Can right wing politics even be high cosciousness

[Not me]

So we just had elections in Finland and I started wondering how more highly conscious people tend to lean left in politics. Is this just because stage green people tend to be more leftist or do people keep going more and more to the left as the grow. I don’t really see a lot of highly conscious right wing people out there so I thought this might be the case. What do you guys think? Can highly conscious politics be right wing?

[flowboy]

Some problems with this question:

• How are you defining "highly conscious"? Are you defining it in terms of Green values for example? Because that would make your reasoning circular
• Assuming you have come up with a clear criterium, how would you be able to judge objectively how conscious any other person is?
  I find that it's hard to see far above our own level. What seems low-consciousness to me could actually be too high-consciousness for me to understand.

To give an example so you know I'm not just arguing for its own sake: if I were a politician in a democratic country, and had many high-consciousness well-intentioned plans, I still have to be elected by the masses. Which means I have to appeal to a relatively low-consciousness crowd, in order to be elected and actually be able to do anything. So I will have to present myself as much more low-consciousness than I actually am, otherwise not enough people will relate for me to get a chance to execute on my high-consciousness ideas. I may even have to hide those from the election program, because the masses just wouldn't understand.

[TheAvatarState]

Well the fact is that if you identify as either right or left wing, you're guaranteed not to be high consciousness. 

[Leo Gura]

@Not me Most right-wing politics is very reactionary and grounded in fear.

But when the left-wing gets totally out of hand, then right-wing politics will have some value.

For example, if true communists take over the government and call for totally abolishing private property, then right-wing ideas will be an important countervailing force to bring things back into balance. But we are nowhere close to that yet in America. We basically have zero truly communist political leaders here. Not sure about how things are in Finland.

The right-wing loves to portray moderate Democratic socialists like Bernie Sanders as radical communists. But that's just their fear reaction, not reality. Hell, they called Obama a Muslim socialist, LOL!

People don't appreciate what true socialism is: it's the abolition of all private means of production. Almost not country has that and almost no leader calls for that. Because it's not practical. Even China and North Korea don't have true socialism.

A highly conscious person will not be right-wing, but she will also be wary of the excesses and dogmas of the left-wing. Left-wing is predominately stage Green, and stage Green definitely has some important blind spots and limitations. You cannot have stage Green run amok without any countervailing force or there will be problems. But the right-wing tends to over-exaggerate this threat.

[tedens]

2 hours ago, Not me said:

Is this just because stage green people tend to be more leftist or do people keep going more and more to the left as the grow.

Both. The second one causes the first. And this is simultaneously reply for:

"Can highly conscious politics be right wing?"

Edited May 8, 2019 by tedens

[Zizzero]

Both the left and the right wing perspective have truth to them. A highly conscious person sees the necessity of both and is nonideological enough to be whatever this individual perceives as needed right now.

But the right-left spectrum is confusing; it really depends on how you define "left" and "right" - it's really just a word game. You can call either side "low consciousness" if you choose a definition that allows you to do so. 

Also, how do you know whether someone is high or low conscious and how would you define those terms? It's easy to fall into circular reasoning: 
When you define the right as a low consciousness perspective, then you exclude the possibility of a highly conscious right winger through your definition already.

[CreamCat]

You can abolish private property in a way by realizing that it is an illusion. But, the illusion seems practical.

On paper, I own a house in an apartment, but I don't feel that I own it. It takes only a few big mistakes to lose it. Ownership is an illusion but still practical. Even a low-consciousness person perceives the illusion of house ownership. When ownership is fragile, you realize its illusory nature. On paper, you own a house. In reality, you don't own a shit. You don't really own the money in your bank account, either. The government can lock your bank account any time. Maybe, not your bitcoin wallet.

To me, ownership and various economic concepts are just a game. But, it's a game that can make you go through a lot of pain.

For the same reason, there is no national border. We just imagine it for practicality. National politics is just a game, too.

We are game players.

Edited May 9, 2019 by CreamCat

[Eric Tarpall]

They care about fetuses surviving. That seems conscious. Besides that I don't know. I think their circle of concern is small but I don't know if that's a bad thing. If you spread yourself too thin you can't be of good use to anyone.

[whatishappeningtome]

5 minutes ago, Eric Tarpall said:

They care about fetuses surviving. That seems conscious. Besides that I don't know. I think their circle of concern is small but I don't know if that's a bad thing. If you spread yourself too thin you can't be of good use to anyone.

Most healthy thinking stage green/left leaning individuals actually are Pro-CHOICE. They see that particular issue as more nuanced rather than on the same grounds as murdering a fully formed human which a more stage blue mind might believe. They also want laws to allow women to be able to make that moral decision themselves.

I actually think this discussion leans into Stage Yellow and tier 2 thinking which might be why it's quite complex.
 

Edited May 9, 2019 by whatishappeningtome

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, CreamCat said:

You can abolish private property in a way by realizing that it is an illusion. But, the illusion seems practical.

