I love the liberal mindset

[Leatherneck]

Saturday Leatherness and I visited the architect who is designing our retirement home at the river for lunch and a review of progress to date. We went to his brand-new self-designed house near Kilmarnock, VA in the Northern neckl. With him was his female friend, who, from her familiarity with the house and surrounding area, I think is a regular there. fair enough.

He's an architect and lawyer from Reston (NoVA) who plays cello; she, a retired State Department linguist and editor. Both come off as fairly artsy-fartsy and liberal, if you get my drift. Complete to the Kerry/Gore bumper sticker on his Volvo.

As we were admiring the many fine points of his ugly new home, Leatherness commented that we should give them a couple of crab pots as a housewarming gift. She reacted rather badly to this suggestion; said she couldn't abide plunging the little crabbies into boiling water. Want to know what we had for lunch?


Crab cakes and salad. I swear.

TC

[K Frame]

Pretty damned common, actually.

Among liberals AND conservatives both.

My exwife was firmly convinced that chicken was hydroponically grown in styrene trays in the backs of grocery stores, and had absolutely nothing to do with chickens found on the farm.

Same with other critters.

Sure, maybe it's hypocritical, but in many ways is no better or worse than many of the rationalizations that every one of us employes in our every day life, often without realizing it.

[Firethorn]

Pretty damned common, actually.

Among liberals AND conservatives both.

Agreed.  Personally, I'm perfectly willing to go out and hunt, but after doing all the math, it doesn't balance out for me.  I'd be perfectly willing to slaughter the cow/pig/chicken, but I know I'm not an expert at it, and a professional can actually do it faster and cleaner than I could.  It's worth the few extra bucks not to have to worry about it myself.

I console myself with the knowledge that I know full well where my meats come from, and have no issue with it.  It's just like hiring somebody to cut my hair, do auto work, plumbing, painting, whatever.  I can do it, but the professionals can do it better and faster, leaving me with more free time, which is valuable to me.

[Leatherneck]

No disagreement with the tasks that are more efficiently done by pros; just the greeny-weeny mindset that professes one thing and then by actions supports another. And you're right, Mike--it's not confined to liberals; just liberals and disingenuous conservatives.

TC

[Art Eatman]

I recall an evening when some four couples of us were enjoying dinner at McCluskey's steakhouse on E. 6th St. in Austintatious.  

I made some comment about the coming Friday being "Deer Season Eve", and was promptly set upon by a lady across the table--after she finished chewing her bite of rare sirloin...

Art

[griz]

Thats part of the attraction of grocery stores, they sell a little distance between the actual killing and the consumption of the result.  Ive never understood that mental separation.  I had a boss a while back that thought killing any animal was morally wrong.  That didnt stop him from eating meat.  Somebody other than he killed the critter, so he had done nothing wrong.  

[...has left the building.]

They sound like cool people except for the disconnect from reality part.

[K Frame]

"And you're right, Mike--it's not confined to liberals; just liberals and disingenuous conservatives."

Personally I think you're going way far out on a limb here, Tom, as it's not a stance that can be defined in clear cut liberal/conservative political terms.

Personally I think it's a bit disingenuous to even try to acribe political affiliations to feelings such as those.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

I especially like the celebrity "enviromentalists" who advocate green fuels and sustainable energy, all while zipping around the country on their personal Gulfstream jets.

[griz]

I especially like the celebrity "enviromentalists" who advocate green fuels and sustainable energy, all while zipping around the country on their personal Gulfstream jets.

But they drive a Prius to the airport, what more could they possibly do?

[El Tejon]

Liberal advocating "environmentalis"=>they believe the roads and airports are too crowded with OTHERS.

Liberal population control=too much of you, just enough of me.

[grampster]

I don't know, but I've never been in the presence of a staunch conservative that wasn't hooked up fairly tightly to reality.  Most liberals that I've encountered, and there have been many, live in a world that is accoutered with a great deal of sentimental emotionalism and wishful thinking.  I know there are degrees, but in general most liberals are weenies and most conservatives are not.  That doesn't mean one can't have liberal friends.  I have many.  It's good to have balance by experiencing both reality and fantasy.

