Political Compass (v 3.0)

Haven't done this one before!

Economic Left/Right: -7.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.31

Graph

 

It was Citizen Kane! It was Citizen Kane! It was Citizen Kane!

Sorry. But yeah, your brother's views may not have become more extreme, but his manner in expressing them seems to have. Unless you listen to Gonk (which he's proven) and it's always been that way. We just were never that aware of it before.

 

With the addition of DorkmanScott, the mean has shifted to (-3.18, -4.20).

That still doesn't change my point about perception.

You tend not to get that latter sort of comment unless there is an actual conflict of some kind. Most people don't just jump into (or start off) the discussion with the extreme support for their views. You only tend to get the more extreme support when people start to feel the need to defend their views more.

In the original thread, I proposed a quantitative measure of what would be considered an "extremist" position based on the distribution of scores. I proposed a circle of radius 5 around the mean as that criteria. My new score has a distance of 2.55 from the 2003 mean, whereas it has a distance of 5.38 from the current mean. By that standard, I would be an extremist here (although still not as extreme as you with your distance from the mean of 6.12 ).

The mean moved 2.89 points from 2003 until now. My score from moved a total of 1.57 points in the same time. My brother's score moved 1.14 points.

You tell me which of those would have the greatest effect on perception.

Kimball Kinnison

 

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make.

Yes, I remember the days when liberal (particularly anti-Bush/anti-war) viewpoints were extremely unpopular here. And I didn't really start hanging here until 2005 - I can't imagine how bad it must have been two years closer to 9/11. Now the liberals seem to outnumber the conservatives; what of it?

I don't think anyone has really tried to argue that JS's views are particularly radical relative to the rest of the nation. Nor have I claimed that my views are in any way moderate. When people lay into JS, it's because of the extremity of his rhetoric, not of his views. I don't think the mean of viewpoints has much to do with perceptions of extremity of rhetoric.

 

Economic Left/Right: -4.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.33

But I have objections to the testing methodology. While forced choice Likert scales are useful, they don't do well with seeing exceptions to trends, or seeking clarification, or seeing nuances in terms (for instance, do objections to full-body scanners stem from a fear for civil liberties or from sex/body-image concerns? Either is read as being more libertarian). Additionally, there aren't enough questions to give the test internal validity (e.g., questions along similar lines, testing whether subjects respond identically to related concepts).

 

Well, I'm going to lay out my comments very clearly, and explain, as I did several times earlier:

I'm also going to put it bluntly: The treatment of George W. Bush had a price that is being paid, and attitudes since then on the part of Obama's supporters have only increased the resentment. For over a year, the race card has been played, and among those playing it was a moderator on this board on two occasions. There was even that undertone of the race card when Obama was questioned over his ties to Jeremiah Wright during the campaign.

I also was looking at the aftermath of Proposition 8, where the response to my church's participation in a means to amend California's constitution - as provided by that document - was to send white powder in the mail to two temples. There was my best friend's wife receiving death threats over donating to the effort to pass it. Neither my church, nor my best friend's wife did anything violent towards gay people. All they did was exercise their rights - and the response was not exactly what I would call tolerant. Again, that has a price.

Go back to when gay marriage first came up almost seven years ago - my problem was not so much with the concept, but the fact that it was being imposed by courts, and that it was going to be seen as illegitimate in some eyes to one degree or another (including mine). They were not unreasonable requests - make sure EVERYONE'S rights were protected under the principle of EQUAL justice. The response has not been to address my concerns, but to instead either brush them as

 

Quixotic
Yeah, it is a really, really general quiz, but it's a tradition here.

 

Agreed, but you're asking a lot from a popular internet quiz.

 

While I do think the quiz is too general to give pinpoint and complex positions for folks, it does generally cover people's viewpoints overall.

It's not so poor that it will put Jabba right next to Pinochet on the econ scale. It's generally right.

 

That reminds me, Smuggler, weren't you leaving? Though I have to give you credit, you made it past the two weeks I bet on.

Your points have all been addressed over and over again, at length, in multiple threads, and we all know by now that you're a dishonest ideologue. But thanks for coming back and proving the point by repeating them some more.

 

Dorkman, leave it.

 

A price for whom to pay?

You DO see the hypocrisy in saying, "Why'd they bother us? We didn't vote for Prop 8!" and then getting upset at the entire pro-gay community for the actions of a few extremists, right?

 

Economic Left/Right: -2.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.33

 

Are there any crazy right wingers in here besides me?

Well, me and Smuggler, whom some want to chase off.

 

Well, as far as this board is concerned, I'm apparently right-winging it also.


