I forwarded a post of Bob's over at No Oil For Pacifists to a (very) liberal relative in CA. He grudgingly acknowledged some worth in the post, but objected to Bob's use of the word socialist. It strikes him as one of those over-the-top-things that conservatives say that show they are just wingnuts who don't know what they are talking about. He calls them Socialists. How can you take these people seriously?
I won't pretend that I don't know what he means; I know many people take it that way and disregard anything said after. Yet I contend that this is an emotive, illogical response, and the term in its denotative meaning is accurate.
Certainly you can find people who are more socialist than California teachers, but just because they aren't pure or absolute socialists doesn't mean the label is undeserved. Heck most of American society has some socialist streak, and it's percentages of how much the government owns versus how much the taxpayer owns that we argue about.
This false dichotomy by progressives is an artful defense. Unless someone is Scandinavian, or belongs to a party that has the word socialist in its title, they believe it's an inaccurate term that shouldn't be used.
It reminds me of the joke about the snooty woman who asks her friend if she has ever been to Spain. Well, I've been to Madrid, comes the reply. "Oh my dear, you still haven't been to Spain."
Using the word socialist for any redistributive plan is legit. One might reasonably ask for clarification or ask for distinctions to be made, but the term is intellectually defensible.
Thanks for bringing this to my attention.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to agree with your left-leaning relative that the label 'socialist' might detract from the rest of the message. Many teachers may take great offense to that label, and more so than the facts I choose to highlight in the blog. It will put them on the defensive.
But more importantly, I don't explain or justify the use of the term in either of the first two articles. I'll see about doing that in the third article, and in these comments.
To the extent that the second article highlights the clear teacher tendency to educate the children about their one-sided political views on the budget cuts for their own good. is a fair display of elitism and a nearly pure left-leaning political agenda motivated by self-preservation and possibly greed, but is it socialistic?
As individuals, I have great respect for our teachers. As a group, they are herded by Union handlers with their own socialistic agenda. The color pink (chosen by the teachers union) has a fair similitude with the term 'pinko', which lends too much credence to the socialistic nature of the group it is too much to ignore.
We also have a single-choice government-operated school system (except for special schools for the wealthy, gifted and elite). In these schools a quite vocal teacher group openly and brazenly educates our children according to their left-leaning political agenda instead of the approved syllabus.
Given that, I believe I am justified in using the term socialists to describe them as a group.
If any individuals take offense, perhaps it will motivate them to make a change for the better in their group think.
Whoa, I never been to Spain, but I kinda like the music. Say the ladies are insane there, and they sure know how to use it.
The term 'socialist' is antithetical to 'individualist' - so it's pertinent to any form of collective persuasion even outside the economic realm. Whether Keynesian in the U.S. or Fabian in UK, it's still forms of socialism. And the Spanish Civil War was a stark contrast of supporters to each side throughout the intellectual world - with its victor Franco the bane of liberals (another term for socialists) everywhere.
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