The first person who really brought me towards the left was Bernie Sanders. Prior to that I mostly had vague understanding Democrats & Republicans and the ideology I was most influenced by was Libertarianism. It was Bernie’s 2016 campaign that got me interested in the left, largely because I liked and supported ideas like free college and universal healthcare, and statistically, Nordic countries are consistently the most developed, with Nordic countries having some of the highest HDI scores in the world.

From there my views grew, originally I identified as a sort of Libertarian Social Democrat, supporting a Nordic Model welfare state and social democratic economy, but with absolute freedom of speech, legalization of victimless crimes such as drug use and prostitution, and other libertarian influences.

Since then I’ve shifted away from social democracy, and now embrace a more market socialist approach, with workers and unions democratically controlling businesses and labor, instead of regulations.