Students and leftism

[C0ckney]

Originally posted by Provost Harrison
You see you're being very idealistic Pekka, true social mobility just doesn't exist as I mentioned in an earlier post.

i don't agree with that at all. i'm a working class kid from london, i've worked hard, got my education and am now making good money. in the next few years, i'm going to qualify as a solicitor, get my own house, nice expensive car, maybe even a wife and a couple of kids, live the middle class dream . my education was free, but everything else i've earnt off my own back. social mobility exists if you've got the brains and balls to take the opportunities that are there. if you haven't, well that's a shame, but it's your own fault and certainly not my problem.

almost all of the real lefty types i encountered at uni were from middle class homes, mummy and daddy paying for everything. always talking about poverty, want and other things they knew absolutely **** all about, and how, if only taxes were even more exorbitant, 'we' could solve all these problems (but not if it means daddy can't afford the payments on my new car!). **** off, go experience life at the sharp end and then see if you come back spouting all that ****e.

i'm pretty right wing (well libertarian really) by british standards, and that's down to where i'm from and what i've experienced. i just don't see what the left has to offer people like me, it might have something to offer working class people who want to sit around and complain about the unfairness of their situation, but not to those like me who want to make something of themselves.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Provost Harrison
Although saying that, I am scared of what I am turning into...a complete betrayal to my roots...I was looking around Morrison's the other day trying to find proscuito...dammit man!

At least you weren't in Waitrose.

[Pekka]

cockney, right. And it pisses you off, that when you made your own moves, didn't inherit the money but worked for it, that now it's somehow unfair you get to enjoy some of the results of that work. How is that unfair?

It is unfair, if someone did the exact same thing but somehow can't enjoy the fruits like you do, because of some BS reason. THat's wrong. If I get paid less to do the same job in the same place for the same employer because I'm a woman or a man or a foreigner, that's wrong.

And you have to consider, what you do, who is worse off because of your actions and work? Some of these people talk as if you take away from them.

Some of the 'progressives' are very anti-progress. When you kill the dreams, you kill innovation and people trying to do things. 'It used to be so much better...'.. BS. It used to be a lot worse in almost every aspect of life. At least the amish peopel are taking a good action on their on behalf, they don't like it, they want to do it their way, so they do it their way. THey're not here preaching to me about the evils of a car. We might disagree, but we're not on each others faces about it. I do my thing, they do their thing, that's fair.

It's funny how some of the lefties in here are starting to lean towards negative income tax, flat tax etc. I argued that there have been a lot of right wingers with the same idea in the past. Apparently I was wrong, this is purely a left wing idea, and no right winger has ever agreed to it. It just doesn't make sense, even if it was a fact. But it isn't even a fact.

Go few years back and the same people were saying flat tax is just a way for rich people to get more rich, and negative income tax to cut down the public services, therefore making it worse to the people who need those services most and are poor.

It's like.. it depends what day it is, and they just hog all the ideas and claim it is their originally and exclusively. So vigilant, that if you say, well, that's not exclusively a left wing idea and in fact one could even argue the very opposite, then somehow that's wrong, factually wrong, you're an idiot and hate the poor.

It's pretty much like wtf. And then you wonder why these people are still wearing expensive clothes and drinking coffee int he most expensive coffee houses.. ohh that's right, because their daddy is paying for it. The irony is overwhelming.

If you ask from a person who works hard, has never had much anything, and now is starting to have the things he dreamed about, because of his hard work, you say to him that you don't deserve this and take it away? I mean, the whole situation is so perverse, that I wouldn't exclude civil war from ever happening again, should these people really gain power.

[Pekka]

I mean, my friends are pretty left leaning, but one is more to the extreme. I still remember when few years back I explained to him what negative income tax means. It was when I was talking about libertarianism and what it means. He thought it was a pretty good idea, but when it came to the negative income tax, he was against is because 'it would make the rich more rich and the poor more poor'. Ok.

And now he talked to me about it, out of the blue. He prolly read about it from the Green party's agenda for the elections this year, and NOW it IS a good idea? I mean, jeesh, I knew you were a loyal Green party voter no matter what, but damn is that stupid or what? Then I said I remember when we last talked about it and he thought it was a bad idea? Apparently it isn't true, I've never mentioend it. It's kind of hard to not remember it when you have a distinct image of it, you remember the situation very well, even direct quotes. But, apparently, I remember wrong. Oh well... I mean, the very epitome of party politics I so much hate. It's not about the idea, it's about MY party and it's a good idea because MY party says so. Who the **** cares who came up with it, really?

So, these days when they try to engage me into political discussion, something I don't like doing in the first place (because of obvious reasons), I just say I don't care about people, I don't give a ****, every man for themselves, that's the way it is, that's hte way it oughta be. They can understand it better that way, because that's what they want to believe I am believing. Then they give me the condescending laugh and 'your opinions are crap'. Yeah well, why do you keep asking, I told you before, I don't care about things anymore. Keep the torch alive dude, walk to the dark shadows and save the world.

I don't want to discuss politics with my friends because it is too revealing of certain kind of logical thinking that is a joke at best. It's like this one person, who is very smart, so I find it so weird that I was told 'if you're not a leftie' and that meant like a REAL leftie, not just left leaning, that would be almost a commie in US terms, 'you are not intelligent'. The claim is, people who think like her are intelligent, and people who disagree can not be intelligent.

