A) In my opinion, ideology is a systematic body of concepts about how a society is govern based on one’s beliefs or ideas associated with a political system. identifying one’s identity and how the government set rules when it comes to consumer protections, disability and retirement support, minimum-wage laws, unemployment compensation, occupational safety, and injury compensation laws. I also think ideology deals with immorality, homosexuality, feminism, and religion.

B) An example that was illustrated in (a) is how numerous conservative leaders have been caught in adulterous affairs, homosexual, immorality, feminism, and religion.

C) An ideology can be described as a set of general beliefs and ideas shared amongst a set of individuals, or a group of people. Ideologies are of different kinds, for example, religious and political ideologies. Michael Parenti in his book “Democracy for the few” sought to give readers a detailed understanding of different political ideologies held by individuals within the political arena, which of course is aligned to their respective political leaning; be it Republicans, Democrats, Independent, etc. this would further be explained from a conservative’s point of view, a liberal or a centrist.

The writer was quick to make the distinction of traditional political ideologies, he states that “Political ideologies traditionally have been categorized as rightist, centrist, and leftist, What is called the political right consists of conservatives, corporate elites, and many other affluent persons who advocate free-market capitalism and defend big business as the mainstay of the good society.” (Parenti, 2011). A summation of these varying ideologies from the rightist, centrist, and leftist are as follows. The conservatives believe in free markets and the support of big businesses, they want to do away with the government as they believe it is the problem and not the solution. “Most conservative ideologues today, however, might better be classified as reactionaries, having an agenda intent upon rolling back all the progressive gains made over the last century” (Parenti, 2011)p 52.

2. My understanding of a liberal ideology are that they believe in free market, free trade, limited government intervention, supporting individual right such civil right and human right.  They suppose democracy gender equality and racial equality. Conservatives believe on the other hand that freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. They also aim at protecting the concepts of small government and individual liberal while promoting traditional values on some issues.

3. My understanding of Althusser’s ideology is the way how one function in society and how constantly reproduced and reconstituted in practice in the way we think, act, and understand ourselves. An example of Althusser is Education.

1.Ideology is a person’s everyday opinion or view of society, politics, culture or an individual. Ideologies are usually formed based on environment and experiences. This usually influences people’s political stance on many topics. Someone who grew up in a very strict christian family may believe the laws certain states are trying to pass on women’s bodies when it comes to abortion are fair. I believe equality is having the same opportunity and being able to remove discrimination on age ,gender, race, and nationalities and that has to do with the ideologies that I developed growing up. 

From what I gather, ideology is the perspective of everyday life that someone accumulates based on their upbringing and as they go through life. Ideologies have the ability to affect people’s choices. The way we make decisions is based on different beliefs we have on behaviors, music, clothes, technology and politics. These beliefs can also develop new thoughts and reform prior perspectives. Our ideologies can also determine how  open minded people can be when approaching issues that need to be resolved. An example of ideology would be the Black Lives Matter movement. People who solidly support the black lives matter movement believe if they don’t fight against racism and police brutality that nothing will change due to being treated differently and feeling targeted . In general, a single person ideology of the movement gives them hope that one day black families, friends and neighbors will certainly matter one day.their Also political view shows protesting toward incidents will result in transformation.

2.Conservative are often referred to as the far-right party which believes in free market, responsibility, limited government and individual freedom. In addition conservative people believe that people should acknowledge solving their own issues. According to the reading, “In actual practice, however, conservatives are for or against government handouts depending on whose hand is out. They want to cut human services to lower-income groups, but they vigorously support all sorts of government subsidies and bailouts for large corporate enterprises. They treat economic recession as just part of a natural cycle. They admonish American workers to work harder for less, and have not a harsh word about the devastating effects of corporate mergers and buyouts, financial swindles, the exportation of our jobs to cheap labor markets abroad, and the increase in economic hardship for working people.” In general conservatives believe that giving help to the underprivileged is not giving them responsibility. They believe in the idea that everyone should be able to pull themselves up to succeed. This does not apply to law when it comes to big companies.

Liberals are referred to as the far-left party which believe that everyone should have an equal opportunity and governments should reduce issues within the community to protect human rights. According to the reading, “Yet some progressives note that whatever the shortcomings and crimes of communist societies, they did offer some things that would have been worth preserving: a guaranteed right to a job, no hunger or homelessness, free medical care and free education to the highest level of one’s ability, subsidized utilities and transportation, free cul- tural events, and a guaranteed pension after retirement—entitlements that were abolished soon after the communist countries opened themselves to the plunder and harsh inequality of the corporate free market.” In general liberals believe in doing as much as they can for everyone to have a fair and thriving society. Instead of protecting the wealthy’s riches they believe in using some of it to help the poor.

Both conservative and liberal have a distinctive ideology that makes them very different. Conservatives demand a less involved government while having a firm commanding state whereas liberals want the government to understand people’s problems and have the ideas of the government being involved in equal opportunity for society. Liberals also encourage the growth of environmental protection. 

3.Althusser terminology of ideology is that we learn this term everyday in different ways without realising. Ideology is used in homes, churches, schools, and around the world. Especially in the school system it teaches kids to acknowledge that there are rules and responsibility in their actions. 

So, we’ve encountered three different overviews of what ideology is, but let’s organize our own thinking about it. In this discussion board, think about and comment on the following questions:

1. Keeping in mind the material covered in this lesson, describe how you understand ideology in your own words.
Hint: One way to approach this is as follows
a) Describe what ideology is in a brief paragraph (in your own words).
b) Give an example illustrating what you wrote in (a).
c) Write another paragraph (or two), explaining to your reader with additional details, how you understand ideology.

2. How do you understand the difference between conservative and liberal ideology in US politics? What seem to be the big differences, the dividing line? Given an example to backup your arguments.
Hint: try to identify key words (concepts) that play a big role in making someone consider themselves to be liberal or conservative. Then, explain in your own words what those keywords (concepts) mean.

3. How do you understand Althusser’s definition of ideology? Paraphrase it in your own words. Given an example. Hint: you may have to watch the second video again, and find the few places where Althusser’s position is presented.

Hint: Remember, the discussion boards are crucial for us this semester, because they reproduce our in-class conversations. Try to be thorough and write more, rather than less. I will do the same, and make sure by the time we end our discussion, we have covered the key ideas on the module.

To organize things better, I have broken up our conversation into two parts. After finishing here, head over to Discussion Board 3 – part 2 .

Before posting, watch this video, which will show you how to post your answer to this discussion board:

NOTE: Once you’ve scheduled your post to be published on at midnight on Sunday, you can still go back and edit your post until then, if you want to rewrite and/or add to your post.

As a review, follow the following steps to submit your response:

1. Click on the “+” button in the black bar at the top of the screen
2. Type a title for the post (it should include your full name)
3. Type your response
4. On the right side, click on Categories: and check “Discussion 3.1”
5. Important: On the right side, at the top: click on the date next to Publish, and enter your post date, which is this coming Thursday, at 11:59pm.
6. Click Publish and you’re done.

What will happen next is your post will automatically be published by the OpenLab system on Thursday at midnight. The goal here is for all student posts to be published at the same deadline. After that point, you can begin reading each others’ posts, and you have to comment on at least one other student’s post.

Note: please make sure that you schedule your post to be published on Thursday, midnight, not before.