How to spot a baby conservative.

[Jim]

Here's the Toronto Star article of the same name.

 

Remember the whiny, insecure kid in nursery school, the one who always thought everyone was out to get him, and was always running to the teacher with complaints? Chances are he grew up to be a conservative.

 

The confident kids turned out liberal and were still hanging loose, turning into bright, non-conforming adults with wide interests. The girls were still outgoing, but the young men tended to turn a little introspective.

 

Block admits in his paper that liberal Berkeley is not representative of the whole country. But within his sample, he says, the results hold.

 

 

And here's the National Review's rebuttal:

 

Ah yes, in Berkeley, Calif., nothing is more rebellious to the status quo than being a liberal. Why, they must be pariahs at the local organic food co-op. I mean, it's just plain heroic to embrace liberal politics in a town where residents cast 90 percent of their votes for John Kerry and only 6.6 percent of their votes for Bush.

 

But don't nominate these mavericks for a Profiles in Courage award just yet. If you read down to the 15th paragraph in the story, you'll discover that there was "a .27 correlation between being self-reliant in nursery school and being a liberal as an adult." In other words, self-reliance explains seven percent of the variance between kids who bravely became liberal and tykes who supinely embraced conservative politics.

 

. . .

 

Perhaps the more revealing psychological insight can be found in the fact that so many liberals think disagreeing with them is a form of psychosis.

 

I'm posting these articles to frame a question that has been bugging me for a few years. I think I'm something of an aberration to several of my liberal friends. I'm fairly free thinking, likable (I hope!) and kind of non-conformist. I think they view my conservatism, for want of a better word, as a flaw in an otherwise good friend. My conservative friends view my liberal friends as somewhat weak minded.

 

I'm generalizing but I wonder, candidly, how many here would admit to similar feelings about those on the opposite side of the political spectrum?

[ecoli]

It's all bullshit if you ask me. Demicins and Republicrats are all the same. Most of the conservative talk show hosts are all about bashing liberals and the liberals are all about bashing the conservatives. It seems almost useless to put yourself on the political spectrum these days.

[Phi for All]

I don't know anybody who conforms completely to what the liberals or conservative, right-wingers or left wingers are supposed to be all about. I'm pretty fiscally conservative and socially liberal, but there are certain social issues where I'm a bit more conservative than other social issues.

 

People want to classify things for simplicity, but people defy classification regularly.

[Pangloss]

And yet most American voters consistently vote on a party line.

[Sisyphus]

(I'm limiting my response to American politics, because, being a stupid, arrogant American, I don't give a **** about anything else.)

 

I kind of look down on anyone who strongly identifies with either "right" or "left," frankly. It just leads to a lot of ridiculous positions. Throwing in your lot with fully half of the population seems like a great way to guarantee hypocrisy. Thus, neither the Republican nor the Democratic positions are very consistent or sensible, which in turn make it very easy for partisans on both sides to make the other side look ridiculous. The partisan mentality is one of a kind of willful ignorance: they choose to only see the ridiculous parts of the other side, and are blind to their own hypocrisies. They see themselves as utterly different from their counterparts, when for the most part (with a few exceptions) they're pretty much the same, in terms of intelligence and non-superficial personality.

 

In conclusion, don't read the National Review. It's bad for your brain.

 

EDIT: Incidentally, I am a registered Democrat, but not a particularly loyal one. My reasoning is that, right now, the Democratic party, for all its flaws, is in my opinion a lesser evil than the Orwellian catastrophe the Republican party has recently become, and so I want to be able to vote in the primaries of the party that is more likely to produce an acceptable candidate. But that still has nothing to do with the "character" of one over the other.

[swansont]

And yet most American voters consistently vote on a party line.

 

Isn't that just a result of having basically a two-party system?

[gcol]

Isn't that just a result of having basically a two-party system?

I was tempted to say that, but I did not want to spoil what might turn into a good ding-dong debate.

[Phi for All]

And yet most American voters consistently vote on a party line.

I've always blamed our obsession with sports for this aberration. Voting is analogous with winning, and the votes themselves are called "races". Voters believe they'll be throwing their votes away if they back an independent candidate who looks likely to lose, even if that candidate represents them better than either of the major party candidates.

[gcol]

I've always blamed our obsession with sports for this aberration. Voting is analogous with winning, and the votes themselves are called "races". Voters believe they'll be throwing their votes away if they back an independent candidate who looks likely to lose, even if that candidate represents them better than either of the major party candidates.

