Years ago, the term “liberal” suddenly became a pejorative term; people began to use it to insult others. The complete breakdown in civil discourse that followed Trump‘s ascension, of course, led to the incitement of the word “libtard” and the development of further insults.
Many of us rebranded ourselves as “progressive.” That seemed to dodge the “liberal” label while confusing those who opposed us, because it just had too damn many syllables. However, in recent years, left-leaning politicians have applied that term to themselves and so those on the conservative right have began to use that term against us.
While my political views really haven’t changed over the past several decades. I seem to have gone from independent to democrat to “radical left-wing communist.“
The only actual communists I ever met were in Berkeley, CA when I worked the polls on Election Day, and only discovered who they were because all the ballots for primaries were color-coded by party and they used red ballots. There was also a communist bookstore across from the near-campus Kinko’s; however, I never actually went in.
(Note: the performance group Culture Clash once welcomed the resurrected Communist leader Che Guevara to the world’s “last Communist stronghold” with, “Welcome to Berkeley!”)
Now, suddenly, those of us on the left are “radical socialists,” if not pure baby-eating “communists.” Incidentally, I am not now, nor have I ever been, a communist. I have espoused democratic socialist views, but remain firmly in the Democratic wing of the party.
But it’s easy to do name-calling, and I see people indulging in it on both sides (“Pete Kegsbreath,” for example), and it’s much more difficult to have a polite and well-meaning civil conversation these days. It is my hope that we will soon return to those glorious days of yesteryear when we would not discuss religion and politics, and instead endeavor to be polite.