[Perd Hapley]

Leatherness commented that we should give them a couple of crab pots as a housewarming gift. She reacted rather badly to this suggestion; said she couldn't abide plunging the little crabbies into boiling water.

At first, I thought she was just too sensible to eat sea-bugs.  I'd react badly to the idea myself.  

Did she say it was wrong to kill the little critters, or did she just have a hard time doing it?  My wife is a jumper-wearing fundamentalist Sunday-school teacher, and she likes shooting my guns, but she's just too soft-hearted to kill anything more than a cockroach.  She can't even handle it when our dog toys with a crippled bird, but she's the best cook I've ever run across.  She likes cooking and eating the meat, it's just hard for her to look into those big brown doe eyes and pull the trigger.  Nothing wrong with that, as long as you can do the deed if it ever becomes necessary.

Thats part of the attraction of grocery stores, they sell a little distance between the actual killing and the consumption of the result.

The "mental seperation" is the result of store-bought food, not the attraction.  We don't see the bloodshed, so we forget about it.  Most of us would rather avoid the killing, sure, just because it's messy and time-consuming.  And most of us have never learned to butcher a live animal, anyway.

[crt360]

I haven't figured out how to divide most of the people I know into liberal and conservative categories.  I know people that think they are "liberal" and prefer the label, while others want to be seen as "conservative", but most of them are so mixed in their actions and real life ideals that they don't fit well into either category.  I'd probably have to ask everyone 100 questions then plot them on a graph.

[Perd Hapley]

As liberalism and conservatism usually refers to one's politics, do we really expect peoples' "actions and real life ideals" to line up with their political ideas?  But perhaps I don't see your point.

Are you talking about conservatives who are on welfare?

[Firethorn]

I haven't figured out how to divide most of the people I know into liberal and conservative categories.  I know people that think they are "liberal" and prefer the label, while others want to be seen as "conservative", but most of them are so mixed in their actions and real life ideals that they don't fit well into either category.  I'd probably have to ask everyone 100 questions then plot them on a graph.

I'd have to agree with this.  The libertarian's two axis graph of defining topics as being economic or social freedom/control can do a whole lot better, but at that pont you realize that there are many potential axis points.  For that matter, the topics cross and intertwine.  Is making race/sex/religious discrimination illegal a social control, freedom, or would it be economic?  After all, while you're increasing the choices of the workers/consumers, you're decreasing the choices/freedom of the companies.

You could plot somebody on their abortion/antiabortion stance alone.  Everywhere from absolute pro-life, such as birth control is banned and all medical means are taken to continue pregnancy, even to danger of mother's life, to a pro-abortion stance where it's mandatory to abort fetuses with detected problems, or where the mother's considered unfit. Before anybody takes issue with this, I've deliberatly adjusted both sides to be offensive to pretty much everyone.  I'm willing to bet that you'd end up the the classical curve with this, though figuring out where to draw the line would be tough, pretty much everybody would be unhappy(though the pro-lifers would be happier).  Back on the libertarian graph, I've seen people rate pro-life as pro freedom(freedom of the baby to live), and pro-control (forcing the mother to be life support).

I've rated my thoughts on a number of issues and generally take the 'don't tread on me' attitude.  I try to figure out the lightest controls that will have the wanted results.  For example, pollution controls.  Figure out what emissions are bad, then charge the emitters a fee based on the amount they emit.  Gradually jack it up.  Without grandfathering, it'll place an economic incentive to be as clean as possible.  While some would say that this is business control, it also comes under personal freedom, as pollution is injurious to everyone.

[crt360]

As liberalism and conservatism usually refers to one's politics, do we really expect peoples' "actions and real life ideals" to line up with their political ideas?  But perhaps I don't see your point.

I was kinda hoping some of them lined up.  I don't see the point in standing up for one thing and then doing the opposite. (unless one prefers to be a deceptive, scheming weasel)

I thought we were talking about throwing live crabs in boiling water.

