Breaking the Myths about Liberals

[Caution]

Recently a number of books have been written about the various myths and assumptions attributed to liberalism and American politics in general. I would love to put together a bulleted list of these items with short, succint back up documentation. Recent books on this topic include Joe Conason's Big Lies, Al Franken's Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, and our own William Rivers Pitt's The Greatest Sedition Is Silence: Four Years in America.

Starting points:

Liberal Media: This should be a dead issue, but some wingnuts actually still believe in this. Massive media conglomerates which support the right wing include Fox, Clear Channel. Right wing media people: Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Don Feder, and Wolf Blitzer (among others).

Blame America for 9/11 and Terrorism in general: Liberals deplore terrorist actions and those who commit them, we are however open to the exploration of the causes of extremism and what we as Americans can do to prevent the outbreak of this type of thought process. In what ways have we been insensitive to other cultures to such a degree that they feel the need to attack us?

Liberals are soft on crime: The United States is practically a prison state, more people are imprisoned per capita in the US than anywhere else in the world, including the various totalitarian regimes, how can it be unhealthy to question why this is?

Liberals are morally bankrupt: How is is morally bankrupt to attempt to provide adequate care and shelter and services for the downtrodden within our society? Why is it morally wrong to defend the rights of all to behave as they see fit as long as that behavior does not bring harm to others?

My favorite paradox: The Rich Liberal Elite/Anti-Capitalism tendencies. OK which is it? Are we the rich elite stomping on the rights of the workers and impoverishing them or are we communists wh oare attempting to destroy the fabric of our capitalist society?

Liberals are trying to undermine the Constitution: Probably the single biggest lie, classic liberal institution: the ACLU, an organization whose sole purpose is to defend the rights afforded to individuals within the Constitution

Liberals are atheists: I know very few atheists, most liberals love god as much or more than most fundamentalists. Liberals simply tend to assume that God actually cares for his creation rather than assume that God intends for the vast majority to go to hell for their transgressions. Liberals are certainly for the separation of Church and State, which goes back to the previous point, defending the rights of the minority as afforded by the Constitution.

Anyone care to throw in any others or to provide detail on the above?

[trotsky]

1. Hey, I'm a liberal atheist.

And from my experience, there are far more liberal atheists than conservative ones. But I'm sure that, like the population at large, there are more god-believers than non-believers in the category called "liberals."

[soleft]

2. And what's wrong with being an atheist?

Instead of defending liberals by saying plenty of liberals believe in God, as if there's something wrong with that, what about saying liberal atheists are fine upstanding people who are often more moral, more compassionate, and more spiritual than fundamentalists, liberal or conservative.

[Brian Sweat]

3. There are a lot of conservative atheists.

Just not a lot of Republican atheists. They tend to be libertarian and vote for Republicans with their noses held.

[trotsky]

7. Interesting, that's not been my experience.

My local atheist groups are both active in working for separation of church and state primarily, but also in gay rights, affirmative action, abortion rights, etc., etc.

'Course that could also be a result of being in Minnesota, which hasn't lost its liberal roots despite recent boneheaded election results.

[AndyTiedye]

8. And There Are Many of Us...

...who do not believe in a singular, unimaginatively-named "God"
but are not athiests either.

[JanMichael]

10. Most of the "Conservative" Atheists are the Randroids.

These "libertarians" trend "fiscally conservative" and often vote repuke.

But they are a HUGE minority amongst the godless. In my experiance, as an activist Atheist, the vast majority are "Liberal" and a good number Socialist.

[Bandit]

4. It would seem like every accusation was derived by looking in the mirror

Everything you listed could more accurately be assigned to Conservatives. They just figure if they take their bad points and say that it's liberals that are like that they will muddy the water so bad people will believe them. Repeat a lie loud enough and often enough it soon becomes a fact in their world anyway. Lies and the Lying LIARS who tell them. Remember that anytime a Conservative opens their mouth. It used to be the stanmdard joke "How can you tell if a lawyer is lying?" Watch for his lips to move. Just replace the word Lawyer with Conservative and you have the TRUTH.

[AmandaRuth]

5. it is the other way around

thats one thing that really really bugs me, its not that liberals are this or that with God, its that the thugs are so not christian and claim to be the party of God.

[Blue_Chill]

6. Are you new to DU

Morality, religion, not blaming america? I've seen very little of those things here.

[Cheswick2.0]

9. I was amused this weekend

I saw several posts on another thread that started off something like: "I don't take drugs, but I am a liberal".

Is drug use a liberal ideal?

[uptohere]

11. need better ammo than that

Liberal media and you name two minor players, one a cable channel and the other a radio concern that is primarily music. What about broadcast TV and the print press ? By and large the media is liberal and has been for decades.

Soft on crime, you have to address the actions of liberal judges. And there are a lot and they are everywhere.

There are wealthy and elitist liberals many of whom are anti capitalist. Streisand, Robbins, Baldwin, Sheen to name a few.

Not saying you have to be wrong about any of this but you need better arguments than the ones provided.

[trotsky]

12. Say what?

By and large the media is liberal and has been for decades.

And you base this on what?

The ONLY statistical analysis the right has EVER been able to offer to support this tired old assertion is that reporters, on average, tend to be more liberal than the general population.

Never any proof between reporters' individual political positions and the stories they cover, or anything like that. Just the fact that they themselves are liberal MUST mean that the news is liberal.

Horse puckey. The right has never proven the media to be liberal, why do we have to prove that it's not?