Do people see centre left parties as more moral?

We are only tribal because it serves politicians to encourage it

🤦🏻‍♀️
It's a fundamental facet of human behaviour & instinct.
It served as a survival function way, way back in our evolution and is an innate part of the human psyche. 'Belonging' underpins a LOT of our emotional well-being; teenagers especially are driven by this instinct.

If nothing else that should tell you how this left/ right good/bad divide is a load of nonsense which doesn't cover any nuance in human nature or behaviour.

Totally agree

All are potentially evil when they become ideological and believe they are so right or good their actions are justified.

And this.
It doesn't matter what the topic is - this is always the case.

VelvetChairGirl
I think it's naive to think that tribalism is pushed on us by politicians.
It's much much deeper than that. It exists in every known society. From hunter gatherer societies to good natured sporting rivalries between rural villages.
It's our nature to gather in small self reinforcing and mutually assisting groups.
Denying that seems to me to be like the ultra religious claiming that sexuality is not innate, merely the devil's imposition and trying fruitlessly to repress it.
Won't work, there are healthy moderate channels for both impulses. Not saying I have the answer to that, though.

Only tribal because of politics! That's a statement that would require some seriously hefty empirical shenanigans to justify. Is there any evidence, anywhere in history, of people NOT being tribal.

the way to deal with it is to have no one hard done by, we have more then enough money to give everyone a decent standard of life.

I am not talking about brexit I am talking about UKIP and how they got popular.

if you want to credit anyone with brexit then credit Cummings Vote Leave campaign

After ww1 and especially Ww2 people were aghast at what nationalism had done to the world. The keywords became co operation, unity, brotherhood of man. Great - racism in particular started to become untenable for most people. Nationalism and ethnic consciousness became associated with the right, for obvious reasons.

But guess what, keeping a lid on tribalism in that way caused tribalism to seep out elsewhere. Now you have identity groups based not on nationalism but on race or sexuality and its transnational. (Internationalism is a left thing, since Workers Of The World, you see it too in the Open Borders advocates)
You don't see union Jack's in polite society but you see plenty of pride flags for example.
And the rhetoric can be every bit as nasty and threatening as the worst c20 jingoism.

We're tribal. Us and them. It brings cohesiveness and belonging which is why its so attractive, and necessary I would say. But when it goes unchecked it brings disaster, like every other human instinct.

I read somewhere a study on the US showed that bigotry based on 'traditional' characteristics such as race and sex has been eclipsed by bigotry based on political opinion. People are less likely to think the other side are misguided but well meaning, but actively malevolent. And it has increased more on the far left side of the spectrum.

Brexit happened because northern labour voters supported it.
The London labour party didn't represent them.

And that's why Boris got a majority as well.

If nothing else that should tell you how this left/ right good/bad divide is a load of nonsense which doesn't cover any nuance in human nature or behaviour.

The left has always been based on identity politics of economy groups but that's been abandoned by the labour party for newer identity politics leaving the traditional voters alienated.

Fascism is identity politics of nations often but not always with a right wing conservatism.

All are potentially evil when they become ideological and believe they are so right or good their actions are justified.

The briefest view of 20th century history shows that neither the right or the left have a claim on morality, and if you think they do you're dangerous.

In the end Farage and the reinvigorated UKIP was the symptom of wide unease, not the cause.

YY to the previous poster.

I voted to leave the EU for a range of reasons which have probably never crossed that posters mind.

I am young enough that I expect to live through the beginnings of the Climate Crisis. One of the main reasons I voted was environmental. We are over the carrying capacity of the UK to feed ourselves, let alone conserve nature. I always believed that if the shit hit it would be every country for themselves. The pandemic proved to be a small unexpected taster with all the drama over the vaccines and trying to ban companies from exporting them to us.

Hardly anyone has probably ever heard that viewpoint. Because its not from Farage, the media or anyone. Its from my own understanding of where we are as a country and a globe. Something which I think is going to be the thing in 20 years time everyone turns around and goes oh shit why did we not consider that?!

hardly anyone was actually interested in leaving the EU and the economics of it thats why the parties were so small, what got people joining was when he started appealing to the national front types, using EU as a excuse for pushing xenophobia and emboldening racists.

No

People were getting pissed off ANYWAY - he just tapped into that and made UKIP visible

People got pissed off with the EU in far larger numbers than previously because of the decision by Blair to allow unfettered immigration immediately when the EU enlargement happened in the 2000s, rather than delaying or phasing it in as Germany etc did
Then the con trick that Blair/Brown pulled over the promised referendum on EU Constitution sealed the deal for many

Keep on believing that Brexit was a xenophobic endeavour & that Leave voters were all #FarageFans all you want - it doesn't make it true though 🤷🏻‍♀️

It's not a matter of whether it was any parties main priority.

What?

You know Corbyn was an EU skeptic from way back, right, like many on the left?

It's neither a new thing nor a fringe position, nor something that emerged with UKIP.

UKIP started out as a breakaway group from the Libdems the fact it got popular after farage took over shows what it was really about, hardly anyone was actually interested in leaving the EU and the economics of it thats why the parties were so small, what got people joining was when he started appealing to the national front types, using EU as a excuse for pushing xenophobia and emboldening racists.

And I find the example on here of the indoctrination of a child into believing half their society is immoral, to be quite sickeningly immoral itself.

See the issue: we have to do bad things because the other people are bad, and that makes us good...we know where that can lead.

