I mean it in the sense big L liberalism, the political philosophy. The majority of Conservatives are still liberals, they are just right wing liberals (there’s a Libertarian and Fascist fringe obvs). Left liberals like to pretend the differences they have with right liberals are substantive, but they are in agreement on the main issues - the primacy of property rights and the market, the composition of government, the authority of the state - and agree on more than they disagree. see, for example, the way a left liberal recoils to the warm embrace of a Tory when presented with an actual socialist.
The term is a useful catch all for the gamut of mainstream/acceptable political opinion in the West. It’s also helpful to distinguish left liberals from the Left, which left liberals often like to imagine themselves as being part of.
I mean it in the sense big L liberalism, the political philosophy. The majority of Conservatives are still liberals, they are just right wing liberals (there’s a Libertarian and Fascist fringe obvs). Left liberals like to pretend the differences they have with right liberals are substantive, but they are in agreement on the main issues - the primacy of property rights and the market, the composition of government, the authority of the state - and agree on more than they disagree. see, for example, the way a left liberal recoils to the warm embrace of a Tory when presented with an actual socialist.
The term is a useful catch all for the gamut of mainstream/acceptable political opinion in the West. It’s also helpful to distinguish left liberals from the Left, which left liberals often like to imagine themselves as being part of.