Why are you a liberal?

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

I do think when picking political ideologies it's a matter of a pick your poison and I think liberalism is ultimately the one that makes the most sense. The principle of tradition for the sake of tradition is something I've never understood which has made even moderate conservatism hard for me to understand and support. I'm also sceptical of entrenched hierarchies and authorities which is inherently anti-conservatives. I've also grown steadily more hostile to the self-identified left of the liberal sphere, which is often infected with weird strains of utopian crankery and seems to have a deeply authoritarian core embedded inside of them. Ultimately I see collectivism as being far too misused through history and think that ultimately enabling people to be free to make their own choices is best thing the goverment can do. After all, I can only speak about my personal social preferences and see no reason why I should have to impose my preferences on others*.This is a bit warped by the fact that I'm also a utilitarian so I'm in favour of state intervention if on the net it improves personal liberty, for example, I'm in favour of drug prohibition because I view addiction as something that inhibits a person freedom by creating a dependency.

I am a bit dejected however by the modern trend of liberalism, and am not blind to many flaws of historical liberalism such as famines, colonialism and slavery often justified by many self-identified liberals. Ultimatley all ideologies come with their own baggage and it's a matter of picking the ones you can live with and of all the ideologies I think liberalism has made the best peace with it's ghosts especialy when compared to the far-left and the far-right.


Mordern liberalism is however something i'm growing a bit estranged from, I think there is increasingly an elitest technocratic bent with regards towards many modern self-identified liberals that I find incredibly off-putting that I think it's inherited from the broader centre-left sphere. Like I see many arguments post-Brexit about the evils of the referendum and the nesseicty of experts as deeply disturbing and most elite in a way that doesn't reflect well on the people who make them. I also do think morder-liberals have been to quick to dismiss concerns about pandemic measures as whining instead of reflecting on why people are getting increasigly freaked out about them

*Marxism is merely the most common one.