Political Labels: What Are They Good For?

If you have been politically active for a long period, or have just recently started. One thing should be extremely visible to you is a political division being made stronger through the use labels. All three of the big political parties in Canada use them and activists on all sides of the spectrum use them as well.

Libertarians, socialists, Marxists, anarchists, freeman on the land, environmentalists, etc. are all examples of these labels. Lets take a look at what the use of labeling different groups does and what they are effective at doing.

For this I am going to use the debate between so called environmentalists and so called libertarians.

The environmentalist/green movement is calling for smarter ways of living in harmony with nature. Cleaner energy sources, more green spaces, improvements in city planning, and ending pollution. In all honesty, I do not think that there is a single person out there who does not want to see improvements in all of these areas. Libertarians (in my experience) agree with most if not all of it. The debate comes into play when the discussion of how these goals will be implemented.

A large portion of the environmental groups feel that increased state involvement (on a global scale) is required to achieve the goals, while dismantling free market capitalism in place of state run markets.

libertarians feel that we as individuals cane achieve them without any state involvement. That returning to a true free market will correct many of the problems.

While both sides of the debate totally dismiss each other through labels ( don’t listen to them they are just crazy right wing libertarian Ron Paul types, or don’t listen to them they are just state loving communists). The achievable middle ground is totally being bypassed.

We could be making major progress with initiatives such as Earthships (self sustaining green homes), individual green energy production (building wind and solar power generation on our own homes), vertical farming in the cities, electric cars (or other transportation improvements), etc. While ensuring that connection into a smart grid or anything of that nature is voluntary.

An example of a Earthship

The key phrase in that video is “the more sustainable we became, as we built it. the more freedom we found we had”

We have the technology and determination to make that a reality. But the political division (left/right divide) that is only getting worse and worse through the use of these labels. Is preventing us from creating a true sustainable future.

These tools of division are loved by the bankers, big oil, etc. who are really running our society. While we bicker amongst ourselves and label each other so we can dismiss information being provided. The “ruling class” continues their agenda untouched. This is what political labeling and division is good for.

If we are to overcome the envisioned future of the oligarchy that we find ourselves under. We must stop dividing, come together and drop the silly labels!

Despite how it seems at times, humans are extremely smart and are great at problem solving. If we all just stop, take a breath and start calmly working together. This planet, our society would be improved in ways never imagined.