, because that is something I been wondering about, myself, for quite some time.

I'm too tired to make a more in depth post, but two things that came to mind:

1; the arguments you define as left-wing argument vs. right wing argument seem largely to mirror the split within liberalism that led to New Liberals vs. Classical Liberals and libertarians. Even Adam Smith pondered the idea of 'how much' equality is needed because he started realizing that, for example, someone with only basic literacy is unlikely to be able to elevate themselves out of the situation they were raised in. That doesn't mean that some won't, but it means things are heavily skewed against them. Eventually the camps couldn't really be reconciled.

2; I've never viewed gun control as a left vs. right issue, primarily because my own views leave me 'to the right' of the Tories or the People's Party in Canada, and basically roughly aligned with American moderates. I would favour liberalizing Canada's gun laws somewhat, although by the standards of this forum's ammosexual community I'm still a gun-grabber although I'd basically look at the 90s era in the US as close to what I'd prefer, although I'd be less focused on cosmetic features, the only two functional features that matter are the inline stock and the high capacity box magazine. I'd likely favour limiting guns with both of those features to smaller magazine capacity than ones with only one of the two features, but the more I ramble the more this becomes a rabbit hole I'm not heading down tonight.

The actual right doesn't really claim to be for "equality". But doesn't mean that they really oppose it either. It's so tricky because the English language has become so butchered and polarized that many words just mean whatever the speaker wants them to mean.

I think US citizens have little idea of what socialised healthcare is because they have never experienced it. Yet many are quite happy to back other public institutions like a bloated military, who have almost carte blanche funding and are well known for wasting money (even if you support a strong military they still burn money unnecessarily and this is well documented).

Socialised healthcare doesn't need to come from a idelogical bent. There is a pragmatic approach to associating the health of the nation to economic growth and stability.

The US, like most countries showers in 'communist' water. Only UK and I believe Argentinia have fully privatised their water supply. What about all those other municipal services the US has?Crickets... I'm being fascious obviously, but it is in response to those that make assumptions about things they have never actually implemented, or experienced, and use that to play domestic politics, or repeating tired cold war era waffle.

The reality is most countries with socialised healthcare have widespread public support for it, and cross party support too. Which is why you have systems that have lasted 70+ years. You think we could not go to our MP or representative if we didn't agree...in 70 years? You think during all that time nobody who had experienced before this or had experienced other private healthcare would have not voted to dismantle it, if it was so bad?

The report that resulted in the NHS being founded was authored, not by a socialist, but a classical liberal ecconmist. Liberal in this sense means someone who in in favour of free trade and laissez-faire economic principles by and large. His arguments were largely based on economics.

On the other hand many US have no idea how poor value they are getting even amongst private healthcare systems. To stitch a laceration you are talking 200USD on average. I'm talking a single stitch being in that ballpark, which is at least five times as expensive as it should be if we are being conservative.

I know because my sister is high up in insurance, that there is no such thing as 'comprehesive' insurance. You can have your tripple platinum plan, when you are up s**t creek and you think you are covered the rug can be pulled from under you. You can take them to court but you chances of winning are slim and your expenses will he high. The reality is public and private healthcare work best together.

In Ireland there is no council tax. Bin collection is mess because everyone gets it on different days from different companies, it is not at all efficient and recycling is limited. It is generally poor value in rural areas. They also have an insurance based medical system, with a medical card. A&E, ambulances you don't pay for. It is not as good as the NHS but better value than in the US. Irish who live in Northern Ireland generally prefer the NHS over HSE in they have experienced both.

Last edited by 0_equals_true on 09 May 2020, 4:45 am, edited 1 time in total.

Canada is considered Left because Trudeau is or aims to be. He plays this left identiarian 'progressive' politics that is ever popular. But it is not really progressive or liberal at all.

His father was just as much a populist.

Authoritarianism exists on both sides of the political divide.

You can use whatever definition you like, but there is difference from the professed aims and the reality.

The original French definition of Left and Right are quite a bit different from modern definitions. The concept itself is limited.

Also Old Tory merged with Liberal principles.

Some confusion could be the US use of the word Liberal has diverged from the original meaning and in the US the Liberals are the left.

In Australia the Liberal party is more Conservative even monachist, but with some classical liberalism (albeit with strict immigration policy).

Oh okay well the part where you say that the right prefers rights that are about hierarchy, I find to be confusing, because I thought that taking away people's guns and their free spreech was a hierachical outcome, isn't it?