My point is I can't tell if someone has a liberal mindset just by the fact that they oppose cooking crabs or prefer storebought chicken to self-killed chicken.  Similarly, one would be mistaken to guess that everyone I go hunting with is conservative, just because they own a few guns, drive a pickup, kill stuff, and eat animals.  Part of the problem is that we have no defined, commonly understood meaning of conservative or liberal.  To some, conservative is only applied to fiscal matters, in which case they could also have liberal views on other issues.  Others don't know the first thing about a budget, but they consider themselves conservative because they like country music, go to church, despise the gay/lesbian crowd, and think all liberals are gay, tree-hugging, animal-protecting, Prius-driving, actor types.  Then there are the ones you mention, who fit the last definition and are on welfare.

If you know of an easy to use identification guide that was not written by Ann Coulter or someone from the DU, point me to it.  I know too many people that look like a duck, walk like a dog, and sound like a goose.

[Perd Hapley]

Wait a minute, now.  One could be very "liberal" without buying into the animal welfare stuff.  

Just as one could be very conservative but think that embryos are subhuman.


I don't think we can put people on a line and say "One end of the line or the other, or you're an inconsistent hypocrite."

Some libertarian types have tried to give us a two-dimensional graph, as Firethorn mentioned, but I think we really need three axes to graph people's politics.

[garrettwc]

I'm going to take a wild guess and say the Volvo had leather seats

[Antibubba]

For those not familiar with the Libertarian graph, the "X" axis is the typical Liberal<--->Conservative scale.  The "Y" axis is Anarchism<--->Authoritarian/Totalitarian.  That explains how you can find libertarians on both the Left and the Right, and why Hitler's Fascism and Stalin's Communism seemed to be darn similar in their results.

Fistful, if we were to create the "Z" axis, what would it be?  FWIW, I've contemplated the Z axis before, but I've never found anything that fit.  Guess I'm just a Flatlander.

[280plus]

Reminds me of the time one of those was giving me hell over fishing. Even catch and release fishing. She says, "Why do you have to harass the fish?" I said to her, "You DO realize fish are carnivorous?" She looks at me and says, "They ARE?" I said, "Yup, one would kill you and eat you and not give it a second thought."

Heh heh hehhhhh...

[Art Eatman]

Lordy, 280!  Think about it for a moment:  Minnows are fish, right?  Minnows are bait, right?  How does somebody get beyond junior high without knowing that?  Even TV ads show a progression of little fish being eaten by larger fish--even without all the shows about sharks.  Blech.  

I get on my soapbox from time to time about "City Folks":  Meat come cut and wrapped in the grocery; don't need feedlots.  Milk comes in a carton; don't need dairy farms.  Bacon comes in a package; don't need a hog farm.  Lights come on because of the switch on the wall; don't need power plants.  Water comes from the faucet, due to turning a tap; don't need dams and reservoirs.  You twist the handle on that white thing in the bathroom and magic makes smelly stuff go away; you don't need a sewer plant.  And on and on and on.  I guess gasoline comes from the nozzle/hose on a funny box at the filling station; you don't need those horrible oil wells or refineries.

Nylon undies come from somewhere unknown; why have a petrochemical industry?

, Art

[280plus]

Art, this was supposedly an EDUCATED women. She probably thought they nibbled on plant life or something.

[Iain]

I'm sure I've told this story before, but a couple of years back I sat in a student house in Oxford with three postgrad females, one from the US, one from Holland and one from China. The conversation bizarrely turned to biology. I found myself explaining that a cow and a bull were in fact members of the same species and that humans were not in fact inflicting some sort of inter-species hybridisation on the bovine critters.

I understood confusion over mules and how all that works, but I was floored by their idea that bulls were not simply male cows.

I'm not sure that it is contry folk/city folk. I was raised in a town, but spent summer holidays on grandfathers farm. Sure I learned some facts of life, and saw animals being born and was aware that animals were being killed or dying. Not sure that this is what taught me that a bull is a male cow though, I think it was more just a general interest in the world and access to a lot of books.

[280plus]

I say let 'em milk the bulls...