I know she is smart, but what the ****? You know, I don't want to talk about that stuff, because it bothers me too much later on. I can't see a perosn the same way after some claims like that, if they are serious. You know? And I enjoy the friendships so I just want to keep it that way and not know how their minds work, or don't work.

[C0ckney]

...and another thing! pekka, you're right about student lefties debating.

some friends of the girls i live with were round the other week, we were all drinking and talking in the lounge. the conversation got round to politics and one of them (he is pretty clever and articulate usually) comes out with "geroge bush is worse than hitler" and i called him on it, said he was talking rubbish and challenged him to back it up.

he was shocked by this and starting floundering around, spouting off random arguments which i swatted away with ease, and then he fell back on "well it's my opinion, you know and err...". and other people were like "you should respect his opinion". to which i said "bollocks...", well you get the idea. i mean what makes these people think it's alright to say something which is just stupid and wrong and then hide behind the fact it's their dumb opinion? if someone tells me 2+2 = 5, then i'm not going to say "hey man i respect your opinion", you're talking ****e, it's called a debate, back up what you are saying or stfu.

[Provost Harrison]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


At least you weren't in Waitrose.

I was thinking 'maybe I'll have to pop to Waitrose'. What am I becoming?

Actually I am one of the most hardened critics of 'The North' as well now, just because of how sh*t it was to try and get somewhere and get a career...

[Pekka]

cockney, yeah.. in that situation, I'd ask, "is that what you REALLY think, or is this just how you feel?", or "Do you REALLY think so? Are you 100% serious and if so, why?".

It goes to African kids after that.

[Provost Harrison]

Originally posted by C0ckney


i don't agree with that at all. i'm a working class kid from london, i've worked hard, got my education and am now making good money. in the next few years, i'm going to qualify as a solicitor, get my own house, nice expensive car, maybe even a wife and a couple of kids, live the middle class dream . my education was free, but everything else i've earnt off my own back. social mobility exists if you've got the brains and balls to take the opportunities that are there. if you haven't, well that's a shame, but it's your own fault and certainly not my problem.

almost all of the real lefty types i encountered at uni were from middle class homes, mummy and daddy paying for everything. always talking about poverty, want and other things they knew absolutely **** all about, and how, if only taxes were even more exorbitant, 'we' could solve all these problems (but not if it means daddy can't afford the payments on my new car!). **** off, go experience life at the sharp end and then see if you come back spouting all that ****e.

i'm pretty right wing (well libertarian really) by british standards, and that's down to where i'm from and what i've experienced. i just don't see what the left has to offer people like me, it might have something to offer working class people who want to sit around and complain about the unfairness of their situation, but not to those like me who want to make something of themselves.

Thankyou for your input. Now I still stand by my original comment but I suspect that you or I did well because of innate ability that was able to get through the state education system (that and I got to a decent state school too). But I think the problem is that you forget about other people further down the social ladder and try and grab what you can. And I am completely as guilty of this as anyone, but I also try and keep it real too. Although despite this I feel that I have very little in common with the working class. God knows what happens as I claw my way further up the greasy pole.

[Fake Boris]

The problem is not that social mobility is absolutely impossible... it's that nevertheless the spots at the top of the pyramid are limited, and we've got to find a way so that those at the bottom still live decently.

[Provost Harrison]

Precisely. But all evidence is that the gap between rich and poor is widening - and no government is doing anything to tackle it and to use this situation to reduce poverty at the lower end...

[Pekka]

Well, if there's someone we need to cater to, I just wish it was the middle class. I don't mind heavy tax cuts on the poor. I mean go ahead, they'll still use all that money they have, because they're poor.

I don't think the problem is what someone makes. If there is a problem, it is a problem of how little some people make. Not how much someone makes.

It is a damn shame some workign people make so little money for their efforts. And surely if there are unfortunate ones, sick ones etc. who can't help themselves, well they should be taken cared of, pretty obvious.

But the ones who don't do anything to themselves and they could, but they choose not to.. screw them.

[Meticulous Man]

Generally, young people want to shake things up -> socialism

The process through which your political preferences are formed is very chaotic though, and I think in most cases rather small events can lead to different outcomes for any person. Forms of peer pressure, exposure to a well-spoken adherent of some ideology, etc, etc.

[chequita guevara]

Generally the problem is that college students are college students, left, right, indifferent, they still think they know everything. I did too. I know better now.

[Spiffor]

My experience with arrogant lefties is limited almost exclusively to lefty students. Outside of the student-sphere, I have met very few lefty people who have a superior-than-thou attitude (I guess I'll know some when I'll work with mayors and other politicians). OTOH, I've met many arrogant right-wingers, usually older and successful in their job.

In the end, it's all the same. Someone is arrogant when he's good at some kind of thing, which he feels make him more worthy as a human being.
Arrogant billionaires ill feel superior to others because they're rich.
Arrogant professors will feel superior to others because they're higher educated.
Arrogant jocks will feel superior because they ****ed more bimbos.
Arrogant religionists will feel superior because they saw the REAL light.
Arrogant lefties will feel better because they understand the reality of marxism. The latter only applies to people who live in a very theoretical world, i.e. students. I saw exactly the same with right-wing students btw.

[Pekka]

That's an interesting observation.. that it's usually the students where you find the weirdos. If I think about it, I must say that mostly this is true in my part as well.