Leave specific issues to the threads for specific issues

 

No, I hear you, but I generally answered "agree/disagree" - there were only about 3 that I answered "Strongly" for, but that apparently swung me a lot further from center.

 

I've always thought there were serious problems with this quiz, and detailed statistical analysis isn't going to help change that. I think at best it just roughly places you in the correct quadrant, but if you a moderate with complex opinions I'm not sure it even does that very well.

 

I generally answered agree/disagree as well, and you see where I ended up.

My point in the statistics is not so much to prove that one person is more extreme than another, or to claim that this place has become a bunch of pinko/commie leftists(tm). It's more to show how individuals have shifted (or not), and how the community as a whole has shifted.

It's interesting to see how some people have shifted "left", while others have shifted "right". I also think it's instructive to see how before we had a greater spread of people to "the right" and a more concentrated group on "the left" (with them split about 50/50 in 2003). Now, we've still got the more concentrated group on "the left", but we've lost a good number of the people on "the right".

It's that last bit that worries me the most, because it's not a result of people changing their minds, but more from people deciding to leave. To me, that says a lot about how the Senate Floor has changed in the past several years, and how it seems some people want it to be more politically homogeneous.

Look at the political diversity that we had even back in 2005-2006 on the graph that Lowbacca posted, and compare that with how things are distributed today. We've lost a lot of that diversity, and I think that the Senate as a whole has and will pay a terrible price because of it.

Kimball Kinnison

 

I agree with the first part, there has to be some balance. But I'm not sure I agree that people want it to be more politically homogenous. I don't think it's the result of an orchestrated effort, I think it has more to do with the tremendous blows the right had to take (Guantanamo Bay, Iraq, Katrina, Obama-mania and the financial crisis). It's probably easier for a left-winger to participate in debates now, as it was easier for a right-winger to participate in debates in 2002.

I know. I was much more left-wing in 2002 and I felt ill at ease here.

 

I never said it was an orchestrated effort. But you can see some evidence of that sort of mentality in this thread.

Look at the warnings that Lowbacca had to give out. Just to use my brother as an example, there are some people in this forum who specifically go out of their way to antagonize him and drive him off (if they aren't trying to provoke him into getting banned). I've seen similar behavior towards others who tend to be more "right wing", including myself, usually right after they express some sort of "right leaning" opinion.

Look in the "Republican Party" thread, and how often the posts there are of the form:

link

Look at what ______ foolish Republican said now.

These are things that add up to create a more hostile environment, which has driven away many of the "old guard" that leaned to the right. As a result of that, this place has lost a lot of its diversity. When someone new shows up, they tend to face more hostility if they lean right, which only discourages them from staying.

Say what you will about several years ago, but the two previous Political Compass threads show that we had an extremely diverse community of views here. We're losing that, and that should worry everyone.

Kimball Kinnison

 

1) You're the one who made him a point of discussion in this thread -- twice, now.
2) Speaking for myself, I don't go out of my way at all. He just shows up and says ridiculous, repetitive, dishonest things. If he doesn't want people to point out he's being ridiculous, repetitive, and dishonest, he should stop being ridiculous, repetitive, and dishonest.

Maybe if that wasn't the only thing that could be said about Republicans these days, you'd see more of the other stuff. Let us know if there starts being "other stuff" before the party implodes completely.

 

I'm sorry, but what logical basis do you have for your statements?

I see two people who are about as far apart politically as they can be (total distance 16.15 between your scores) and the one who is closer to the community's mean repeatedly singling out and ostracizing the one who is farther from the community's mean. To me, that strongly suggests a clear bias and a desire to drive off (or have removed) the person farther from the community mean.

I haven't seen my brother single you out, and yet you repeatedly single him out in discussions. It is behavior like yours that destroys the political diversity in a community like this.

Kimball Kinnison

 

It's worth noting that the years of "diversity" happened to occur during a period of immense right-wing power. And judging from the superior "This is not a discussion; we're in power" attitudes I remember from those days, it doesn't surprise me that many of them have gone as national politics have shifted.

 

I just read the latest posts; I was going to say that the board seems to have taken a definite shift to the left during the time I was off the JC. I thought maybe it was my own perceptions of the boards that changed; I'm glad to see that Keiran seems to agree with me about the political compass itself changing. I don't think I took the quiz in 2003, but I also don't think my political views have changed much since then, if any. I definitely felt grossly outnumbered then though. Now, not so much. I feel kind of sorry for the conservatives on the board now.

 

Yeah, I do remember being told in 2004 that support for John Kerry equaled support for Al Qaida. IMO that's equally as wrong as accusing people who don't like Obama of being racist. (Which, FWIW, is wrong on many levels and shuts down discussion. Nobody likes being labelled.)