The Rose Outlook

“Everyone is a liberal except me.”

This is a statement exemplifying many left-wing attitudes, and it’s not hard to find left-wing people using this mantra to insult or attempt to discredit people with even the slightest views against them.

What is liberalism?

Liberalism is a capitalist or ‘bourgeois’ ideology that first took hold of Western nations. It emerged in a classical form after the Enlightenment, resulting in bourgeois revolutions that sought to replace feudal monarchies and theocracies. Liberalism supports the ‘free market’ and individualism, supporting individual autonomy, liberal democracy, and the rule of law.

In A Counter-History by communist Domenico Losurdo, he wrote that “liberalism, as a philosophical position and ideology, has been bound up with the most illiberal of policies: slavery, colonialism, genocide, racism and snobbery.” I have many critiques of liberalism, but it was useful for its time–progressing into the next stage of human ideology.

The Opinion

I previously said that many leftists use this as an insult, including myself. The problem lies when leftists, traditionally of the more radical type (Leftcoms, Leninists, Maoists, etc.) use this adjective for someone who doesn’t directly and rigidly support their movement. Due to this, they are dubbed ‘complicit’ in capitalist ideology, and thus, a liberal. This logic is similar to the “social fascist” theory that Stalinists applied to Social Democrats, arguing they were ‘complicit in fascism’ and thus ‘the moderate wing of fascism’.

Even large communities are infested with the same problem! If you support Ukraine? You’re a liberal. It doesn’t matter if you’re a communist or even an anarchist. I don’t think we should let Ukraine be conquered by the aspiring imperialist Vladimir Putin, but because of this, tankies would accuse me of being a liberal! For example, I have some problems with Marxism-Leninism. It’s too authoritarian, except… well, this thought makes me a liberal. The mindset in question echoes the rhetoric of the far-right, who quash any independent thought and label people as ‘republicans/rightists in name only’. 

Conclusion

If you’re a part of the problem, thinking that anyone who disagrees with you is simply a liberal, you ought to reflect on why you think you’re always right. Left unity is essential. However, this isn’t realistic if you cling to radical dogma or kill any independent thought as if it were a mortal heresy.