Why are U.S. conservatives shifting away from the word "Liberal" in favor of "Leftist"?

I think that some of my friends here at r/Ask_Politics might be over-thinking this question. The use of "Leftist" over "Liberal" is just about branding their opposition.

If you're interested in what makes that kind of branding work, then come along as I join my friends in over-thinking this question:

An opposition brand needs to have two attributes: 1) it needs to be a term that your own side understands as describing only terrible people, and 2) it needs to be a term that your opposition does not openly use for itself.

On attribute 1:

For a whole bunch of reasons, the concept of a "leftist" is more objectionable than "liberal" to your average conservative. Mostly, this is because they associate it with the atrocities of 20th century communist regimes. Until recently, "communist" and "socialist" were the preferred terms used for this purpose. However, in recent years those terms have failed on attribute 2 (see below).

The use of "leftist" is a lot like progressive's use of terms like "anarcho-capitalist", or "corporatist", "fascist", or even "American Taliban" for their opposition. Though, I find that progressives are less effective at this kind of branding because they can rarely agree on what is the most objectionable attribute of their opposition.

On Attribute 2:

The branding loses its power when the opposition becomes comfortable using the term for itself. This is because as long as there is no one (or almost no one) willing to stand up and say "I am a [insert term]ist, and this is what I believe" then the other side is free to define their beliefs for them. "Socialist" and "communist" have gone through this cycle. 30 years ago, almost no one anywhere near the mainstream in America described themselves as a socialist. So, the right was free to create it's own socialist mythos; "socialists want to steal all your stuff, they want to throw you in jail for believing in God, they probably want to eat your babies too."

They could keep this up for as long as the only socialists they needed to deal with were straw men. When more mainstream Americans began to embrace the "socialist" label, use of the term became a lot more complicated for the right. Socialists couldn't be boogeymen if they were real, and willing to say things like, "I don't hate your religion, I don't eat babies, and I only want to redistribute some of the wealth, not all of it." Now it's a debate, and debates are not what people who use these terms are after.

What you want, if you're looking to brand your opposition like this, is one word that says "everyone who opposes us are secret monsters." Today, "leftist" is that word for conservatives. Tomorrow, my money is on "statist". That one's been percolating for a while now...

To reclaim a word that was appropriated and definitely doesn't reflect the American Left in 2017. They are Progressives. There's a big difference between wanting to preventing the state from discriminating (poll taxes etc) and the state being used as a cudgel to force private individuals to do something against their will (make a wedding cake that goes against their religion and then forcing them out of business). I support gay marriage and think the government has no business preventing 2 people if age and of sound mind from marrying. However, even though I am an atheist, I think that the cake thing was a miscarriage of justice. I wouldn't describe myself as conservative either, having never voted for a single Republican. Leftism as a term reflects the shift of American democrats from the civil rights/vietnam/hippy era to this new "the state must provide healthcare to everyone" view that has become dramatically more prominent in recent years. The liberals of the baby boomer generation were living in an era where the horrors of leftism were right in your face on the news from Cuba, to the Warsaw Pact Nations, to Pol Pot and the Kmer Rouge. They were much more skeptical of a big state than our generation's left. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_liberalism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_liberalism

It’s to link American liberals with Communists and Socialists, even though most Democrats fall to the right of many conservatives in other developed countries.

This is happening so fast it doesn't seem like a trend but an intentional and well-orchestrated transition.

half the country is not organized into a cabal that decides language use.

and now it's everywhere

Seems like not so much.

You mentioned that leftist is a European term. The Russians are known to be interfering in American politics and run bot farms and the like. Is it so hard to make the connection that "leftist" is a term being used more simply because the Russians are backing the alt-right to sow discord in America? I know I am not the only one who has noticed how many users will post strikingly similar right-wing comments in the (North American) overnight hours in r/politics? A lot of whataboutism and projection. We still hear complaints about leftist paid shills, and I have no doubt a lot of that is projection.

