What is the 'far left'?

I can't count the times I've read and heard on TV that the dems are going far left as if wanting to stop the war, health care, poverty and other issues are so out there that anyone who supports them are nuts.

I understand left, centrist, liberal, conservative, right wing and all that.

But far left? What is that? Socialism?

And which is being employed in any one usage of it can be difficult to sort out.

The most common definition, probably, is an individual's feeling someone is more to the left by a good measure than they are themselves: you can see 'rightist' and the like employed this way a lot as well. Many people consider themselves to be of the left, and are, but do not see themselves as so far to the left that they wish, say, more than a European Social Democrat party promotes.

Then there is a purely propagandistic usage, designed to shut down people's consideration of ideas the person using the term does not want considered, by making them seem emblems of something fringe and widely unpopular. There is a strain on the left, vocal out of proportion to its numbers, that is widely perceived by the people as 'anti-American', and to succeed in tying a political figure or a policy to this group in the popular mind is to destroy it in our political life.

rhetorically more often than as a reification of any actual social phenomenon in the U.S.

Note that the "left"\"right" dichotomy originated in the French Revolution of 1789.

was communism. Maybe with no sight of Emmnuael Goldstein aka Bin Laden being caught they're resorting to the previous spook.

The terms far left and far right are often used to imply that someone is an extremist, and are usually used as pejorative terms by outsiders rather than as self-labels. The term ultra-left is sometimes used in the same way, but also has a more specific meaning within the Marxist tradition. Hard left is sometimes used in the same way, but also has a more specific meaning within the British Labour Party. The far left has been associated in various degrees with socialism, communism, anarchism, anarcho-syndicalism, Marxist-Leninism and Maoism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_left

..."anything I don't favor."

Just as you suggested, it's just their way of demonizing those who care about stopping the war, health care, poverty, etc. because doing those things would take money out of their pockets. Ironically, they would probably define THEMSELVES as centrists!

:headbang:
rocknation

left, centrist, liberal, ??

i asked that question of one of my co-workers and went through the list of liberal stances. we both agreed that the majority of americans must be 'far left' because they believe in most of the same things we do.

the 'far' or 'extreme' left wing is a construct of the rw and the msm designed to make boogeymen out of liberals . . . again. it is b*llsh*t. just another example of rw control of the language and their use of the msm to perpetuate their obfuscations.

ellen fl

And sadly, it seems the GOP is not the only political party using that definition.

For the 'good' of all - forcing me to live the only life I have the way they say.

They will want to monitor what I eat, my weight, if I smoke, how many miles I can drive in a year, tell me how many kids I can have, lay constant guilt trips on people about how their very existence is hurting this rock we live on and use scare tactics constantly (ala bush and his terror warnings) to attempt to make me a slave to their social religion.

The rw wants to control us so they can save us from terror, the far left wants to control me to protect mother earth and save me from her.

The far left and right have the few who think they should control the many because they are smarter than everyone else and they can only save us by forcing us to do what they say is best. Which is funny to me....

The rw wants preach abstinence and we scoff because it just ain't natural. People like to fuck like bunnies, always have and always will. The lw wants to preach abstinence on meat, cutting down trees, fishing, smoking, etc - something we have been doing for centuries and ain't going to change either.

The people who have stepped away from the 'far' part on both sides get it, and want to meet somewhere else along the spectrum, balancing out freedom for the individual with the needs of the group.

As was once said "Do what is best for yourself, AND the Group, and you will get the best results for everyone"

I am so glad I've never actually run into one of those critters. Where did you say you found one?

Just read GD a lot and some will pop up like in the whack a mole game.

And they are 'far' left, as in few and far between. But the OP asked what far left meant, and I explained it from my vantage point.

Most people on the left have balance, change through education and such. When you start forcing people to do things you think are best it can become an issue.

And since we are a nation of laws we all know there are laws that serve a good and useful purpose, it is abuse in creating laws that shifts the person into the 'far' category on either side of the political spectrum.


Legislating people to 'purity' has never worked, the churches of yore can attest to that.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

not economic/political leftists.

along with Hillary, Bush and all the other corporatists

capitalism is not compatible with democracy and anyone who has figured that out to even the slightest degree is "far left"

candidate other than the MSM's designated frontrunners.

are on I would say far-left would be communism, anarchism, revolutionary socialism, etc.


But what people on TV mean: anyone to the right of Joe Lieberman. At least that's what I gather from the way they use it.

and definitely would not describe any American Democrats.

The new meaning is you think social security is a good idea.

a "Democratic Socialist".

Far left and proud!

If there was a far left, they'd be supportive of the Chimp's attempt to control the media, etc.