Are you a liberal or conservative, etc?
Technically, I'm a neopaleoprogressivist. According to your poll, however, I voted myself as a non-conservative Republican.
Because I feel that it's the best of both worlds. My philosophy is that our world is full of competing interests all vying for resources that each organization and person try to secure for itself for their own well-being.
So by having government forces compete with corporate forces I believe that individual people are able to live better lives.
Another part of my philosophy is something I call "organization psychology." That is the psychology of organizations.
I think that for-profit businesses have only one goal - to exploit resources in order to make profit. Also, the larger and further removed the executives of a business are from the consequences of their actions the more likely they are to use hurtful or abusive practices to gain a profit. Small businesses are closer to the consequences of their actions, and so are more empathetic to their employees and customers. Large businesses, however, are less empathetic to their employees and customers because of their large sizes and the sheer number of people they employ makes it near impossible to treat every employee and customer with a level of intimacy. Large businesses don't care how they treat their employees or their customers - only how they profit matters.
Please note that this isn't a criticism of businesses. It's just an honest assessment of their purpose as an organization.
However, this would put businesses along the lines of the "Id" according to Freudian psychology. Rather than the pleasure principle, however, businesses operate according to the profit principle. And so long as a business makes a profit they care little about the consequences of their actions in acquiring a profit.
Because businesses, especially large businesses, can perform hurtful practices in the pursuit of profit they require some way to enforce empathy upon them in order to regulate their behavior. That is they need a "super-ego" to provide a structure of behavior that will ensure they act with good faith for their employees, their customers, and people in general.
So, in this way, businesses can do their purpose - exploit resources done by employees and provided to customers for a profit - regulated by the government - who ensures that the exploitation that businesses do are not overly hurtful or abusive to individuals.
So mostly neopaleoprogressivism states that the best form of government is the kind that
regulates businesses. However, personally, I agree that there are some functions - such as our penal system, the military, and emergency services - that are best done by the government regardless.
The reason why I consider myself a non-conservative Republican is because I believe in many of the interests of the Republican Party. That is I believe in entrepreneurship and the importance of business That's why I'm a Republican.
However, I'm non-conservative because I don't hold that the government is adversarial towards businesses. After all, as a business owner I need to hire employees with a basic education. Therefore I should support public education. Also as a business owner I need my employees to be healthy. Therefore I need to ensure they have access to adequate health care and that food safety regulations are in place. As a business owner I also need good roads to allow goods and customers to flow, so I support transportation infrastructure of all kinds.
Basically, as a business owner I don't mind government regulations on businesses, as I realize that my business is a customer to other businesses, and therefore as a customer I require protections and therefore benefit by regulations on other businesses. Hence why I'm a non-conservative Republican.
What makes your stance better than others?
My stance is more practical than ideological. As I said before it doesn't put me in an adversarial position to government but rather to a supporter of government. My business benefits from government regulations and programs. Therefore I should not oppose the government purely on ideological grounds. Rather I should ensure that the government benefits my business interests and pay taxes to ensure that the government does so.
Do you percieve any flaws in your stance?
Others may not like the fact that I don't take a hard line on stances. Also, while government should regulate businesses I don't think the government should regulate everything. Therefore statements about this philosophy may cause others to go off the rails. Also, my philosophy pre-supposes that groups with work together to try to find
mutual self-interest - when conflicting groups work together to come to a compromise instead of exclusive self-interest - when conflicting groups demand only their own best self-interest without compromise. All too often we get the latter rather than the former.
Which one specific aspect of the other political identities do you abhor?
I abhor extreme libertarianism. Oh, I understand the appeal to it, and to some degree I even appreciate it. However I don't think that the points of libertarians are realistic. It pre-supposes that people, businesses, and organizations are
always rational actors - and people, businesses, and organizations usually aren't. Therefore, all their models tend to be drastically off.
I admit, there's a few specific things about libertarianism I agree with, but for the most part I am against the whole of the philosophy.
You're welcome.