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Completely liberal?? Drinking is extremely expensive and regulated, drugs are strictly forbidden. It's full of subsidies and welfare in many aspects of life an

by Trufa 11y ago

Completely liberal?? Drinking is extremely expensive and regulated, drugs are strictly forbidden. It's full of subsidies and welfare in many aspects of life and society, not sure what you're talking about. It's very liberal in some senses, but calling it a completely liberal society is silly.

toyg 11y ago
He's talking right-wing American English, where "liberal" strongly overlaps with "communist/socialist". Americans are fond of reverting long-standing European political conventions "just because". Historical Liberalism was all about free trade and low taxes? Let's use the term for the party that supports higher taxes and regulations. Red is for socialists, blue for conservatives? Let's swap them! How fun! (Not that it matters anyway, the entire European discourse is a million miles to the left of anything being discussed in the Land of the Free. The world is so weird.)
- ajmurmann 11y ago
  The use of the word "liberal" in the US drove me nuts the first few months I lived in the US. I used to be identify myself as a "Liberal" in Germany and constantly felt misrepresented when people were talking about "liberals" in the US. Weird enough the term that comes closest to what I understand as European liberalism is libertarianism. So we had to throw in a syllable to make up for the word that's being used everywhere else having been hijacked. I wonder if some of this is fallout from the insane two party system.
kagamine 11y ago
I think user mahouse has confused liberal with European socialism (as opposed to Soviet socialism) and is blaming socialist policies for the death of Sweden. There is some truth in that Scandinavia has gone too far in favor of the world's poor at the expense of it's own citizens (by truth, read: popular opinion). But let us not forget what Scandinavia was like (and still is) without the mass immigration of 'those brown people', it was an Aryan wet dream with everything for us and none for you. In many ways the modern Scandinavia is a hugely successful human accomplishment. While some people have less (of material things) many have had their lives improved enormously. For every "svarte neger" that hits the headlines as a rapist, 10000+ or more no longer have to live in poverty, in a war zone, under an oppressive regime. Shed a tear for the leftists who saw a way to make the world a better place one life at a time, made that happen with their country's wealth even at the expense (in limited financial terms) of some, and have created a positive liberal society striving to reach a worthwhile ideal. The old Sweden is dead, long live Sweden! What the blogger fails to address (and I haven't read more than that one post) is how any of this affects him, why this means he has to go back to the US and why any of us should give a shit about his tabloid fueled opinion.

by Trufa 11y ago

toyg 11y ago

He's talking right-wing American English, where "liberal" strongly overlaps with "communist/socialist". Americans are fond of reverting long-standing European political conventions "just because". Historical Liberalism was all about free trade and low taxes? Let's use the term for the party that supports higher taxes and regulations. Red is for socialists, blue for conservatives? Let's swap them! How fun! (Not that it matters anyway, the entire European discourse is a million miles to the left of anything being discussed in the Land of the Free. The world is so weird.)

ajmurmann 11y ago
The use of the word "liberal" in the US drove me nuts the first few months I lived in the US. I used to be identify myself as a "Liberal" in Germany and constantly felt misrepresented when people were talking about "liberals" in the US. Weird enough the term that comes closest to what I understand as European liberalism is libertarianism. So we had to throw in a syllable to make up for the word that's being used everywhere else having been hijacked. I wonder if some of this is fallout from the insane two party system.

kagamine 11y ago

I think user mahouse has confused liberal with European socialism (as opposed to Soviet socialism) and is blaming socialist policies for the death of Sweden. There is some truth in that Scandinavia has gone too far in favor of the world's poor at the expense of it's own citizens (by truth, read: popular opinion). But let us not forget what Scandinavia was like (and still is) without the mass immigration of 'those brown people', it was an Aryan wet dream with everything for us and none for you. In many ways the modern Scandinavia is a hugely successful human accomplishment. While some people have less (of material things) many have had their lives improved enormously. For every "svarte neger" that hits the headlines as a rapist, 10000+ or more no longer have to live in poverty, in a war zone, under an oppressive regime. Shed a tear for the leftists who saw a way to make the world a better place one life at a time, made that happen with their country's wealth even at the expense (in limited financial terms) of some, and have created a positive liberal society striving to reach a worthwhile ideal. The old Sweden is dead, long live Sweden! What the blogger fails to address (and I haven't read more than that one post) is how any of this affects him, why this means he has to go back to the US and why any of us should give a shit about his tabloid fueled opinion.