are you prejudiced against people who are, or who vote, republican/conservative?

yes

yep

But not as much as I am against liberals who spend more time bashing democrats than republicans.

Yeah, I really am WHEN they are boasty-toasty braggarts about it who try and soapbox smugly at every turn. If they're honest folk that keep to themselves & are not actively harming others, I can't begrudge them their vote.

no

a little.

not really

not at all. however, it does slightly annoy me when people strongly identify with ANY political party...but that so common that I sort of have to put up with it.

in thought, not in deed.

ledge OTM

I have had personal EVIL SHIT wrought on me by proud & uptight Dems. Basically political persuasion is no determination of one's jerkstore levels.

I do think your Nutso-Christian Neocons are worse than our Bullingdon Boys though

i was just talking abt this last night w/some friends cause at dinner a friend of ours who had since departed the bar told us she was dating a republican (mormon too).

i was like eh you have to be at least kinda clueless or heartless to be a republican but people are complex etc. but my friend catherine was all to call yrself a republican after all the shit thats gone down the last 8 years you have to be a total asshole. i wasnt totally unsympathetic to her argument.

I'm with Ledge also, mostly.

On my x-country train trip, most of the people we were seated with in the dining car avoided political chitchat, but then there was this one guy who was asking all dining companions who they were going to vote for. My wife and I got into it a little bit with him because it turned out he was a typical wealthy old white Republican, but he actually seemed or pretended to take some of our criticisms of him to heart. At least he was better than the 4th person at our table, a rude Ann Bancroft lookalike whose main contribution was "I find all your voices incredibly tiresome."

a friend of ours who had since departed the bar told us she was dating a republican (mormon too).

Oh my god she is getting herself into a world of trouble and pain. No good can come of this.

Depends on the kind of conservative they are really. If they're the kind who actually genuinely believe that lower tax burden/smaller state ultimately benefits the majority of people in society, improves social mobility etc, then I think they're profoundly misguided and wrong but that wouldn't stop me enjoying their company.

If they're the kind who just want to pay lower taxes out of selfishness/rampant individualism or have all or some of the anti-immigration, anti-EU, society in gutter, hang em and flog em prejudices then I will give them a wide berth.

If they have a braying laugh, a wardrobe full of pink shirts and an interest in rugby and shooting I will just keep the fuck away for aesthetic reasons if nothing else.

But generally I suppose it's Daily Mail conservative vs Economist/Financial Times conservative. There are several Tories of the latter persuasion I've met who have been perfectly nice and sociable even thought I don't agree with them, and several right-on lefties who are fuck-awful socially-inadequate arses.

I am. It's ignorance, nihilism, or evil, and there's no excuse for any of it. Being simple, quiet, stupid, down-on-the-farm folk won't get you out of it either. A vote is a political action, and to vote republican is an act of violence, it seems to me, so fuck em.

Not prejudiced, more like curious. Have much more respect for smart, intellectually honest conservatives than for lock-step, camp-following liberals. Speaking as a liberal, I mean...

Also I forgot about the really attractive posh female ones. Keep them.

This is kind of difficult to gauge on a US/UK divide anyway as US Democrats are still equal or to the right of UK Tories on a lot of issues anyway, chiefly economic ones.

Being simple, quiet, stupid, down-on-the-farm folk won't get you out of it either

But birthing animals really fucks up your brain! If you had to force goats to eat their own placentas, you would be SO MIXED UP about politics.

Lies brought to you by Goat Lobbyists for the Republican Party.

But generally I suppose it's Daily Mail conservative vs Economist/Financial Times conservative.

oh yes. but get a couple of pints down a nice "Economist conservative" and watch them turn into a nasty Daily Mail reader before your very eyes.

I'm definitely more prejudiced in an election year. But is it really prejudice if your judging them for their actions (i.e., voting republican/conservative)?

i think being prejudiced against anyone for their political affiliation once you're out of university really shows up your ignorance and social inadequacy. lots of people can express their politics in tiring ways but this goes across the spectrum.

In before 'what about being prejudiced against them for liking indie music?'

multiple xposts

very true matt

but US dems and the UK left are surely somewhat spiritually aligned? tht is another question obv

??? i have never been prejudiced against anyone for liking indie music!

on how much US/UK politics are non-aligned: dennis kucinich's british wife is a tory.

