What Happened To Liberals?
“Terrorist, extremist, Nazi, bigot, ‘magat’, white supremacist, racist, sexist, traitor, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, deplorable” are just some of the daily slurs thrown toward conservative Americans. These slurs are not just coming from anonymous accounts on social platforms but from President Biden, and many prominent Democratic members of Congress.
According to many Democrats, these slurs apply to me, a mom of 5. I spend most of my days caring for my children as a stay-at-home mom changing diapers, cleaning the house, cooking meals, etc., yet somehow I am in the same category as Al-Qaeda, ISIS, and even Hitler, just because I have a different worldview. My opinion and unwillingness to submit to progressives is genocide I’ve been told.
The ironic thing is the people who hurl these baseless slurs, call themselves kind, diverse, inclusive, and empathetic. Yet calling average normal Americans these horrible names doesn’t seem to exhibit any of these positive traits.
Inclusivity and empathy are not defined by hurling insults against anyone who has the nerve to believe differently, especially when the offensive belief was shared by progressives just a few short years ago.
Less than 20 years ago during the MeToo movement, if a man walked into a woman’s locker room and exposed his penis, he would be all but publicly tarred and feathered. Now not only is he celebrated for doing the same thing, but anyone who objects to his behavior risks being publicly canceled, losing their job, and of course can expect to receive a barrage of baseless insults.
Even just a couple of years ago, it would have been unheard of to think of 12-year-old girls having their breasts cut off because they wanted to be boys. Now objecting to transing kids even with a plethora of data suggesting most kids grow out of gender incongruity is a cancelable offense.
What happened?
How can supposedly kind, inclusive, empathetic people become so unhinged, radical, and outright cultish in their thinking? Why do they have so much power and why do they hate conservative people so much? And why does their criticism of those who disagree with them solely consist of bizarre insults rather than substantial arguments?
The rise of woke ideology has apparently given a shield to those with the correct views to exhibit the most despicable, disgusting, and hateful behavior, and to do so not only with impunity but with adulation. There is a growing body of research that suggests many of those who adhere to woke ideology or leftist extremism also suffer from high rates of what is called dark triad traits, otherwise known as psychopathology and narcissism.
These psychopathic narcissists have been able to capture, not just the Democratic Party, but every single educational institution in the US, almost all medical institutions, the media, entertainment, many NGOs, government agencies, and increasingly big business. Once they have captured an institution, they go to work demonizing all of those who will not parrot their ideology.
This is new. It is anti-Democratic, anti-American, and quite frankly anti-human. Conservatives are being persecuted in increasingly open and terrifying ways. From the January Sixers to pro-life advocates while radical leftists burn down buildings, take over police stations, and colleges, threaten women, Jews & conservatives with very little pushback.
Conservative people, many of whom are Christian live quiet lives, and for the most part, keep to themselves have now become the new scapegoat and target of progressive disdain. As a conservative person, I cannot tell you how frightening this is.
Political persecution is real, and millions of people all over the world have been killed for it. Most Americans and most humans know this is wrong. They know that calling yourself kind while demonizing innocent people who’ve done nothing to deserve it is abhorrent. It is indicative not of kindness and empathy, but of hate and rage.
I frequently hear from liberals and Democrats that they don’t believe in progressive ideology, but they are fearful to stand up against it. So they just watch their fellow countrymen be targeted & dehumanized and hope it doesn't happen to them.
It’s time for the real kind, caring, and empathetic people to stand up. If you truly believe in democracy, you would not sit by in the freest country on earth & watch your fellow citizens be treated in this fashion.
Thankfully, we have many laws in this country that protect us. But it is possible laws can be changed, or people can simply ignore them. The new hate speech law in Scotland proves this. Great nations have fallen to ideological capture, and have committed some of the worst atrocities humanity has known. It is absolutely possible it can happen here too.
If you believe in liberalism, if you believe yourself to be a kind, empathetic person, it’s time to prove that. Stop letting your fellow citizens be demonized and treated in such an inhumane fashion.
Your continued silence further separates you from these positive qualities that you say you hold so dear. We are not punching bags, scapegoats, or infantry soldiers for you to hide behind.
It is not fair nor right to expect people like me with young families to stand up, and risk our livelihood, political persecution, or even prosecution just because we’re standing up for our beliefs, and what we believe is right.
Those who hurl these slurs towards us, cannot define them, nor provide any receipts for how they apply to us. They spew this hate towards us because they desire power above all and believe this is the best way to gain it.
It’s time for liberals, the real liberals, to stand up for and with conservatives. Put your differences aside and recognize “your side“ is the one on the wrong side of history now.
There’s an old poem from World War II:
“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”
They’re coming for us now, but eventually, they will come for you and you’re going to want someone there to speak out for you too.
Rebecca Velo is a mom, wife, and political writer. She is the Opinion Editor for Wrong Speak Publishing and also writes for Substack. You can follow her on X.
Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author's own.
Nice piece, but a couple of errors.
1. She left 'fascist' off the list, that's one of the left's favorite lies about us.
2. "The rise of woke ideology..." It's not a real ideology. It's just a list of lies. Just one example: Do you think the leftists really believe that there is no biological difference between men and women?
"I frequently hear from liberals and Democrats that they don’t believe in progressive ideology, but they are fearful to stand up against it." The reality is worse than that.
I came across Rene Girard's work on Scapegoating. He noticed that Judeo-Christianity introduced concepts such as the innocent victim being scapegoated such as Job and then more importantly Jesus. Though Jesus knew he was innocent, he asked forgiveness for his persecutors. Girard said the ability of the victim to question his sacrifice was a culture shift. It was an awareness that the scapegoating was in error, which is unlike other mythology such as the Oedipus myth. And when a person has suffered a terrible wrong at the hands of others but chooses to forgive, an act of grace is witnessed. The Good Samaritan story transcends tribalism. I think we are seeing what happens when you strip away these moral traditions. Nietzsche predicted without God everything would be reduced to power, which in turn, seems to turn to nothing but tribalism.