i need some definitions please.

[Ravenbm]

i think i am pretty "left-wing".
but could you define:
Left-Wing
comunism.
Anarchy.
and facism.(its not a good thing right?)


thanks.

[ArrowLance]

I'll try, at the risk of offending any of those groups (other than the fascists, who cares about them).

Left-Wing: Economically, I would say more collective or social in nature. That's all I dare say, and I'm not even completely sure that's true. Overall I don't find the label all that useful (maybe because I'm a bit confused to what it really means).

Communism: A Stateless, Classless, Egalitarian society.

Anarchy: Statelessness. I'm sure there is more to it but this is the best I can think of that applies to ALL anarchists (I'm including an-caps).

Fascism: Ya, not good. Fascism generally refers to a system involving; one-party rule, corporativism, and nationalism. Also their outlook on classes is very different from marxists. They think that marxists exploit the classes into class warfare (or something like that). Instead they believe in a 'Strong vs. Weak' view on classes.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

Left-wing: No one really knows what it means; or, to be more exact, it is a political term that has always been vague and open to interpretation. It was created during the French Revolution in the late 18th century and originally referred to those people who supported a democratic republic and were opposed to the monarchical status quo. Over time it changed meaning, and the only thing that the various uses of the term "left-wing" have in common is that they always refer to people who oppose the established status quo and promote social change in the direction of more equality. If you want a very short definition, you could say that "left-wing" = "advocates of more social and economic equality".

Communism: This word can have two separate meanings. It can refer to a type of society, or to a political movement (whose final goal is to establish that type of society).

1. Communism as a type of society: A stateless, classless, egalitarian society. This means a society in which most decisions are taken by direct democracy (stateless), where most property is held in common (classless), and where there is near-total equality of wealth between people (egalitarian).

2. Communism as a political movement: Also known as Marxism, this is a political movement that advocates the creation of a communist society (see above) through class struggle and a workers' revolution.

Anarchy: When used to refer to a type of society, "anarchy" usually means the same as "communism." Sometimes it is more generic, in the sense that anarchy may only require statelessness and not also classlessness and egalitarianism like communism does. And sometimes the precise kind of statelessness of "anarchy" is different from the precise kind of statelessness of "communism" (in other words, communists and anarchists may disagree on how decisions are to be made in the absence of a state).

Fascism: A political movement that advocates radical nationalism, corporatism, class collaboration, social and economic inequality, and sometimes also racism. It is very strongly opposed to the left in general because fascism is based on the idea of inequality ("the strong must dominate the weak"), while the guiding principle of the left is equality. Also, fascism is exceptionally opposed to communism in particular, because communism advocates international solidarity and class struggle ("workers of all countries unite and overthrow the capitalists!"), while fascism advocates nationalism and class collaboration ("workers and capitalists of our country, stand together and fight other countries!")

[A_Ciarra]

Here's a link to take the political spectrum test. (http://www.politicalcompass.org/analysis) and also study the short analysis - it will definitely help you understand how parties or groups break down. Basically you have four quadrants on a grid. Left to right is your economics spectrum (how money is made, who's getting what etc, how it's distributed) -- then vertical is your authority/state operated or Libertarian/organized by the people from the bottom up scale. You definitely want to know how that is broken down to understand who is who, what you believe and so on.

I have to go so I’ll just post on anarchism and skip fascism. Anarchists seek to reverse the way power plays out. Right now what we have basically amounts to dictators sitting on top telling the people how things are going to be (or else). We don't want politicians running our affairs; we want the freedom to organize our communities ourselves. Only we go about power by involving all people in ways that directly affects their lives. We don't want to make moves that violate others wishes, so we co-operate OR refrain from making decisions until issues are resolved... In this way we seek to reverse the pyramid of power and truly put it directly into the hands of the people (not mobsters and their worker bee's/politicians that ultimately ignore the people for their own power).

