The #1 Problem With the Left

I'm pretty much a leftie when it comes to politics. I support higher taxes on the rich, universal healthcare, the welfare state, drug legalisation, access to abortion, a carbox tax, and so on.

However, I still try my best to be impartial, and try and judge issues on their merits, rather than based on who's arguing for who.

Tribalism is rampant in politics. I'm guessing it was probably worse in the past, but you can still see it everywhere. For anyone who doesn't know, 'tribalism' could be defined as judging people not based on what they say, but simply on who they are. Despite their lofty promises, I notice the left does this just as much as the right.

Please, lets not even try and deny this. Conservative politicians, from Margaret Thatcher to George Bush to Tony Abbott, are constantly (and often unfairly) ridiculed by various figures on the left. If Tony Abbott came out tomorrow and declared that 'the sky is blue' there'd immediately be a flood of posts in my Facebook newsfeed saying 'OMG! Doesn't Tony Abbott know that the sky is red or orange at sunset? WTF? Tony is sooo stupid!'

But even this hypocrisy is not the biggest problem with the left side of politics. No, here's the real biggest problem.

They're not FOR anything.

Now the left is against plenty of things, sure. They're against racism, sexism, big business, corruption, pseudoscience, war, poverty, pollution and a whole lot of other bad things, yes.

But what are they actually for?

Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson highlighted this recently when he said he'd challenged the Greens to name one place in Australia where they would support the building of a mine.

Apparently, he's yet to get a response.

Now the right, there's no denying, is actually for plenty of things. They're for building factories and mines and smelters and digging stuff out of the ground. They're for fracking, for drilling in the ground everywhere between the Gulf of Mexico and Hudson Bay. They're for waging wars in the Middle East, be it in Afghanistan, Iraq or any other country full of brown people.

They're for plenty of things - often stupid, twisted, evil, moronic things - but at least they're for things.

When you think responsible governance, when you think of statesmenship, of tough, dedicated people of integrity who rationally argue for a cause, I tend to think of people on the right rather than the left. Tony Abbott and his government may be seen as callous by a lot of people in Australia, but arguably they're preferable to the incoherent joke that was the Rudd-Gillard government.

Labor, it seems, would rather hundreds of people die at sea than implement something as 'cruel' as offshore processing, even if it turns out the latter probably harms fewer people. Even now they won't admit they were wrong, for fear their base would tear them to shreds for a lack of sufficient idealism.

So to the left, I say this.

Grow a backbone. Come up with a vision for the future, one based on logic and fairness, and stick to it. Stop just dogmatically opposing everything the right comes out with. Stop with the childish name-calling and start coming up with serious arguments. Pretend you're arguing in a court perhaps, in front of a judge, who will call you out on your bullshit if you stray too far off-topic.

The left needs to stop being so reactionary. Righteous hysteria will only take you so far.

ISIS in Context

People I spoke to today

An odd idea for a post perhaps, but for some reason this occurred to me today.

When I say 'spoke to' the definition could vary a bit. It doesn't necessarily mean they replied and we had a full conversation, but merely that something was spoken one way or the other and acknowledged in some way. Some people I obviously spoke to more than once, but they're only listed once in the running tally.

So here goes -

1/2. My parents, this morning, when I realized the shower was out of soap and had to look in the upstairs bathroom for some more

3. A guy on the train who I said 'excuse me' to when I got to my station

4/5. Two fellow classmates at uni at the start of the lecture when we were looking for the light switch

6. The lecturer at the end, when I asked for the unit guide as I'd missed the first lecture that semester

7/8/9 - At least three people sitting at my table in the tute after the lecture

10/11 - A couple of other people when we had a discussion in class about asylum seekers (it was a politics class today)

12/13 - Two people serving food at the canteen when I asked for the fish'n'chips and they said it would be a couple of minutes

14 - A girl while I was having lunch asking if I knew where a room was

15 - A friend who walked in just as I was finishing lunch

16 - A woman at the uni bookstore

17 - Another woman at the other uni bookstore (at a different campus, where I finally found the book I needed...)

18/19 - Two women in the hairdressers when I went to get a haircut afterwards, one who told me to sit down when I entered and the other who actually cut my hair

20 - Saying 'hey' to a friend of my dad's as I got home while they were loading up the trailer for a camping trip this weekend

20 - My sister briefly at home on where the soap holder went (as in the ceramic bit attached to the wall, which appears to have gone the same way as the soap...)

21-29 - Then went to work, where nine fellow staff members were present. I'm pretty sure I exchanged at least a few words with all of them

30-43+ - I took 14 deliveries while at work (I deliver pizzas) so I spoke to at least that many people, maybe a few more when multiple people came to the door

44+ - My other sister after I got home on what pizza I'd brought back (we get a free one with every shift, its compensation for the sh*tty pay)

So there you go, I spoke with at least 44 people today, maybe a few more.

I wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Futuregeopoliticalscenarios.blogspot.com.au HAS MOVED

My other blog, due to it always having an overly long and cumbersome name (all the good ones seem to be taken here on blogspot) has moved to a new address.

It is now called http://futuredemons.blogspot.com.au/

Please update your Google searches and Favorites lists accordingly.

Sincerely,

Dan