I...don't think this is true. I see use of the word 'liberal' everywhere, all over the place - from memes to commentators on TV. Don't think it's disappearing.

When people are pursuing liberty and permissiveness, it makes more sense to call them liberal. When people are pursuing social justice, they are pursing a particular end (that which they perceive as just), which is at odds with with liberty (i.e. if you want society to form certain balances, you need to take away the freedoms that allow them to reach other balances). In the earlier stages of civil rights where we were talking about illegalizing slavery, legalizing women voting, etc., both those supporting liberty and those supporting social justice are on the same page. But in the issues we've been covering more recently, the two have been diverging. A person who supports liberty won't compel you to be kind to others or to empower others. A person who supports social justice will restrict the rights of certain people (often what they see as a privileged party) in order to allow others to be happier and more empowered. So, on some issues, particular some recent ones (e.g. gay rights, trans rights, ACA), the two diverge. The American left is compelling people to do what they think will create the greater good. Meanwhile, those who are "liberal" would be permissive of the range of good and bad behaviors.

I'm sure some people will disagree with those definitions and I'm not really here to defend that they are the only or the best definitions. I'm just answering the question... why conservatives feel a need to pivot away from calling the left liberals. If you talk to conservatives, you'll often hear them proudly talk about how they are classical liberals and are just taking their name back.

Personally, I look at the definition of liberal in the dictionary "open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values; broadly construed or understood; not strictly literal or exact". To me, that seems to essentially boil down to the opposite of authoritarianism and I identify with that a lot. Meanwhile, the left is increasingly authoritarian (and yes I know the right is too) and while it may be for great intentions I still don't think that necessarily warrants calling it liberal. The modern American left is partly liberal and partly not. Liberal has a much more constant definition than "left" and "right" and sometimes left or right will align strongly with liberal and sometimes they won't and it may vary from issue to issue. The left is a platform that is liberal in some ways and not in others. Referring to that platform as the left can more accurately reflect that distinction. In other words, I always consider myself liberal, but I only sometimes consider myself associated with the left.

To describe the various parties in relation to their place on the political spectrum is indeed a relatively new thing for Americans, but not for the rest of the world. In most other democracies, it's fairly common to describe a certain party in terms of where they sit on the spectrum.

Americans have never done this until recently primarily because we have always had very weak parties. For most of American history, your geographical region was more indicative of your policies than your party--a northern liberals often had very much in common with northern conservatives as well as northern liberals. This meant that a national Republican party or a national Democrat party had a surprisingly diverse representation of viewpoints and it's exact position on the spectrum was impossible to pinpoint.

But ever since Newt Gingrich was Speaker of the House, parties have been strengthening. Now, regardless of geographic position, Republicans are most in common with other Republicans, and Democrats with Democrats. This means that there is comparatively little diversity in the party, making it much, much easier to pinpoint specific locations on the spectrum.

So back in the day, to call the "liberal" party "leftist" would have been very incorrect--the each party held a diversity of views across the spectrum. Now, the conservative party holds all views on the right side of the spectrum, and vice versa.

"Leftist" also holds a slightly derogatory connotation from back in the Cold War when the left represented Communism.

I'm not sure, but my guess would be that it started in right-wing radio. Just like how conservatives now say "The Democrat Party" instead of "The Democratic Party". Limbaugh popularized that one.

There are a lot of long answers in here, but it's because the "ist" suffix sounds more extremist, kinda like communist or islamist. It's just a branding thing.

The 't' at the end allows for extra vitriol and spittle when saying the word, hence it's popularity.

This is somewhat speculative, but it might be due to the schism between the corporate and populist wings of US conservatives. Big businesses don't want to tarnish liberal ideas like free trade and immigration because they're profitable, and politicians don't want to be seen as opposing their corporate donors.

It depends where you're seeing it - shows like the Rubin report are becoming really popular and the point that show generally makes is that the left, or progressive left, is becoming less and less liberal (restriction of free speech by banning people from speaking at universities, for example) so perhaps that is why you've seen it in some circles?

