Talk:Leftist

This is a total contradiction:

Politics on the 'left' usually imply taking positions in favor of poor, powerless, or oppressed people. Therefore communists, socialists, and social democrats are usually considered leftists

People living under Communism are not "oppressed". Pul-leez. It will be reverted, but I haven;t a clue how to fix it. RobS 14:56, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

That is not a contradiction but a limit of the one dimentional political view. That is why some views use an additional libertarian/authoritarian axis. The communist ideal is in favor of the positions mentioned above, but takes a very authoritarian approach to acheiving those goals. It is by that standard that it becomes oppressive and indeed, much of the reason that communism seems to fight its own ideals.

Exactly, it's not a contradiction at all: it's evidence that not every political viewpoint lies on a left/right spectrum. Back in 1917 communists and a lot of other kinds of leftist radicals stood up in favor of the poor and the serfs against the Russian nobility. They proceeded to massively screw up their country. So around 1989 a lot of ordinary Russians stood up against oppression by Soviet bureaucrats. The people who overthrew the USSR were:

1. leftist?
2. rightist?
3. none of the above? (Seems to me that's the right answer!!) --Redblue 05:55, 9 April 2007 (EDT)

By the way, I made some comments on how to define the political spectrum on the Talk:rightist page. --Redblue 05:57, 9 April 2007 (EDT)