Also Lex that only really follows if you're talking along more or less economic, neutral social lines and not taking into account attitudes towards race, immigration, sexual equality, abortion, gay rights, whatever. I can think of lots of people who are probably very courteous and nice in person but are hateful people BECAUSE of their hateful politics.

I can respect people with whom I disagree. I have less respect for people who cannot articulate their postions or who form them based on mere rancor or prejudice.

as to the thread, I take ppl as I find them even massive tories and zeze ifore

i don't like anyone who takes a smug joy in their own righteousness, but at least i agree with the left-leaners more.

i think conservatism boils down to promoting the welfare of you and the people you identify with as part of a group or community, from the family upwards. you can't really fault that instinct in itself, it's just that the most direct route is always at the expense of the people you don't identify with. that's not typically a dilemma for the conservative, but it's the essence of liberalism.

I try not to be and actually have lots of conservative/republican friends. I think it's healthy to interact with and have civil, serious discussions with people who don't agree with you.

In reality, though, things have gotten so bad that that's ceased to apply the past few years. Several of my conservative/republican friends/relatives have stopped identifying themselves as such and have disavowed the Bush administration.

With the ones who are holding firm, things are just too dire for political conversations not to devolve into anger.

That said, that doesn't keep me from being able to talk to them about sports or movies or TV shows or books or whatever.

That's about right.

I mean I can't start hating my entire family/60+ people in my extended family for being conservative! They're FAMS. (I do have good reasons for hating some of my extended fams bcz they are bad, bad people.)

Also I'm glad I take this view because otherwise I'd be really fucking angry at David Cameron for making it harder to spot Tories at first glance.

(xpost - Roberto, I don't know, parts of British conservativism have always had a sort of protectionist, closed community attitude that sits awkwardly with post-Thatcherite conservatism).

we're talking about card-carrying party affiliates though aren't we? i don't automatically think 'tory' about people who express ignorant social views about immigrants or whatever, indeed the only person i know who actually does this is a member of labour. the tories i know/have known are perfectly pleasant and mostly socially reasonably liberal.

xxppps 2 matt

This is NYC, I don't know any conservatives.

srsly, I'm glad my mom stopped voting a few years ago cuz I'm pretty sure she discounted Clinton automatically in '92 (because of the wang).

But not as much as I am against liberals who spend more time bashing democrats than republicans.

-- Eric H., Thursday, August 28, 2008 5:18 PM

Well, I'm just glad I'm a leftist!

In the abstract, yes. I tend to be less polite to drivers with "W The President" stickers. Sometimes a complete dick. And I can't even pretend to respect the views of a lot of right-wingers.

But on a personal level, no.

also this seems obvious but 'republicanism' and 'conservatism' are broad and complex churches, and assuming you even know where the rep/tory in question stands on any given issue apart from what box they cross at elections before they've told you is rather presumptuous. what's also presumptuous is assuming the reasons they vote rep or tory.

that only really follows if you're talking along more or less economic, neutral social lines and not taking into account attitudes towards race, immigration, sexual equality, abortion, gay rights, whatever.

-- Matt DC

It is sorta of a strange question. Elephant in the room: Would anyone here cop to being prejudiced toward a devout fundamentalist Muslim?

Lex - no, we're talking about voters. Young urbanite card-carriers are weird because they tend to be odd political anorak hack types (like a lot of your workmates I met at that party lol) who own biographies of both Tony Benn and Margaret Thatcher and like nothing better than to get into genial arguments with one another. It was really weird turning up at a party and being nicely asked if I was Labour or Conservative and getting a slightly confused response when I said 'neither'.

Contenderizer - I wasn't really talking about party alleigances per se there, more trying to push Lex a bit on what he was saying and his definition of political views.

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41813000/gif/_41813230_letters1.gif

Would anyone here cop to being prejudiced toward a devout fundamentalist Muslim?

Yes. But because of the devout fundamentalist part, not because of the Muslim part.

why is that an elephant in the room

i think the recent obama/clinton primary battle revealed that many people who vote democratic have, um, .......interesting views on race (and also women). there is a spectrum in both parties from good to hateful, maybe the "good" wing of the dems is much larger but it is quite immature to dismiss a person based solely on party affiliation.

well, basically i would be prejudiced against someone who expressed views i find hateful (anti-immigrant rants for example), but i wouldn't extrapolate their voting allegiance from it; and i wouldn't assume that their voting allegiance means they subscribe to the more hateful views of that particular political wing. i mean, unless we're talking BNP.

