Why I Fight With My Dad About Politics

By The Princess on September 9, 2004 9:03 PM in Social and Political

I finally got around to doing the Political Compass, since the coughing is keeping me from napping like I should be. *cough*

Economic Left/Right: -5.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.23

Unwired Ben said he was uncomfortable with the forced choice aspect. I usually hate forced choice, but I had very few instances in this test where I felt like my nuances were being steamrolled.

I was a wee bit surprised I wasn't more left, since it goes up to 10...*cough*

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3 Comments

By JPed on September 9, 2004 9:39 PM

I'm just slightly to the right of the Dalai Lama. I can live with that. I'm glad there was some forced choice, otherwise I would have been picking "evenly split" a few too many times...

In case you want my numbers, L/R -2.88, L/A -4.77. You commie. Sorry, child of the 80s, felt forced to, etc. Course, by dear old Ronnie's measure, and most Republicans, I am a commie too! I will refrain from making any value judgements about how those money-grubbing, bedroom-peeking, jackboot-wearing yahoos sleep at night. I bet the Dalai Lama would be proud of me for that...

By Shane on September 10, 2004 12:55 AM

Economic Left/Right: -4.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.64

Meh. It's not so much the forced choices but the relevance of nearly every fourth question that is hard for me to buy into. Spanking? Bottled water? Hackneyed cliches about "abstract art"!? The hell?

Of course, if I made a test, there would be a "prig -- libertine" axis and a "call the general strike, institute the worker's councils, and smash the power of the owning class -- hail hierarchy" axis. This would, clearly, do nothing positive for the sense of forced choices! It would, however, fit folks' responses into my own private political taxonomy.

I've been thinking about better political taxonomies this week, largely because some essays were forwarded to me from the ever peculiar, occasionally prescient (when not boarderline scandalous, or actionable...) http://www.spiked-online.com/ . It amuses me no end trying to place them.

By UnwiredBen on September 10, 2004 12:57 AM

So you're slightly to the left of me on social issues, but I'd posit that the difference is probably just a couple of "strongly agree" versus "agree" choices.

On economics, we differed by two points, with me taking a more centered view. I'd guess that I'm a little more willing to see the value of large corporations and trade working in a well-regulated capital market with effective, unconflicted management and transparency to investors. I tend to be one that views wealth as a non-zero sum game; the best companies turn the ideas and effort of their employees into wealth, while unethical companies primarily acquire their wealth by preying off other companies, communities, and consumers.