Would you describe yourself as a free thinker?

[Dorian]

As I said in a post on my other thread, I've run into a couple of Marxists who don't like to describe themselves as "free thinkers" or even "progressive", as scientific and materialist as they are, because they regard it as a "liberal" label, and negatively associate the terms with people like Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins or Bill Maher (all self-described freethinkers). I'm just asking because it seems like the Marxists I've met can go to unreasonable lengths to distance themselves from anything liberal, even though liberals can sometimes be our only allies around.

[Jimmie Higgins]

As I said in a post on my other thread, I've run into a couple of Marxists who don't like to describe themselves as "free thinkers" or even "progressive", as scientific and materialist as they are, because they regard it as a "liberal" label, and negatively associate the terms with people like Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins or Bill Maher (all self-described freethinkers). I'm just asking because it seems like the Marxists I've met can go to unreasonable lengths to distance themselves from anything liberal, even though liberals can sometimes be our only allies around.There's some trickiness in definitions of these terms because they have various connotations and have also changed over time - I will try and use them in the common way that people see the terms today.

But even within the contemporary connotation of "liberal" I think there's a difference between someone who holds some liberal views or ideals and Liberalism. Liberalism is a pro-capitalist view ("Progressive" is varried, it can be what basically a democratic socialist in the US might call themselves, but in general it would be a kind of reformist), today in official politics it basically means austerity with maybe a little less vitriol. But Liberalism fundamentally is a view about how to best preserve and expand capitalism.

Regular people who hold liberal views however, can be our allies and I think they are generally the people who we want to try and convince away from Liberal arguments and explanations in favor of revolutionary ones. But people who call themselves liberal generally are not liberal because of a set ideological worldview that they are committed to, but because they want union protections, they want to not be totally at the mercy of capitalist demands, they don't want racism or homophobia, etc.

But the problem is the Liberalism supports a system that maintains and bolsters the exploitation and oppressions and lack of real democratic input that many working class people with "liberal positions" hope that Liberalism will help ease.

And yes, radicals are generally hostile to Liberalism because it supports exploitation, oppressions, and imperialism. We are sometimes more hostile to it than we are to conservatism because Liberal politics are often a barrier to more radical possibilities because they offer a non-threatening non-solution to the overlapping concerns of say, anti-racist workers and anti-racist activists. So in a practical way we are more in competition with the ideas of Liberalism than with the ideas of Conservatism because it's not like conservatives are going to come to a grassroots anti-police brutality coalition and then convince other workers that we will best organize by having a voter-turnout for Obama or vote in a new Mayor.

A lot of the knee-jerk frustration from the Left comes from "Liberal hypocrisy" of appealing to semi-popular wishes but supporting the system that creates the initial problems anyway. Like how can liberals claim to be anti-war but then vote for Obama, forget LBJ and WWI and WWII were all under Presidents who got the "anti-war" vote.

Finally, I think anecdotally, for some of us, we were drawn to revolutionary ideas out of a frustration with the limitations and hypocrisy of Liberalism and liberal politicians. So it's natural that we would get a little irked by being lumped in with ideas we consciously rejected.

[Blake's Baby]

Partly there's a problem that 'socially liberal' doesn't usually apply to the same people as as 'economically liberal'. 'Economic liberals' are often social conservatives if not positive reactionaries, and 'social liberals' are often economic protectionists.

I was a bit shocked a couple of years ago to discover that the Liberal Democrats (centrist party in the UK) include both 'social liberals' and what they called 'market liberals' in the party. I'd never heard of 'market liberals' before. It's the 'market liberal' wing that is currently in control of the party and in coalition government with the 'Conservate' party (which is economically 'liberal').

[Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant']

I don't find that label 'offensive' or inaccurate, I get why Marxists might want to distance themselves from it because of it's connections to liberal rhetoric but I don't have a problem with it personally.

[BIXX]

Honestly calling yourself a free thinker just sounds kinda annoying. I mean, I get why the label exists and whatnot, but seriously- if someone tells you they are a free thinker they tend to be really annoying.

No problems with it otherwise, but I haven't researched it much.

[Igor]

its smug as hell and if you call yourself that you need to get over yourself

[Rosa Partizan]

Maybe there's another connotation in Western Europe than in the US, but to me, being liberal is nothing bad, unless it's about economic liberalism.

[PhoenixAsh]

Freethinking is basing opinions on empirical thought and reason rather than authority and tradition. I don't really see how that is "liberal" since I think Marxism can be a form of empirical reasoning.

So yeah...I also realize that most revolutionaries, and invariably Marxists, are ultimately very dogmatic. So are in fact not really freethinkers. ;)

[Criminalize Heterosexuality]

Maybe there's another connotation in Western Europe than in the US, but to me, being liberal is nothing bad, unless it's about economic liberalism.

In the context of revolutionary leftism, "liberal" refers to the bourgeois ideology of historic Liberal (or - for example - Ka-Det) parties. Saying that someone is a liberal means they haven't broken with bourgeois politics.