Also, I have lots of Republican friends (I kinda have to - since I go to YU), but I'm much closer to the few people who are liberal. Mostly because my political opinions are very much wrapped up in my moral and religious opinions. So it's easier to relate to those who share my values.

Also, I am prejudiced against people who are very right-wing conservatives. Lots of students on my campus agree with Santorum's pronouncements about homosexuality = bestiality, etc. I don't have any time for those people. In those cases I think their political beliefs directly reflect who they are as people.

Lex - no, we're talking about voters. Young urbanite card-carriers are weird because they tend to be odd political anorak hack types (like a lot of your workmates I met at that party lol) who own biographies of both Tony Benn and Margaret Thatcher and like nothing better than to get into genial arguments with one another. It was really weird turning up at a party and being nicely asked if I was Labour or Conservative and getting a slightly confused response when I said 'neither'.

gotta move to hackney to get into these kind of parties

Haha that party was in Dulwich, QED.

Also - I would totally understand if a Conservative thought I was a bad person for being pro-Choice. If you really feel that abortion is murder, why would you want to be friends with someone who advocates murder?

I wasn't really talking about party alleigances per se there, more trying to push Lex a bit on what he was saying and his definition of political views.

-- Matt DC

Yes

(Not to say that I advocate murder. I misspoke that.)

the prejudice can be overcome, to some extent, but absolutely

This would be a foolish prejudice for me to have formed. Many otherwise excellent people vote for conservative politicians. It is sad, but it is not a reason to deny their better qualities. I would hope they would extend me the same courtesy.

People are complex. The origins of their politics have little to do with how well they behave as human beings.

We are all born in ignorance. We learn only the lessons that are offered to us, if we learn any at all. And we are all very capable of compartmentalizing whatever ideas we have which conflict with one another.

i've certainly met decent people who are conservatives, and like some of them a lot. but it's pretty hard for me to respect their opinion.

hello, like 82% of my extended family. Matt DC OTM with "Depends on the kind of conservative they are really. If they're the kind who actually genuinely believe that lower tax burden/smaller state ultimately benefits the majority of people in society, improves social mobility etc, then I think they're profoundly misguided and wrong but that wouldn't stop me enjoying their company.

My tolerance really breaks down when they start talking about their Lord & Savior Jesus and the attendant finger-pointing. If they are old-school, strict separation of church and staters (few and far between these days), I'll chat all day long.

what's also presumptuous is assuming the reasons they vote rep or tory.

-- lex pretend, Thursday, August 28, 2008 1:15 PM (20 minutes ago)

how presumptuous is it, tho? parties exist to sort sides on a range of ideological arguments, arguments which are all a mixture of head and gut ie they flow from what people think and believe.

in other words, how many good reasons are there to vote GOP/Conservative?

q: are you rich?

I kinda have to - since I go to YU

I thought this was a Jewish school? Are they all neocons?

those people

Some at least potentially good reasons to vote GOP:

1) Belief that the Republicans will make it easier for you to hold on to most of your money.

2) Belief that conservative policies are better for business and the economy, and that what's best for the economy is de facto best for the nation.

3) Belief that market restrictions and wealth redistribution schemes are more unjust/harmful than what they seek to address.

4) Belief that a strong military and a willingness to use it are vitally important to the security of the nation.

5) Belief that life is inherently unfair, and that all citizens must deal with the hand they're dealt.

6) Belief that the government should not be used (or cannot be effectively used) to address most social problems.

7) Belief that enlightened self-interest is more rational and effective (both individually and socially) than a morally confused insistence on helping others.

8) Belief that a coherent system of shared moral values allows society to function effectively (whether or not those values are assumed to be objectively true).

9) Belief that liberal/Democratic policies are ineffective, confused and damaging to the nation as a whole.

10) Belief that good ideas and good intentions don't necessarily guarantee good results.

jay, yeah. They are all neocons, tho some are neocons AND social conservatives (cause of Biblical inerrancy).

^^ all of those state the right-libertarian case, which is, these days, a tiny portion of the animating energy behind conservatism. xp.

