Live Liberal :: LESS ABOUT ME, MORE ABOUT WE.

The ancient or archaic meaning of conservatism is "preservative agent or principle." More popular contemporary definitions present conservatives as people who uphold tradition and oppose major changes in laws and institutions. While they are often resistant to change, should they come to think that it is necessary, it should be gradual and minimal. Generally, conservatives oppose "big government" and support free-market economic policies and low taxes. Perhaps most consistently, they seem predisposed toward opposing liberal reforms. In other words, in any conversation or proposal suggesting change or reform, they are most likely to say "no‚" at the outset. At best, they sometimes say ‚"yes, but..."

Because tradition is important to most folks of any perspective, an analogy might be helpful. It has been said that tradition is simply society's "attic" crammed full of all sorts of items, some valuable and worth keeping and some that are outdated and some that are simply junk. The traditionalist conservative would seek to keep saving it all.

Whereas conservatives seem predisposed to keep everything in society's "attic" as well as to say "no" to change or reform, liberals seem predisposed to keep cleaning the "attic" of old or useless relics, while feeling free to say "yes" to reform and change. The ancient Romans and Greeks both used the word "liber" to denote being free. As such, the root "liber" is not only the root of "liberal," but also of "liberty" (being free from restraint), "liberate" (to set free), and "liberalize" (to free from prejudice and narrow beliefs), among many other such words.

In contemporary use, the word liberal has several meanings, all of which convey some facet of liberal thinking. These meanings include "favorable to progress and reform, as in religious or political affairs"; "favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties"; "open-minded or tolerant, esp. free of or not bound by traditional or conventional ideas, values, etc."; and "characterized by generosity and willingness to give in large amounts". (Random House Dictionary of the English Language). In other words, liberals support changes that increase personal freedom and tolerance, and exercise the liberty to empower government to the extent necessary to achieve those ends.

In short, liberals see the role of all social institutions (church, family, education, politics, economics) as providing a framework within which individuals can develop their lives and contribute to society. Each social institution, from the liberal perspective, provides for equal opportunity to ameliorate the effects of poverty and discrimination. Each social institution supports the values that health care and education should be universally available, since without either, individual choice is severely limited. Liberal values permeating the social institutions support the ideas that such social institutions are not there to protect people from themselves or to interfere in individual interaction, except insofar as to prevent systematic actions that cause harm.