I'm in a group project currently in which we are linguistically analyzing AdBusters magazine. I basically spent last night outlining why the magazine makes no sense at all from a linguistic point of view. They use intertextuality in such a way that it almost never supports their point or has anything to do with what they are even talking about. They make up narratives that we're supposed to just know (whether they exist or actually cohere properly with what they are talking about is another matter). They coopt jargon improperly -- for instance, from the field of economics. They use this to allude to various professions in which are all blasted in the most reductionistic way possible.For instance, all economists care about is "their precious rising GDP levels." Also, they prove that no economists understand environmental issues by quoting "ecological economists" and "public policy" officials -- who of course consider the imaginary lowered GDPs because of pollution as the "biggest market failure" in history. Also, Starbucks is also the biggest market failure in history. By reading the beginning of the sensationalistic article you think Starbucks has just gone out of business, sold everything, went bankrupt, etc. But then you read that it's because now they have thurmases and candy and sell CDs in their stores. The employees they hire are not even experts on coffee. Some are kids, some are old people, none know how to grind coffee beans without a machine or know what unsealed coffee smells like. Their coffee store atmosphere is not authentic anymore. It's just brown, green, sepia color -- some orange and that same old logo in every store! How dispiriting! If the market really produced anything, they'd have more colors, no thurmases!, the coffee beans wouldn't be sealed. Wait what hell were we talking about again? Oh yeah, Starbucks has destroyed civil society with thurmases and CDs and their dull color pallette. And now people are taking to the streets to fight the power! Some place in China refused to allow Starbucks to be built and this proof!By the end of every article you're left scratching your head. What kind of fascists run this miserable magazine?
I used to read that magazine. From what I saw, all they'd do was hilariously mis-characterize the free-market position, attack it using sarcasm, call anything and everyone "right-wing" that isn't far-socialist, then call it a day. It's just... dumb. It's a better-funded version of Socialist Worker.
Don't allow leftists to play games with definitions! Some of the libertarian-leaning leftists at this forum will try to redefine "left-wing" back to its original defition (Third Estate, limited government, free-markets, laissez-faire reforms, etc.). Fine! We non-leftists can't stop them from using their own personal definitions; they can use whatever labels they want to describe any concept they want.However, they have the audacity to then use their personal definition of "left-wing" (remember, the original definition, which is no longer valid) to prove that modern leftists are more libertarian than modern rightists! They will say that libertarianism is "inherently leftist" (again, using the original, no longer valid definition), and use that to insist that we should prefer and side with modern leftists over modern rightists.
Question their motives.