Here is the distinction I make, leftists are antihierarchichal, liberals are not. Leftists come in many forms, but they all oppose hierarchies. So before intersectionality bridged all the forms of critical theories, you would have 3rd wave feminists, who oppose majority male hierarchies, in critical race theory, you would oppose hierarchies that would be majority white, and as a gender theorist, you would oppose hierarchies that would be majority cisgender or heterosexual. Add Marxism to the loop, and you would oppose hierarchies, and the rich and wealthy that compose it. What intersectional feminism did is combine all of these philosophies into a symphony of pseudophilosophy and ant meritocracy, and anti humanism. So now not only are hierarchies bad, but if a hierarchy is not made up of people with differing characteristics such as race, gender, or sexual orientation, it ought to be restructured because of its innate corruption. Because the leftist worldview has no conception or value of meritocracy, any hierarchy they produce will likely collapse. Liberals reject this as they believe in hierarchies, and meritocracy, and are proponents of a form of order, but their proclivity towards compassion ends up guiding them to leftism, which is what the modern liberals are having a huge problem with. I consider myself a classical liberal, which is different from a modern liberal in that I do not think it is necessarily good to try and get the government to influence certain aspects of the market or society. I used to be farther left, but I had to reshift mu position when I came to University and saw the influence that Marxism had on modern political discourse, and the confusion I had to the practical application of much of the leftist intersectional ideology.

As well as the word "liberal" changing over time, it also has different connotations across the pond. Here, in The UK, we have the "Liberal Democratic Party" which is a very centrist party. Our Classical Liberals tend to be on the right wing of the Conservative Party. We also refer to the "Liberal Elite" who tend be rather globalist, left-leaning and pro -EU! It can be confusing!

I often use the phrase "nothing new under the sun". I have watched the same rhetoric swing back and forth for over 4 decades. Just when I was on the verge of accepting that nothing changes, the internet came along. I have renewed hope in the human experience. It may be ugly at times, but it is our first taste of telepathy (of sorts) and it's a shock to the system to see other's inner, unchecked thoughts. I find the whole process exhilarating. Sure, there's a lot of chaffe. But if you sift through it carefully, you find the seeds. Like I just found you!

Yeah, I can see this happening, but you gotta remember, many people on here have been silenced on FB & Twitter for quite a while and it's liberals that did it. They're drinking from the freedom fountain quite greedily. But don't give up, use persuasion and reason and things may settle down.

Norman Thomas, U.S. Socialist Party candidate for president 1928 till1948, once reportedly said, "The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But, under the name of 'liberalism', they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened."

Leftism is seen as the result of Liberalism. So although many don't see the difference between the two, some don't care.
I see evil twisting something that was once good. The political veneer and labels matters not

A major difficulty is that the meaning of words has been changed intentionally over the course of the past 100 years or so. What was a Classical Liberal of 1900 was an independent, self-sufficient, widely educated, libertarian who was able and willing to discuss any topic. That is pretty much the opposite of what people who call themselves "Liberals" now are. Todays "Liberals" are typically angry, unable to calmly or intelligently argue their favorite topic, desire Government subsidy, and have couch-potato education,. So the word now means the exact opposite of what it did. What the Media calls "Right wing" is the old time Liberal. Even Libertarians are described as Right-wing by our MSM.

I'm a California Republican aka liberal. Try not to take the words to heart. There are good conversations to be had here

I've no qualms with liberals per se, my concern is those who call themselves progressives, or leftists as you put it. Welcome to the community by the way.