There are different branches of anarchist's of course, different methods in how people can specifically organize and all that. You definitely would want to look up direct, and consensus democracy since they are very different than representative democracy like we have now. There are also groups identifying as anarchists that are NOT (anarcho_capitalists and such). Anarchism refers to classical anarchism which is always left wing. If you do searches you want to stick to classical anarchist sites like Infoshop, SpunkLibrary, AnarchyArchives, Libcom.com, LucyParsonsProject and such (run if you hear people referring to Ayn Rand in the positive – damn capitalists). And here is one page FLYER (http://struggle.ws/pdfs/whatis.pdf) you can check out.
Keep in mind that anarchism holds beliefs in running autonomous communities to, so it's not like anarchist's are asking anyone else to join us that totally disagrees, we first want our own freedom (and to give that to others in their own, states, countries whatever). We will work on the greater forces of imperialism down the line. For an example of an anarchist based community you check out the video documentary A Place Called Chiapas (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4513202692382805096&ei=BIxVSsWlB6S6qwPcztDBBg&q=A+Place+Called+Chiapas&hl=en&client=firefox-a). They pretty much living in poverty (NAFTA) so that might be a little shocking put they are a great example of community structure from the bottom up.
:)

[RedRise]

These are the dictionary definitions;
Left-wing:
'The liberal, socialist or radical section of a political party or system.'

Communism:
'A political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.'

Now really I don't see why everyone's got such a big problem with all that! I mean, people bemoan all the poverty in Africa and other places around the world. I think it's like when I'm looking for the Milo in the cupboard and I can't see that's it's right in front of me. :rolleyes:

Anarchy:
'Absence of government and absolute freedom of the individual.'

Why didn't anybody think of that before? Every human is born with the desire (and right) for freedom!

Fascism:
'And authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization.'

Pretty much the opposite of everything we talk about here.

Scarlowy

P.S. If anyone was wondering why it took me so long to post, it's because of computer problems. :blushing:

[CommunityBeliever]

Left-Wing:
A broad range of political ideology that is denouncing the of economic and social inequality in the present order of society and advocating the adoption of vigorous public policies to reduce or eliminate these inequalities in opposition of the political agenda of the rightist. Common political paths include socialism , communism , social democracy, welfare statism, contemporary American liberalism and anarchy.
http://www.information-entertainment.com/Politics/polterms.html

Communism:
People who are for the abolition of all private property including the state and the corporations.

Anarchy:
An ideology that is basically about eliminating authority and control.

Fascism:
An ideology held by a group of good for nothing haters.

[CommunityBeliever]

Oh I recommend that political spectrum test thing, thank you "A Ciarra" for posting that. It rates you based on libertarianism and leftism I got

Economic Left/Right: -8.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.56

Oh and it gives you a picture too
http://www.politicalcompass.org/facebook/pcgraphpng.php?ec=-8.00&soc=-4.56

[Tjis]

(I'm including an-caps).
You shouldn't. That's like saying national bolsheviks are leninists.


'Absence of government and absolute freedom of the individual.'

Not absolute freedom of the individual, but the freedom to do all things that do not limit the freedom of others. Absolute freedom would include the freedom to rape kill and exploit, something anarchists are obviously against.

[A_Ciarra]

Yep, :thumbup1: taking that test is great when your forming your politics. And people shift along the different spectrum the more and more they develop their views, so even though you score one thing today that can definitely change later down the road.

But it's interesting to see that when most people identifying them selves as democrats in the US - they are really Democratic Socialist's or communists, which is really is vastly different than what the Democrat Party is running in the US. In other words most of those lending support to the Democrat Party are seriously working AGAINST what they believe in, and would want to impart - especially onto the planet through the foreign policies of the Democrat Party. This is important because the Democrat Party is being used by the wealthy to enact seriously violent crimes as they seek to control the worlds resources and control governments through imperialism. Other than some civil wars (that are often stirred up by the US and others), peoples struggles to become free around this plant can almost always be traced back to how the Democrat, conservative and others parties are being used to keep and maintain control of the people elsewhere. This of course goes to the Parties of the UK and elsewhere too.

The way democratic socialists and state communists break down how they organize, and the way anarchists do are quite different - but a lot of truly leftist strides are made just by people having the chance to use little tools like the political spectrum tests and notice where their beliefs and loyalties truly are. A lot of the anarchists and other leftist's I know first made a hard switch to the left after taking this or similar tests. Good little tool indeed.

[Ravenbm]

thanks so much everyone,
u guys really help alot:laugh:

[mikelepore]

The main thread I see in the terms "left" and "right" is:

The "left" says social inequality is caused mainly by environmental circumstances, the economic system doesn't give everyone the same opportunity, the playing field isn't level, equality is possible if society were run in a more rational way, the people should change the system.

The "right" says social inequality is caused mainly by some people being smarter and creative, and choosing to be more hard-working, and they move up the ladder, others are lazy and they end up being poor, inevitable due to the nature of the individuals.

There are hundreds of political and economic organizations with their own programs, but I think this distinction clarifies a lot about how they line up.