Us Trotskyists in particular like to hide behind piles of unsold newspapers and shoot accusations of liberalism and Stalinism at each other behind the heavy cover.

[Skyhilist]

No one is a "free thinker". All of our thoughts are predetermined mostly by material conditions and by genetics to a lesser extent. There's nothing free about all your thoughts and actions being predetermined before your conscious mind is even aware of them.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

The term "free thinking," seems on the face of it like a meaningless term and not necessarily consistent with our understanding of contemporary psychology and seems to rest on a number of presuppositions and logical fallacies. Completely unscientific, inaccurate, meaningless and not useful; to put it in nutshell.

[Comrade Jacob]

Like the word rationalist if you call yourself it you are normally a fool trying to sound above that.
Also as Igor said it's as smug as all hell.

[Creative Destruction]

I've never given much thought to the term, tbh. It's used by a lot of hardline atheists and since I'm not particularly hardline about atheism or agnosticism, I've never applied it to myself. Just my initial feelings, though, is that it is a pretty condescending and loaded term, frankly.

[Creative Destruction]

There's some trickiness in definitions of these terms because they have various connotations and have also changed over time - I will try and use them in the common way that people see the terms today.

But even within the contemporary connotation of "liberal" I think there's a difference between someone who holds some liberal views or ideals and Liberalism. Liberalism is a pro-capitalist view ("Progressive" is varried, it can be what basically a democratic socialist in the US might call themselves, but in general it would be a kind of reformist), today in official politics it basically means austerity with maybe a little less vitriol. But Liberalism fundamentally is a view about how to best preserve and expand capitalism.

Regular people who hold liberal views however, can be our allies and I think they are generally the people who we want to try and convince away from Liberal arguments and explanations in favor of revolutionary ones. But people who call themselves liberal generally are not liberal because of a set ideological worldview that they are committed to, but because they want union protections, they want to not be totally at the mercy of capitalist demands, they don't want racism or homophobia, etc.

But the problem is the Liberalism supports a system that maintains and bolsters the exploitation and oppressions and lack of real democratic input that many working class people with "liberal positions" hope that Liberalism will help ease.

And yes, radicals are generally hostile to Liberalism because it supports exploitation, oppressions, and imperialism. We are sometimes more hostile to it than we are to conservatism because Liberal politics are often a barrier to more radical possibilities because they offer a non-threatening non-solution to the overlapping concerns of say, anti-racist workers and anti-racist activists. So in a practical way we are more in competition with the ideas of Liberalism than with the ideas of Conservatism because it's not like conservatives are going to come to a grassroots anti-police brutality coalition and then convince other workers that we will best organize by having a voter-turnout for Obama or vote in a new Mayor.

A lot of the knee-jerk frustration from the Left comes from "Liberal hypocrisy" of appealing to semi-popular wishes but supporting the system that creates the initial problems anyway. Like how can liberals claim to be anti-war but then vote for Obama, forget LBJ and WWI and WWII were all under Presidents who got the "anti-war" vote.

Finally, I think anecdotally, for some of us, we were drawn to revolutionary ideas out of a frustration with the limitations and hypocrisy of Liberalism and liberal politicians. So it's natural that we would get a little irked by being lumped in with ideas we consciously rejected.

Well, it's not only that, but I think people are fairly quick to forget -- at least in America -- how violent liberals have been toward radicals. Nearly the entire Chicago Democratic machine was bent on destroying radical left groups in the city and murdered at least three leaders, including Fred Hampton, back in the 60s. They're also rather obnoxious and aggressive toward people who are barely social democrats, like the Greens (see: the 2000 and 2004 elections.) Etc.

There's very good reason to be extremely skeptical and even completely hostile toward liberals. They are, in the end, capitalists, and their zealous desire to try and defend themselves as capitalists is what becomes more harmful than anything else.

[Rss]

You cannot be a free thinker without fedora, MLP t-shirt and trenchcoat to back it up.

Yeah, it is kinda smug.

[Comrade Jacob]

You cannot be a free thinker without fedora, MLP t-shirt and trenchcoat to back it up.

Yeah, it is kinda smug.

Don't go ragging on trench-coats comrade. :grin:

[Sea]

I describe myself as a moon child.

[Thirsty Crow]

Substance over labels.

Adhere to historical materialism, and a communist, internationalist. That should be it.

[Illegalitarian]

Nope, "free thinker" is a class collaborationist liberal hogwash term used by people who pride themselves on being able to "~see both sides of the argument~" and "~find a nice middle ground somewhere~", basically getting their political ques from South Park.

Nonsense. Pure nonsense.

[BIXX]

Nope, "free thinker" is a class collaborationist liberal hogwash term used by people who pride themselves on being able to "~see both sides of the argument~" and "~find a nice middle ground somewhere~", basically getting their political ques from South Park.

Nonsense. Pure nonsense.


See, I've never noticed this. A lot of them don't take the middle ground, and a lot do.