 

An argument for real proportional representation then?

[Pangloss]

Isn't that just a result of having basically a two-party system?

 

I'm sure that's a factor, but IMO it has more to do with lack of attention being paid to politics, and developing one's general worldview based on consistent input over time from friends and family members, without further thoughtful analysis.

[Jim]

It's all bullshit if you ask me. Demicins and Republicrats are all the same. Most of the conservative talk show hosts are all about bashing liberals and the liberals are all about bashing the conservatives. It seems almost useless to put yourself on the political spectrum these days.

 

The classifications have some meaning. I am definitely more "conservative" than Ted Kennedy. As I've said many times, merely because lines are hard to draw doesn't mean that you can't get a sense of relationships and make gross classifications.

 

So, no, I do not think it is "bullshit" to say something like "conservative" magazine National Review or "liberal" magazine "New Republic." So long as people are sensible and understand that any classification is simplistic, I think it is fair on occasion to use labels.

 

My point wasn't that people don't have tendencies but how do we look at those with differing points of view. It's rare that the issue comes into the open so clearly as it did with this study.

[Jim]

The partisan mentality is one of a kind of willful ignorance:

 

....

 

In conclusion' date=' don't read the National Review. It's bad for your brain.

 

[/quote']

 

Isn't that somewhat... partisan or at least close minded? The National Review is well written and usually well argued. Your objection is that it disagrees with your POV?

 

I read the online National Review because it is the easiest place to get the conservative POV. For the "liberal" point of view, I can go to New Republic, Slate, NYT and most MSM outlets.

 

I certainly try to take issues on one at a time and am certainly unelectable by either party. However, I think the two-party system is far preferable to a fractured system that let's even more extremist groups build influence through coalitions. I also thing it is silly to pretend that there are not gross differences between those classified as liberal and those classified as conservative.

[Sisyphus]

No, it's not partisan. I don't read Mother Jones either. It's not bad for you because it's conservative, it's bad for you because it embodies the partisan mentality. Anything whose admitted purpose is to be a "conservative publication" or a "liberal publication" is not about having a thoughtful discussion, but rather about "winning." They don't take the positions they do because they think they're right, they think they're right because they're the conservative positions, and focus on a way to argue for the presupposed correct position. That it's well argued often just makes it harder to detect the BS.

 

That said, however, it's probably not that harmful as long as you don't limit yourself to one echo chamber or the other, and take everything with a huge grain of salt, as a study in how the different sides think rather than at face-value. I was being light-hearted in the criticism.

[swansont]

Isn't that somewhat... partisan or at least close minded? The National Review is well written and usually well argued. Your objection is that it disagrees with your POV?

 

I read the online National Review because it is the easiest place to get the conservative POV. For the "liberal" point of view' date=' I can go to New Republic, Slate, NYT and most MSM outlets.

[/quote']

 

Which of these "liberal" publications/outlets do you consider well-written and well-argued?

[Jim]

Which of these "liberal" publications/outlets do you consider well-written and well-argued?

 

All of those I listed are well written. I tend to agree with less of their arguments, however.

[Jim]

No' date=' it's not partisan. I don't read Mother Jones either. It's not bad for you because it's conservative, it's bad for you because it embodies the partisan mentality. Anything whose admitted purpose is to be a "conservative publication" or a "liberal publication" is not about having a thoughtful discussion, but rather about "winning." They don't take the positions they do because they think they're right, they think they're right because they're the conservative positions, and focus on a way to argue for the presupposed correct position. That it's well argued often just makes it harder to detect the BS.

 

That said, however, it's probably not that harmful as long as you don't limit yourself to one echo chamber or the other, and take everything with a huge grain of salt, as a study in how the different sides think rather than at face-value. I was being light-hearted in the criticism.[/quote']

 

I have to admit I enjoy reading advocacy pieces. You can advance your own thinking quite a bit by seeing what each side is saying. As you say, as long as you understand the purpose of such magazines, no harm done...

[Skye]

I'm not that fond of any particular party at the moment. There's no party that's running on the 'Providing scientists with a rock star lifestyle and porn star girlfriends' line. Politics is so out of touch with the common man.

[ecoli]

I'm sure that's a factor, but IMO it has more to do with lack of attention being paid to politics, and developing one's general worldview based on consistent input over time from friends and family members, without further thoughtful analysis.

