[virgil]

I've seen it put that the Left is revolutionary while the right is reactionary. I think both the left and the right are subject to reactionary behavior. To associate reaction with conservatives is wrong. Conservatives tend not to be the ones who run out into the streets to set fires and break windows when they don't like something.

[risk]

>>>> Conservatives tend not to be the ones who run out into the streets to set fires and break windows when they don't like something.

We have these associations with the words "liberal" and "conservative" but there are historical reasons for them that are equally important. I think it's OK to say "I'm conservative and therefore I don't break windows."

Resorting to direct "dictionary" terms for identifying what these political terms mean is risky because they can be made to argue just about any social perspective that way. Maybe that's a part of politics -- that we adopt words we like to describe ourselves, and then find ourselves changing our behavior and our outlook to meet other definitions of those words as time goes by (and we mature in our perspectives).