[argeiphontes]

There's 'liberalism' which is a mainstream political position a bit to the right of, or partly the same as, progressivism. In the US, people in the Democratic Party and Green Party are called 'liberals.' These are the kinds of liberals nobody wants to associate with because they are capitalist reformists.

Then there's the 18th century political philosophy of Liberalism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism). Liberalism was revolutionary for its time and I'm sure that left-libertarianism (anarchism) owes some debt to Liberal and Enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century since nothing is without historical precedent. (More to Rousseau and Humboldt though, I suppose.)

Freethinkin' is a kind of antidogmatic, antireligious positivism that traces itself to the execution of Bruno. It's all in WikiPedia if you care. I'm not sure how it would be considered liberal or Liberal except as guilt by association.

[Rafiq]

Substance over labels.

Adhere to historical materialism, and a communist, internationalist. That should be it.

Where does it end? Should being a Communist not denote a sort of internationalism?

Anyway, the problem with referring to yourself as a free thinker is not that we do not "think freely" (even though to do so would be impossible, recall Hegel, 'to recognize limitations is already to be beyond them'), but that a 'free thinker' refers to a specific, historically defunct (though influential in modern bourgeois-liberal thinking) 'philosophical' (for lack of a better term) movement.

[Rafiq]

Nope, "free thinker" is a class collaborationist liberal hogwash term used by people who pride themselves on being able to "~see both sides of the argument~" and "~find a nice middle ground somewhere~", basically getting their political ques from South Park.

Nonsense. Pure nonsense.

Perhaps you refer to those who believe themselves to be 'above ideology', who are capable of forming a non-conscious, unbiased and rational conclusion from the rhetoric of different ideologies. It is these people that are the most ideological, who are the most biased and who are the most influenced by their consciousness. To be "moderate" in today's context is ideological identification with the existing state of affairs. Who decides the measuring point from which you locate your 'modernity'? Why are we far leftists, and they centrists? I, with all of my views, can call myself a moderate because I'm not like those Anarchists who take it 'too far' or those Stalinists who are embedded in classical liberal values. It's a worthless, arrogant and pretentious state of thinking inherited only by those who are incapable of forming conclusions beyond the political functions of legitimized ideology.

[Rafiq]

Then there's the 18th century political philosophy of Liberalism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism). Liberalism was revolutionary for its time and I'm sure that left-libertarianism (anarchism) owes some debt to Liberal and Enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century since nothing is without historical precedent. (More to Rousseau and Humboldt though, I suppose.)


We all owe some sort of debt to enlightenment thinkers, just as proletarian consciousness owes some sort of debt to the contradictions of capitalist production, or to the political domination of the bourgeois class. The point is, utilization of this ideological rhetoric. Anarchism (as a historical category, a movement, make no mistake, modern anarchist thinkers are riddled in revolting liberal muck) is not a 'liberal' ideology because it espouses the interests of the revolutionary proletariat over any sort of abstract liberty, albeit in a muddied, eclectic and immature fashion. Marxists, Communists, as well pre-suppose some values from the enlightenment, and from there draw our criticism, just as proletarian consciousness pre-requisites the existence of the bourgeois class.

[Future]

I've always assumed "free thinker" was just a broad term that meant someone who doesn't accept the status quo blindly and stands up for what they know is right regardless of the social repercussions.

Under that definition, I'm definitely a free thinker.

[Illegalitarian]

Perhaps you refer to those who believe themselves to be 'above ideology', who are capable of forming a non-conscious, unbiased and rational conclusion from the rhetoric of different ideologies. It is these people that are the most ideological, who are the most biased and who are the most influenced by their consciousness. To be "moderate" in today's context is ideological identification with the existing state of affairs. Who decides the measuring point from which you locate your 'modernity'? Why are we far leftists, and they centrists? I, with all of my views, can call myself a moderate because I'm not like those Anarchists who take it 'too far' or those Stalinists who are embedded in classical liberal values. It's a worthless, arrogant and pretentious state of thinking inherited only by those who are incapable of forming conclusions beyond the political functions of legitimized ideology.

Yep, this is exactly the type of people I'm talking about.

[BIXX]

Perhaps you refer to those who believe themselves to be 'above ideology', who are capable of forming a non-conscious, unbiased and rational conclusion from the rhetoric of different ideologies. It is these people that are the most ideological, who are the most biased and who are the most influenced by their consciousness. To be "moderate" in today's context is ideological identification with the existing state of affairs. Who decides the measuring point from which you locate your 'modernity'? Why are we far leftists, and they centrists? I, with all of my views, can call myself a moderate because I'm not like those Anarchists who take it 'too far' or those Stalinists who are embedded in classical liberal values. It's a worthless, arrogant and pretentious state of thinking inherited only by those who are incapable of forming conclusions beyond the political functions of legitimized ideology.


There are folks who are non-ideological, but I think you are not referring to the same people I am, as the people I am referring to do not claim to be unbiased or whatever.