The left believe they are more moral yes.
In fact they are convinced of it.
Because they are utopian rather than realists.

But this drive towards a top down imposed utopia can easily become very dangerous and not moral at all.

This gender ideology is part of the insistence that we can create a utopia if only we can force every one to comply.
A utopia which allows everyone to be whatever they want to be.
But a utopia which clashes with the reality of biological sex.
So a utopia which must be enforced and those who will not comply punished and shamed until they do.

Morality does not belong to the left or the right, it exists in a struggle between the rights of individuals and the group, and has to exist within the reality of a material world which acknowledges human nature.

The history of the 20th century history shows the equal ability of the left and right for huge evil.

Given that it amazes me how leftists still cling to the mirage that they're uniquely moral.

People are aware, aren't they, that Ayn Rand type radical neoliberalism, greed is good, is not actually conservative? Quite the opposite, it's libral, and you can find it is both the LP and CP.

If being an EU skeptic is bad, and being a leftist is good, how is it that leftism has, until economic liberalism took the wheel, tended to be skeptical of the EU?

Maybe it's not actually that simple.

and what do you mean by before UKIP?

I can't speak for the poster that said this obvs - but my understanding of 'before UKIP' is 'before UKIP became a widely known factor in politics'.

Before UKIP, I had no clue what parties there were who represented anti-EU sentiment or policies.

For me, personally, I became Eurosceptic from the Maastricht Treaty.
Margaret Thatcher made speeches & wrote articles around that time & I remember strongly agreeing with her over John Major & the prevailing Tory govt stance at that time (on this issue).

Since then I opposed the pro-EU policies & treaties agreed to under Blair/Brown and a salient issue for me was the promise of a referendum on the proposed EU Constitution which was then shelved as it 'wasn't an EU Constitution anymore, it was 'just' another treaty' (which Brown then skulked off & signed).

It is entirely plausible that millions of voters were like me; that is, not remotely interested in or knowledgeable of party-political goings on, but very much in favour of a referendum on our continuing EU membership.

put your football shirt down and stop this nonsense

I would suggest that it is actually you who needs to take a step away from the tribal tbh 🤷🏻‍♀️
Anti-EU sentiment cut across all axes of political identity, as do many other current big-topics

So, say you've supported leaving the EU for years, since before UKIP even. Many have. And because Farage says something and puts a poster up you're supposed to go, oh sorry now we can't vote leave, despite wanting to leave for 30 years? Madness. Narrow minded madness. And part of the identify politics problems of the left that is keeping them out of power. You did or said X, I don't agree with X, therefore you're bad and I'm ok with people calling you bad things because, well, you're just bad, basically because you're not me. Dear heavens...

vote leave was a referendum not UKIP, half of the Tories wanted to leave the EU such as Boris Johnson who made up lies about bendy bananas in his journalism days to help get the anti EU sentiment rolling.

UKIP has never had a single seat in parliament with the exception of an already established Tory minister who defected.

and what do you mean by before UKIP?, they were The Anti-Federalist League before changing their name and were a smaller party then The Referendum Party, by the time UKIP broke thru onto the political scene and was picked up by the MSM it was clear half of the Conservatives supported leaving the EU, the referendum was due to the party splitting not UKIP.

put your football shirt down and stop this nonsense, Farage usurped Sked and steered the party away from a liberal economic stance towards xenophobia.

your proving "lefties" are more moral, you stuck with a party that pushed sexism, xenophobia and elicited ridiculous BNP style shouting about WW2 etc, thoroughly embarrassing us in the EU parliament multiple times, over a single issue, so either you agree with sexism and xenophobia or you turned a blind eye to it over a single issue.

something us "lefties" on mumsnet have repeatedly stated we will not do, we will not vote for parties that disregard womens rights, we will not vote for parties that are racist, sexist etc. we would just not vote at all because we will not turn a blind eye to evil and regressive policies just because they dangle 1 single carrot above the pile of manure.

I was a leave voter. I voted that way because I felt there was an increasing democratic deficit in Europe. I didn't expect more money or an easy time after we left. I also didn't expect Boris and hoped negotiations would have been undertaken in better faith. But if we had stayed in Europe following a remain vote then that would have had consequences too.

Since

Anti-EU cut across both left and right, authoritarian & libertarian of both too.

Some people for xenophobic reasons, yes - but there's extremist wankers in every group regardless of what that group consists of, or what overarching belief or characteristic they share.
The extremist wankers are not representative of any grouping of people, they're always just a tiny minority fringe.

This is true across all areas & topics of debate or ideology.

I am & have always been a floating voter - pretty central, lean slightly left wrt social policies, slightly right on economic policies & am very much 'live & let live, so long as it's legal and doesn't hurt others'.

I'm friends with people from across the political spectrum - my best friend has voted opposite to me on Brexit (I was a Leave voter), Scottish Independence (I would have been a No voter had I still lived up there), the last GE (I voted Tory, she voted Green). But we align on many other areas 🤷🏻‍♀️
We have some good debates & we've both benefitted from hearing good arguments for the 'other side' on issues we diverge in.

It's healthy to not be tribal.
Blanket-labelling an entire grouping of people as either goodies or baddies is reductive and childish & achieves nothing.

I honestly do believe that most people are pretty reasonable and open minded - the silent majority.
It's a shame that the shouty minority hog the spotlight.
But then this is also why the cries of disbelief & outrage from them are so visceral when things don't go their way - they truly believe that their view is the majority view and cannot comprehend or accept that it is, in reality, not.