Imperialism = Whatever the US is not doing (except when Trump is in charge)
On a serious note, liberals are idealists. They don’t understand imperialism. It’s just a synonym for “evil” to them. They think imperialists imperialize because they are evil imperialists. Russia is evil, therefore Russia is imperialist. If Ukraine was evil in their eyes, then Ukraine would be imperialist instead/as well.
Some liberals understand on a surface level that US is doing imperialism, but only because they’ve heard others speak of this in this way. If you ask them about what the US is actually doing, they might even admit it’s the “bad kind” of imperialism, but they’ll frame it as “however, the US has no other choice, so it has to do this bad thing, but for a good reason”. Because the US are the good guys, and therefore can’t be evil imperialists. If they are being imperialists it’s because it’s going to help the greater good. Or it’s because bad people have momentarily come to power, but the liberal thinks that quite soon the bad people will go away, and the natural order of things will be restored. Then years later they’ll rehabilitate the “bad people” (e.g. see Reagan, Bush senior, Bush junior)
Imperialism = Whatever the US is not doing (except when Trump is in charge)
On a serious note, liberals are idealists. They don’t understand imperialism. It’s just a synonym for “evil” to them. They think imperialists imperialize because they are evil imperialists. Russia is evil, therefore Russia is imperialist. If Ukraine was evil in their eyes, then Ukraine would be imperialist instead/as well.
Some liberals understand on a surface level that US is doing imperialism, but only because they’ve heard others speak of this in this way. If you ask them about what the US is actually doing, they might even admit it’s the “bad kind” of imperialism, but they’ll frame it as “however, the US has no other choice, so it has to do this bad thing, but for a good reason”. Because the US are the good guys, and therefore can’t be evil imperialists. If they are being imperialists it’s because it’s going to help the greater good. Or it’s because bad people have momentarily come to power, but the liberal thinks that quite soon the bad people will go away, and the natural order of things will be restored. Then years later they’ll rehabilitate the “bad people” (e.g. see Reagan, Bush senior, Bush junior)