Is the West Experiencing a Right-Wing Drift?

for the record, I agree with you re: vote-splitting. I don't want any kind of NDP/Liberals merger and will most likely vote NDP in the next election.

Still, I think it's difficult to argue that the Conservatives being the only viable party right of center doesn't benefit them enormously, allowing them to form majority governments despite not being able to get beyond 40% support.

The real problem is a lack of any kind of proportional representation.

I don't have the nuanced take on what is left wing, probably a bit dated & old fashioned. Indiscriminately killing civilians with drones and police does throw up some red flags though

most nuanced take

It is all shifted right in the context of most other Western countries.

it seems hard to dispute that obama's the most progressive president since johnson

Obama Lashes Out at Liberal Foes of Pacific Trade Deal
By PETER BAKER 3:07 PM ET
At Nike headquarters in Oregon, the president lashed out at critics within his own party, accusing Democrats of deliberately distorting the impact of the trade agreement he is negotiating with Asia.

i didn't think it'd be terribly controversial to say that obama was more progressive than carter or clinton. but yes i'm aware that the guy isn't bernie sanders.

you are also aware some people never get tired of criticizing him

I don't think the left's popularity is waning. It's just that their appeal is becoming more selective.

http://i.imgur.com/OGFBhT3.jpg

Here in Quebec it definitely feels like we have shifted to the right. Every successive Liberal leader has been more right-wing than his predecessor.

― silverfish, Friday, May 8, 2015 2:20 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Not only that, but like in many places across the West, our de facto left wing party has slowly and steadily become right wing.

love the passive voice thread question

plz put the q in active voice for me

present progressive, not passive

de facto left wing party

Had sort of a hollow lol when I realized that this probably refers to the PQ.

h/t the donald trump thread

https://cdn2.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/_MxkTUjnGeBaoavzdNapdX_UqkI=/1600x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4082854/Figure_7_.0.png

I'm not sure I understand what is meant by "shift in the percentage replying..." -- e.g. if 1000 respondents were surveyed from the United States in 1995 and 50 said "good or very good" then, does the chart mean that the number/1000 increased to 55 in 2014, or does it mean it increased to 150?

i.e. are we talking percent change or percentage point change?

the way i understand it, if in 1955 20% said army rule is good, and then in 2015 30% said so, there would be an increase of 10%? does that make sense?

btw i think the premise of this thread is true more than ever right now.

I don't think there's an overall rightward drift in the US. I do think there's a rightward drift on the right.

xp that makes sense, as long as that's what vox means

btw i think the premise of this thread is true more than ever right now.

― Mordy

I dunno. hard to say. to play devil's advocate:

likelihood is the United States will elect a democrat next year for the third election in a row.

Canada just voted out the conservatives in an election where the conservatives purposefully used wedge issues and stoked islamophobia as a vote-winning tactic.

The ruling party the conservative PP in Spain failed to return a majority in the election on Sunday.

I do think there's a rightward drift on the right.

^^^this

otoh france has moved so far to the right that the socialists had to throw their support behind the republicans to keep the national front out of power

terrorist attacks will do that

It's also important not to treat the opinions of the youngest voters as the future, necessarily, because people's opinions can tend to moderate as they age.

"moderate"

I do think that we've seen an increase in a kind of hyper-emotional style of politics that drives people away from grudgingly settling on the middle. I think the internet and social media actually have begun to break up the hold that mainstream news channels and the sensible-sounding center had on US politics, with both good and bad effects. I think Sanders' substantial support is evidence of that every bit as much as Trump's -- it has to be the internet and social media that have allowed Sanders to raise the kind of funds he has from small donors while being given little attention in old guard press and tv outlets.

I think as far as a worldwide rightward drift, though, that was actually happening from the 80s through 00's and now may have pulled back a bit. Maybe not in every country, but in the US and much of Europe (in spite of surges in right-wing nationalism), I think so. Obviously Israel has gone further right, maybe India has.

The responses on the army-rule question are not necessarily comparable between countries -- a heavily destabilized country like Iraq might have good reasons for seeing army rule as an alternative beyond any "rightward drift"

India's internal politics don't track much with other countries afaict, lot of unique competing interests and circumstances there

re France our republicans are to the left of your American republicans, tbh the Front Nationale is to the left of your republicans

sort of impressive india has never been under military rule

in the United States there was a definite rightwards shift in center-left coalitions starting in the late seventies and peaking in the presidency of Bill Clinton.

i don't know if this phenomenon has as much to do with ideology as much as it has to do with structural changes in capitalism

xxp 1858–1947

fwiw i was arguing w my dad a month ago and he called me a progressive, which was weird, cos that's maybe the first time in my entire life anyone, let alone him, has said that. i blame Trump and Facebook.

you should tell your dad that you're a La Follette Republican

We all need to reach out to our Muslim family and friends, imo

Maybe that's condescending? I hate this shit. My irl friends (yes I have a few) know how I feel.

bump.

fingers crossed i don't have to bump this thread again in nov.

while neocons like Kagan fundraise for Clinton, the more reliable War Pig.

stfu dumbass

lol, timely revive :(

while neocons like Kagan fundraise for Clinton, the more reliable War Pig.

