What’s the difference between a Liberal and a Leftie?
Let’s get one thing straight: Liberals and Lefties are, politically, not the same thing. They are distinct political categories with different histories and different aims.
There has been a tendency in recent years to conflate the two labels – perhaps as a result of American Liberalism being their comparatively ‘left-wing’ option. That conflation has allowed people who are chronic fence-sitters or who lean neutral to ride on the clout coattails of those pushing for real change.
Let’s examine what those differences I mentioned are. As a caveat, in this article I refer to both Liberals and Leftists in a casual sense rather than an academic one – that’s best left to the book nerds.
What does it mean to be Left?
In the simplest terms possible, the Left believes in equality over hierarchy. This means it stands for universal rights and equity, regardless of whether or not that means ceding their own individual power and/or comforts. The famous Marx quote “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need” is a succinct summary of the basic principles of the Left.
In Leftist praxis, social and economic goals cannot be separated from one another. As such, Leftist ideas tend to centre on the concept of dismantling capitalism and the systems it hinges on as a means to meeting the needs of the collective, rather than just a few privileged individuals. Notably, this is not the same as “levelling the playing field” – this is more of a Liberal viewpoint, believing that existing obstacles simply need to be removed in order for people to have a ‘fair’ crack at also succeeding within capitalism (what a nice fairytale). The Left, by contrast, wants to uproot capitalism entirely.
Their focus is on how inequality pervades through systems of class oppression, which can and does include wage theft, rent extortion, exploitative workplace practices, and class warfare. The Left are critical of those hoarding wealth, property, and land, believing instead that wealth should be redistributed. Class consciousness forms a central pillar of socialism.
Some of the basic principles overlap with Liberals, particularly the general, vague desire to turn towards a more socialised model, but Leftists come at it from a fundamentally different angle.
Essentially, if you’ve ever:
Lamented over landlords pricing people out of the area you live in;
Bemoaned the fact that you’re working five days a week doing a job you only semi-enjoy just for the luxury of not being unhoused and to acquire money to spend during your two state-mandated days off per week;
Wondered when and why basic commodities such as housing and food became so unattainable;
Joined the dots and realised that the value of your labour to your company is significantly more than the wages you are paid;
Wished we had cheaper, more reliable, more convenient public services;
Thought that actually, Billionaires don’t need all that money and should share it about;
Wondered how it can possibly be ethical for companies to pay hundreds of thousands in dividends to their shareholders but still only pay their workforce the minimum wage;
Then congrats! You’re starting to tickle the belly of socialism. Welcome, comrade. Simple concepts to grasp, right?
What does it mean to be Liberal?
When picturing the political spectrum, Liberals tend to fall roughly in the centre. Sometimes they veer slightly to the left or right, but by all accounts they’re the very definition of “we want change, but not so much change that it affects my personal quality of life”. They are interested in altering the status quo, rather than challenging or replacing it.
In general, Liberals support capitalism with certain degrees of regulation or caveats imposed in an attempt to make it “fairer”. They don’t wish to dismantle oppressive systems, but rather temper them to benefit more (but, importantly, not all) people. They’re likely to hold themselves on a bizarre “it won’t ever happen to me” pedestal – they’re your pal who insists they don’t need to be in a union (spoiler alert: everybody should be in a union. Your company will not be on your side when push comes to shove.).
Socially, Liberals tend to engage positively with feminism, although you will find that many of the trans- and sex work-exclusionary feminists (TERFs and SWERFs) sit in this camp (that said, there are also a fair number of Marxist TERFs and homophobes – these people view both wealth and gender through a materialistic lens and consider sex-based oppression to be purely socially imposed, and therefore not internal). This political area is where you’ll find white feminism running rampant – think t-shirts with “girls do it better” emblazoned on the front and pink pussy hats, but no meaningful engagement with feminism beyond these surface ideas. As much as we loved Barbie: The Movie, it would fit squarely in the Liberal camp.
As an example, you might find a lot of these people are Boomers or older Gen X women who are still engaging primarily with ideas of women’s equality. These people witnessed huge changes in women’s roles in the workplace and in professional life in general during their own adulthood, and as a result have become utterly obsessed and fixated on this being the most important inequality to address.
In doing so, they completely ignore any other intersections or plights – never mind race, class disparity, gender non-conforming people, or queer struggles, so long as women get their dues they’re happy. This is an illustrative example of the tunnel vision “I want change so long as it benefits me” mentality.
Why does the distinction matter?
The distinction matters because it helps us keep people accountable and striving for greater equality. As with most movements for change, the majority of people seem to resist identifying with the most ‘extreme’ opinions, instead choosing to align themselves vaguely in that direction without committing to it.
Those who mooch about in vaguely Left political ambiguity tend to benefit from the appearance of aligning with quasi-Leftist ideals, whilst refusing to commit to the cause and actually conducting themselves in practice in a Liberal manner. These optics are not good and do more harm than good. Radicalism literally just means addressing the root of a problem, rather than its symptoms.
Many people’s beliefs align almost perfectly with socialism, yet they hold a nervousness about labelling them such. There’s a pervading anxiety hangover from the Cold War era that if you claim your beliefs as firmly Left-wing, you’ll be seen as a dirty commie. The modern equivalent is being typecast as a crazy eco-hippie who glues themselves to roads.
But with all things considered - is it really worse to be seen as actively trying to address the problem than to blend in, pull the wool over your own eyes, and blindly continue to contribute to it?
What next?
We hope this article has offered some clarity on the distinction between Liberals and Lefties – as we have illustrated, they are two distinct systems of belief with different fundamental approaches. Yes, Liberalism is to the political left of fascism (notable mentions being the UK’s Conservative Party and the USA’s Republican Party), but it is extremely limited in scope when it comes to anything beyond a mild challenge to the status quo. Liberalism feels radical because it questions the current state of things, but by definition it will never try to truly rock the boat – that’s not what Liberalism is about.
As the next UK General Election looms (gloomily) on the horizon, and discussions around candidacy for the next US Presidential Election are starting to emerge, it’s more important than ever to make sure that the people we’re electing accurately represent what we stand for. We would strongly encourage you to make a point of using the correct labels to summarise your beliefs.