Those beliefs are also fundamentally incorrect.

the bottom line reason is that, you know, just maybe, YOU could be wrong about some of this stuff. always more to learn.

i'll give you #'s 5 and 10

the "must" in 5 is pretty much what make me sad about these crazy kids.

Nope, I don't often talk about politics to be honest. Mine is a dispassionate existence.

No

Based on personal observation, the conservatives I do know and I get along with tend to have far more self-loathing issues than the center/leftist people i know.

I'm helping one conservative with the self-loathing issue right now, and maybe it's coincidence but I'm noticing as he gains self esteem, he tows the conservative party line less and less.

(I stress 'personal observation' in all of this.)

i do not judge as i am a perfect person

Belief that the Republicans will make it easier for you to hold on to most of your money.

This is actually the reasoning behind most of the 'hip' Repubs I know: "Hell, I might get rich someday, right? Better hedge my bets."

Uh...

what I still fail to understand about US politics is how the economically libertarian points above get intermingled with biblical fundamentalism to create a weird hybrid which is neither libertarian nor particularly Christian ( if Christian means following the teachings of Jesus... love thy neighbour? bollox to that. Turn the other cheek? I think not.)

i'd go further in that those high-minded hard-headed right-lib kind of statements are rarely used except as a club to beat down solutions for obvious moral ills. conservatives have a handy way of reaching for "first principles" when liberals have a problem clearly in the box.

i think this, from matt yglesias, gets at it pretty well:

We’re Against Bad Stuff; Just More Against Efforts to Redress It»

Ramesh Ponnuru deems it “disgusting” to equate opposition to the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act with approving of equal pay for women. And of course it’s true. It’s perfectly possible to think that it’s wrong to discriminate against women in your pay practices but just also oppose any effort to make it feasible to redress that right. It’s just like how the people who opposed anti-lynching laws in the 1920s and 30s weren’t for lynching, they were just against federal interference in state law enforcement efforts. Or how conservatives in the mid-1960s were against the Civil Rights Act, liked to insult Martin Luther King, and had an electoral base of white supremacists but didn’t approve of segregation.

But at some point politics is about policy. If your opposition to pay discrimination doesn’t extend to favoring measures to halt pay discrimination, then what’s it worth? To people suffering from illegal discrimination, it’s worth nothing. To people who want to engage in illegal discrimination, it’s worth quite a lot.

xp Thomas this kind of answers your question, i think.

hah i think he means "approving of UNequal pay for women"

Since I will get into a big fight with my parents very soon if Republican mom and Weekly Standard-reading dad mention that it was Obama who used the race card, my first impulse is to say "no," but the truth is, yes, of course! Most of my family is conservative or Republican. A couple of my friends are. We have our differences. My parents, however, are adamantly pro-choice.

I genuinely enjoy reading National Review and The Corner. Why? Some of the posts and articles are doggerel with a human face. But the posts that challenge me speak to my Cuban background, which recoils from big government and hates the self-pity that afflicts media liberals. What offends me most is the disregard for history. The last 100 years of American history have been so filthy that I'm not sure how anyone can come away thinking that liberalism and conservatism have a future.

(by the way, I love the assumption in the thread title. Is everyone here a self-professed liberal? I'm not).

what I still fail to understand about US politics is how the economically libertarian points above get intermingled with biblical fundamentalism to create a weird hybrid which is neither libertarian nor particularly Christian ( if Christian means following the teachings of Jesus... love thy neighbour? bollox to that. Turn the other cheek? I think not.)

yeah it's really fucked up. The Republican machine has totally co-opted cultural conservatives by latching on to things they (the Repub boss hogs) probably couldn't care less about (e.g. abortion, gay marriage). it's gotten so that if you consider yourself 'born-again', voting Dem is practically out of the question. Well, unless you're black. I'm not sure this was the case 30+ years ago.

The last 100 years of American history have been so filthy that I'm not sure how anyone can come away thinking that liberalism and conservatism have a future.

ha what the hell kind of statement is this?

Not saying, by the way, that I endorse any of those points I enumerated above (in fact, I don't 100% agree w/ any of 'em) -- just that I can understand, respect and even relate to a hypothetical GOP voter. Goole's right though: I'm describing the old-school libertarian conservative position, and it's got little to do w/ either modern neocons or the religious right. Still, I think these sorts of beliefs are the defensible core of American conservatism, even if that core is usually obscured by crap.

