Most Evil: Who Has The Worst Stereotype - Liberals Or Conservatives?

Most Evil: Who Has The Worst Stereotype - Liberals Or Conservatives? 07/06/2009

by Dacia Nichol

There are two stories in the news today that actually exemplify the stereotypes of each party that are worth considering:

On the liberal side, there's the kid-ditching dad. In Nebraska, a man with 9 children abandoned them at a hospital under the state's Safe Haven law after his wife died. He couldn't handle the burden of taking care of all of them, so he just dumped them like garbage. You can't have sympathy for this man - he must have figured out his tolerance levels around...oh...4 children or so ago. There were options for him and he took the wrong one, and to top it all off (the news of the day), his girlfriend is now pregnant with twins. This exemplifies the liberal view that the state knows what's best for you and with that hubris passed a law that allowed this. It also exemplifies the liberal idea that responsibility for your actions is a nice idea, but if you can't deal with it, good old government will come in and fix your life for you.

On the conservative side, there's the 15-month old little girl that died after her parents would not allow doctors to treat her pneumonia. They belonged to a congregation that believed in Faith Healing, thereby shunning doctors from their members. In sum, these folks let a child slowly die of a perfectly treatable disease, choosing prayer over science. This exemplifies the conservative views that seem to go against science in favor of religious belief. There is a large faction of the right that seems stuck in ancient ideas and decries anything that goes against them, including bringing arguments against evolution and some even questioning the existence of dinosaurs. Naturally, one would extend this to include the global warming argument - of course conservatives are against it...they don't believe in science, right?

This author thinks that it's fair to say that both articles do not represent either party constituency as a whole...or anywhere near a majority for that matter. Both parties do however, use these types of articles and events to demonize the other side. When we think that the types of people that these articles describe represent the behavior of our opposition, well, no wonder we don't get along. We'd like to think that our reasoning goes much deeper than just cherry picking examples to help our cause, and for some of us this is true. For most of us though, or rather the bulk of voters that loyally choose one side over the other in each election, it really does come down to these nasty stereotypes.

So who has the worst stereotype? Let's have a look:

Liberals - free love, abortion on demand, no responsibility, the system is at fault, atheist, down with the rich and/or successful, race hypocrisy, communist, socialist, fascist, tax and spend, micro-management, power to the labor unions, pay to play, animals before people, anti-business, anti-competition, anti-American, hard work is bad, anti-military.

Conservatives - anti-science, Bible thumpers, homophobic, war monger, hate monger, fear monger, fascist, witch hunters, to heck with the poor, secessionists, hicks, racists, unfaithful spouse hypocrisy, non-intellectual, party of "no", stuck in the past, cling to guns and religion, big business first, screw consumers, protect the status quo.

Or does it even matter what the other side really meant to say? It seems that no matter how the phrase is worded, something negative can be derived from it. Rush Limbaugh’s “I want Obama to fail,” is one beaming example along with any other remark made by a right winger that may allude to race. Any time there’s an objection to religious symbolism in the public forum, the “left-wing atheists” are blamed along with the claim that their influence has been what has brought about entire downfall of societal values.

Who’s right? Well, statistics can prove anything, and fact checkers are just as politically motivated as anyone else. We can find hope by acknowledging that the other side is not as horrible as we think they are - at least one would suppose. Unfortunately, there are agendas to be seen to and as long as billionaires are funding them - God help us all.

Despite the enraging battles, these are what will always remain as the guiding principles of this nation: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of happiness (“LLP”). We’ve got the know-how (the Constitution), and we’ve got the means (We the People). Time to stop the BS with these stereotypes and get down to the root of the problem: the evil that would have this nation become something it was never intended to be.

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