It's an attempt to brand the opposition, something that the Republican media universe has been extremely successful at.

The old word, liberal, was associated with Obama, Clinton, Pelosi and mainstream Democratic politics. But that label isn't working as a perjorative like it once did, as Democratic policies and politicians have enjoyed a resurgence in popularity when the Republican alternatives saw the light of day.

Leftist is an older perjorative term, but one that the right is attempting to associate with antifa, BLM, more radical campus politics, etc - the left wing of the Democrats that isn't broadly popular.

So the goal is to try and conflate normal Democrats and politicians with extremists that (rightly or wrongly) are not popular in the US

People on the left are saying this word is offensive to them and use it as a reason to disregard your entire perspective. As it was presented to me, "liberal... Liberal.... There's that word again, liberal. Do you realize your talking about me using that word, about my family, about everyone I've ever loved!?". It's almost like it's the n word for left beliefs all of a sudden.

It seems that among my conservative friends, anybody to the left of their positions is now considered a "leftist" - even those who espouse views that are arguably objectively centrist. It seems many factions of conservatism increasingly hold to some flavor of "us vs the world" mentality. "Either you're a conservative, or you're with the terrorists."

I've seen a lot of great arguments here, but I don't think they are addressing the issue. I think the reason the term "leftist" has come into favor is the same reason we are seeing the term "alt right."

The parties and the political system are so polarized that each side is resorting to terms that seem pejorative. To me it seems like a product of the recent presidential election. Hyper polarized sides. It's not enough to call someone a liberal, it has to be leftist. It isn't enough to call a Republican conservative, it has to be alt-right. It is a product of the extreme polarization of our political parties.

We also are seeing the return of the moderate or the "classical liberal." These people are trying to reclaim their term, so they need another name for those who lean to the left.

I personally still use both pretty interchangeably. Maybe it's because of the common mention of the "alt right" puts the idea of left vs right into people's heads.

It isn't shifting to Leftist, but there definitely has been a shift away from "Liberal". My observation is that the term "Progressive" has taken off as the less-tainted term for those on the Left. Annoyingly, 'progressives' is also currently trending as a label SPECIFICALLY for the purist/idealist wing of the Left (e.g. Berniecrats and Greens), so perhaps 'leftists' is indeed the preferred name for some.

It is difficult to explain to those outside the US, but it has to do with the misguided political dialogue in this country, in turn spurred by media shameless in its partisanship. 20 years of Limbaugh, Hannity, and other big names in Right-leaning media have managed to skew the term Liberal to a negative connotation. Beyond just being a designator of left/right worldview, a "liberal" can now imply something about one's personality, or one's manliness, or threshold for taking offense, or even one's patriotism. Many have a cemented stereotype of a "liberal" in some or all of these aspects because of the treatment the word has received, with consequences both intended and unintended.

Even those that are Left-leaning politically, the term has taken on an air of undesirable self-designation - a product of the millions of utterances and uses within a negative context by the big dogs of talk radio, who coincidentally are also the big dogs of conservative radio (a phenomenon within the American political media post-Fairness Doctrine, 'the media' is accepted to be unquestionably left-biased and thus right-themed radio programs stumbled into a goldmine of a loyal and eager market). But anyway, the word "Liberal" in the modern US has come a long long way from its classical origins. By the mid to late 20th Century, the term occupied a space on the left that was more in line with contemporary politics than the "small government and laissez-faire economics" definition it carried for the classical left (which in modern political classification would have been placed towards the center of the left-right axis), and liberalism became tied with issues of civil rights, social justice, environmentalism, and socialism....all of which are issues whose defenders earn scorn in the poisonous contemporary political climate, and within a generation and half you slowly build a reluctance to associate oneself with a specific term, after the abuse and disgust thrown on it by countless Limbaugh monologues, South Park sketches, etc and all the mischaracterized associations that people put together mentally as a result of all the above.

If you say another bunch of people are leftist, there's this "othering" at work here. There are connotations, "they have left", but more importantly you say you are right.