― helpless before THRILLARY (Dr Morbius), Friday, June 24, 2016 9:19 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's really remarkable how human-like this experiment in artificial intelligence is. it's almost as if a real person is up around the clock, posting the same ideas every ten minutes, couched in slightly different language, metaphors, and invective. whoever programmed this bot deserves more attention than she is getting.

the same like 3 people bop in to respond to every single morbs post and you're one of them so who's the bot here

http://www.theycallmedaymz.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/whostheboss.jpg

to answer the q idk if it's an overall drift but the right we've known is being eaten alive by the right we thought was dead

big french election next year too. marie le pen looking pretty smug today.

the same like 3 people bop in to respond to every single morbs post and you're one of them so who's the bot here

― goole, Friday, June 24, 2016 11:00 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i happen to read many of the politics threads, and morbs happens to post 400 times an hour in those, 90% of his posts variations on the same thing. sorry if once in a while i mock him for it. makes it every slightly more bearable, in the absence of a reliable post filter.

sorry we're all engaging in hyperbole here. i don't respond to "every single" morbs post (that would be several full-time jobs) and he doesn't post "400 times an hour."

Marine Le Pen's FN can count on 25% of voters but it's hard to see them breaking out beyond that.

I have a friend active in Mélenchon's Parti de Gauche who is hosting a Brexit party tonight. They're working toward a Frexit too, and they may be able to pick up 10-ish% of the vote next year.

So if there were to be an alliance of the Eurosceptic Left and the Right, it would at any rate have more of a voice in the legislature than French euroscepticism has had to date. But I don't see them winning the presidency.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/10/peter-magyar-leading-polls-hungary-election-tisza-opposition

Right let's keep the racist shit. Fine with European liberals.

With the exception of migration, where he has vowed to take a harder line than Orbán by scrapping the country’s guest worker scheme, Magyar has committed to doing away with many of the most problematic parts of Orbán’s programme.

yeah the celebrations seem a little premature

What a dummy.

Today could be a big turning-point. If Hungary votes to oust Viktor Orbán, Putin’s (and, weirdly, Trump’s) ally inside the EU and NATO will be gone. The EU can give more help to Ukraine, which is anyway doing better on the battlefield. And the tide could turn against populism.

— John Simpson (@JohnSimpsonNews) April 12, 2026

that's why he gets the big bucks

oh is "populism" a political ideology now?

Really want to see the EU giving more help to Ukraine now I'm sure Orban was the only blocker there.

US and Russia picked the wrong racist huh

Yeah Magyar doesn’t seem like a Good Guy. Obviously Orban losing seems objectively good though. Including as a fuck-you to all the American right-wing weirdos who have latched onto him.

This thread of real time reactions from someone there is pretty great, I think:

https://bsky.app/profile/youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com/post/3mjd3busdyk2j

Saw that (you may be aware that most UK politics ilxors think she’s a melt).

Lol what a pathetic shit.

"I DON'T KNOW WHAT HE SAID BUT PRETTY SURE MAGYAR JUST MENTIONED MAGDA SZABO WE LOVE A LEADER WHO BIGS UP LITERATURE"

‪Olga Nesterova‬
✧@onestpr✧✧✧.onestnetw✧✧✧.c✧✧‬
· 5h
Peter Magyar confirmed that Szijjarto, Orbán's FM, has barricaded himself with some of his closest colleagues and is shredding documents related to the sanctions on Russia any other evidence of treason.

https://www.lilyslynch.com/p/the-end-of-orban

Good on the wider implications for the region

Lily Lynch lol

What's the gossip? I just came across that..

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/businesses-fear-economy-if-swiss-vote-cap-population-10-million-2026-06-08/

Swexit?

That is dumb as hell

eco-fascist drift in the air

maybe direct democracy isn’t so great

Surely there are some mercenary outfits they hire to make sure the population stays under 10 mil.

as well as driving up rents and crime

redundant

intrigued by Swiss gun nuts, they seem pretty different from US gun nuts

maybe direct democracy isn’t so great

as i understand it switzerland is an entire nation dedicated to proving this concept

Lol