On paper, I own a house in an apartment, but I don't feel that I own it. It takes only a few big mistakes to lose it. Ownership is an illusion but still practical. Even a low-consciousness person perceives the illusion of house ownership. When ownership is fragile, you realize its illusory nature. On paper, you own a house. In reality, you don't own a shit. You don't really own the money in your bank account, either. The government can lock your bank account any time. Maybe, not your bitcoin wallet.

To me, ownership and various economic concepts are just a game. But, it's a game that can make you go through a lot of pain.

For the same reason, there is no national border. We just imagine it for practicality. National politics is just a game, too.

We are game players.

I mean abolishing private property in practice. So for example, if you start a business, the government will own it. If you buy a house, your local town/village will own a majority stake in it. That's true communism. And no one is seriously advocating for it.

[CreamCat]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

if you start a business, the government will own it. If you buy a house, your local town/village will own a majority stake in it.

That sucks. If the government owns my business, a government officer can kick me out of my business any time and give it to one's relatives. If I buy a house, my village's bureaucrat can take 51% of it and kick me out of my house?

It can easily degenerate into kleptocracy or cronyism.

The bad part is that the government pays nothing for everything and takes resources from others.

A warlord could do the same exact things.

The government better pay for everything if it wants to own everything.

Edited May 9, 2019 by CreamCat

[Leo Gura]

@CreamCat You are the government.

[CreamCat]

8 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@CreamCat You are the government.

That is too cryptic for me. I don't understand. Do you want to say I'm everything including the government?

Edited May 9, 2019 by CreamCat

[Not me]

@Leo Gura I see. Yeah I agree there’s no real danger of communism right now. Still I wonder what the next step beyond green politics would be. Right now in Finland we have high tax rates, free public services and social security which seems very green to me. Would stage yellow change that? I find it hard to see how yellow could allow for natural hierarchies based on talent for example without creating too big of a socioeconomic gap. 

[Not me]

@Zizzero What I would consider right wing is lower taxes, less government control over people and businesses. Basically you have more freedom to do what you want, bur also more freedom to fuck up and make poor choices .

Left wing I would define more as higher taxes, helping the poor, limiting the growth of the rich, narrowing socioeconomic differences.

What do you think yellow politics would look like?

[tedens]

In short: 

Right-wing is conservative and left-wing is collectivist

Edited May 9, 2019 by tedens

[RichardY]

Right-wing is Distributive, at it's best. Assholes at their worst. Conservative is defunct and lifeless politically, it hasn't only failed its failed badly. If they can't keep two types of bathroom, fail.

The etymology of the word Left is literally "weak", strength in numbers. At it's worst it's Collectivist. At it's best creative.

I like the idea of Agrarianism, it goes one further then Greens in Theory. Only the Nordic countries have them as a credible party. But from what I hear they sellout just like other parties. Although the Agrarians did put up quite a fight against the Soviets in the Winter War. An estimated 500 kills by a Finnish farmer, turned Sniper. With the Green Socialist Parties too much money gets wasted through corruption.

 

[Zizzero]

2 hours ago, Not me said:

@Zizzero What I would consider right wing is lower taxes, less government control over people and businesses. Basically you have more freedom to do what you want, bur also more freedom to fuck up and make poor choices .

Left wing I would define more as higher taxes, helping the poor, limiting the growth of the rich, narrowing socioeconomic differences.

What do you think yellow politics would look like?

Ken Wilber introduced a distinction between the left and the right as how they would answer the question "why is someone poor?"

The left will typically name things like: Inequality, lack of opportunity - the system's fault

The right-winger will typically answer: lazyness, lack of responsibility, bad decision making - the invididual's fault

The left by that definition - and I believe this grasps how you defined it - sees the source of human suffering in the exterior. The right more in the interior.

Now, both sides have a partial truth to them. What happens with the entrance of tier 2 is that you recognize both truths simultaniously. 

Here's a thought experiment: In three different dimensions you are president of a country. In the first dimension all your citizens are red/blue, in the second all your citizens are orange/green and in the third all your citizens are turquoise/coral. What laws do you propose? Yellow, unlike its predecessors, will choose policies based on the current circumstances - not based on pure ideology. 

Another way to look at it is this: the warm colors are more individualistic, the cold ones are more collectivist. That makes yellow a more right-leaning stage and turquoise a left-leaning stage. Green exists to solve the problems orange creates. Yellow exists to solve the problems green creates.

[Nivsch]

@Not me yellow will lead much more flexible economy with capitalist or socialist attitude depends on the situation and the time. For my opinion.

I think Yellow is much more centrist.

Edited May 9, 2019 by Nivsch

[Nivsch]

@Not me its all about your flexibility and how less ideological you are. One who is very moderate and soft-right-wing (and close enough to the center) can be even in tier 2.