 

don't forget vicious political campains. I'm no analyst, but I'm willing to bet that good media attention and good campaign commercials are as if not more important than a platform.

[JohnB]

What I found interesting in the original pieces is that the first one was praising self reliant children as more likely to grow up liberal. Yet self reliance is not something liberals tend to value in an adult. They seem to believe that everybody should have innumerable govt. departments and commissions looking after them.

 

I don't know about the US, but down here it is the liberals that think that if there is any sort of incident in a school, a small army of counsellors is needed to help the poor little darlings deal with it. They appear to have some sort of vested interest in making people think that they can't look after themselves and need others to "help" them at all times.

 

To make things more confusing for our international readers, the major conservative party in Oz is "The Australian Liberal Party".

 

Like others I don't subscribe to the traditional Left/Right political spectrum. I view the true spectrum as Anarchist/Statist. The traditional liberal (or Left) position is slightly more Statist than the traditional conservative position. Both are nearly in the centre and therefore look similar most of the time.

[Sisyphus]

I think we all have different anecdotes that could support any conceivable evaluation of liberals/conservatives.

[bascule]

I didn't want to touch this thread with a 10 foot pole, but to toss in my two cents, I call BS on the Berkeley hippies

[swansont]

What I found interesting in the original pieces is that the first one was praising self reliant children as more likely to grow up liberal. Yet self reliance is not something liberals tend to value in an adult. They seem to believe that everybody should have innumerable govt. departments and commissions looking after them.

 

I don't know about the US' date=' but down here it is the liberals that think that if there is any sort of incident in a school, a small army of counsellors is needed to help the poor little darlings deal with it. They appear to have some sort of vested interest in making people think that they can't look after themselves and need others to "help" them at all times.

[/quote']

 

Not to single this post out, but it's a convenient starting point: I'm not a big fan of "liberals think this" or "conservatives think that." Especially when it comes from someone admittedly from the opposite end of the spectrum (e.g. Ann Coulter does this quite a bit). As I think most people recognize, there is a broad spectrum of thought within either group, since you are trying to pigeonhole a continuum of ideas into just two categories. And I also think the more extreme of liberals or conservatives just have no clue what the other side thinks. They know how a few individuals act, and then extrapolate that behavior to an entire group.

[Jim]

Not to single this post out, but it's a convenient starting point: I'm not a big fan of "liberals think this" or "conservatives think that." Especially[/i'] when it comes from someone admittedly from the opposite end of the spectrum (e.g. Ann Coulter does this quite a bit). As I think most people recognize, there is a broad spectrum of thought within either group, since you are trying to pigeonhole a continuum of ideas into just two categories. And I also think the more extreme of liberals or conservatives just have no clue what the other side thinks. They know how a few individuals act, and then extrapolate that behavior to an entire group.

 

I am not a fan of the outright lies that both sides put out through the internet. People send out stuff without making a quick check with urbanlegends.com or snopes.com. It is entirely possible to read nothing but you want to hear these days.

[Phi for All]

It is entirely possible to read nothing but you want to hear these days.

To a certain extent, it's always been this way. Most people at the extreme ends dismiss what doesn't support their POV and relish that which does, no matter the source. They treat the media like a buffet table, turning up their noses at what doesn't look good and loading their plates down with the stuff they like.

[Jim]

To a certain extent, it's always been this way. Most people at the extreme ends dismiss what doesn't support their POV and relish that which does, no matter the source. They treat the media like a buffet table, turning up their noses at what doesn't look good and loading their plates down with the stuff they like.

 

I thought about making that point.

 

The election of 1876 (if you believed the dueling campaign literature) came down to a choice between an alcoholic, syphilitic con artist (Samuel Tilden*) and a man so venal he robbed corpses on the battlefield during the Civil War and once shot a gun at his own mother (Rutherford B. Hayes).

 

In short, American politics was never an elegant debating club guided by the values of Miss Manners. The 19th century was the Age of Sludge, not gold. Campaign rhetoric actually got more high-toned in the 20th century, in part because newspapers began to formulate ethical standards.

 

We have come full circle now with a medium that has no ethical standards. It is possible to find support for any narrow POV from the multitude of media sources.

 

This is probably still better than the nation gathering at the feet of Walter Cronkite at 6:00 p.m. every night.