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can anybody provide unbiased or at least mainly neutral sources which explain in detail all the different political views. I feel I don't know enough. I just want a reliable source to explain things like socialism, fascism, anarchy, communism, environmentalists, libertarians, etc. etc.
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how do i learn about all sorts of political views?
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4 Replies
Reply by EngiQu33ring
posted
If you want to learn more about political and economic ideologies, the best thing to do is just read stuff in your free time. Some of it is pretty dull at first, but once you read a few things you start making connections between ideas and it becomes a lot more interesting.
This site is a really good repository for leftist writings over a really broad range of time. I would just click on something that sounds interesting and go from there. I don't know about any online resources for right-leaning writings, but would be interested if someone here could link to one.
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Reply by EngiQu33ring
posted
Also, I feel like it would be remiss not to say that while reading about ideas related to politics and economics, it's best to take the idea into account separate from whatever ideology you think it might most relate to. A mental trap a lot of people fall into is reading about an idea and thinking, "oh, this must be related to <ideology>, which means it must connect to <unrelated idea>." Evaluate the ideas as they are presented and then see how they relate to others.
That isn't to say you shouldn't divorce the idea from the author though. After reading something, it's usually helpful to read about the author's life to see what kind of things may have influenced them to make them think a certain way about a topic.
Reply by Sánchez
posted
I think wikipedia would seriously be best. It's very succinct and at a decent level understood by everyone. Plus, it has sections on important figures, books, and further reading.
Reply by otto
posted
Read, read and read! When it comes to other topics I'd say go on a Youtube dive, but with politics its a bit...wretched, people who don't know jack shit about what they are talking about often try and give definitions, and this goes for both sides, republicans don't know what an actual communist is and can't tell the different between them and socialists, and some leftists don't understand socdems, which is fair, things get mixed up in the great game of telephone.
Most people know about the basic stuff relating to leftism, so for libertarians and to a more extreme, anarcho-capitalists I'd start with "A Spontaneous Order" by Chase Rachels Chase and "Anatomy of the State" by Murray Rothbard.
Again, head down to a public library and browse for a bit in the political theory section, even if you disagree with what they believe in, whether a small amount or they are on a completely different axis than you, it's good to know 1. where they are coming from and 2. what they believe in actually.