Basically boils down to the idea that if one were Superman and had all the money in the universe, then one could rationally support the proposed liberal "solutions" to every imaginable social problem. But since resources are finite and ends aren't guaranteed, it's better to focus on self-interest, self-preservation, and taking care of business.

those high-minded hard-headed right-lib kind of statements are rarely used except as a club to beat down solutions for obvious moral ills.

-- goole

yes, some nazis were nice.

</godwin>

This is NYC, I don't know any conservatives.

waht

(also important to note that vast swaths of American Christians have pretty much abandoned the teachings of Jesus, love thy neighbour, turn the other cheek bit)

wait where are all the ILX republicans?

on a secret board

banned xp

with amazing and hilarious meta threads you and i can only imagine

xp

there are no ILX republicans. only socialists procrastinate.

what I still fail to understand about US politics is how the economically libertarian points above get intermingled with biblical fundamentalism to create a weird hybrid which is neither libertarian nor particularly Christian

-- Thomas

Then again, maybe that's just wishful thinking...

The only thing I'm guilty of is not letting people with (W) bumper stickers merge in front of me during rush hour.

Only the hard-core social conservatives. But there aren't that many of those where I live in NJ.

fien, people are Republicans, whatever. We can agree to disagree, etc. But if you didn't scrape that W sticker off your car by like '04, you are a grade-A @sshole.

fine

hai guys I have a friend whose Volvo still has a Dukakis bumper sticker.

Well, my brother was a Republican and a Conservative for a long, long time. A proper one in ideology and everything, not just one of those people who wants to have cheaper taxes and all that.

He told me that left the Republican party essentially because he thought they were selling out, and was really disgusted by the lunatics that W was getting into bed with politically.

Then this past week, he told me he was hanging out with MARXISTS. Actual MARXISTS at a Marxist Economics Conference. I have no way of expressing how hilarious this is. (My mum said he turned up in his Ralph Lauren suit and his $500 haircut, with a t-shirt with dancing Karl Marxes thrown on over the top.)

So, um...

I guess the answer is that although I have kneejerk prejudice against conservatives, yes, I have had to learn to converse with them nicely. (And even get along with them, depending on their reasoning.)

I think your brother and David Horowitz should have a nice friendly chat.

That's where this cynical appeal to fundamentalist religiosity comes in.

-- me

xxxpost

that's cool. I could probably find some folks around here with faded stickers of Willie Horton with a red/circle/slash.

What, Ned, about switching sides from the opposite directions?

My brother is actually awesome. Completely bonkers, but awesome.

We've had such political arguments over the years, I often kind of suspected that he was going so far to the Right he would end up going full circle and swinging to the Left.

What, Ned, about switching sides from the opposite directions?

Mainly I just want to see Horowitz cry, but I am simple that way.

Been reading this thread and trying to think of people I know/converse with who have vocal political party affiliations and the number is close enough to zero. I think they are people in the UK of a certain age (ie this is a post for ILXors in their 20s) who have been able to vote in two general elections, both of which have been non-contests, and in that time have seen the ideological gaps between the two (maybe three) main parties reduced to a huge extent. So I'd kind of more expect people's stances or prejudices come out in offhand comments about immigration or whatever than people nailing their colours to a mast

now that i think about it, i'm a little bit more prejudiced against the 'swing voter'

figure out what you believe, figure out what the parties are like, it's not that fucking hard!

xpost to dj mencap. UK Gen election voter turnout '45 - '05

http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/gif/turngraph.png

Been reading this thread and trying to think of people I know/converse with who have vocal political party affiliations and the number is close enough to zero.

-- DJ Mencap

i worked with a libdem guy once

economic conservatives are usually decent to talk with -- whatever you think of their views, they've generally thought them out and have interesting arguments in their favor.

i find social conservatives almost impossible to talk to because the only 'serious' arguments they ever make are full of strawmen like "the gay agenda."

xp think it is true that very few people have a firm party allegiance, especially in the last decade or so. As DJ Mencap says, there are very few funamental ideological differences between the main parties any more, and since the 80s socioeconomic class has been no good indicator of vote. For someone like me, who is slightly left-of-centre ( ie probably well to the left of the US Democrats ) , I'll typically vote either LibDem, Labour or Green depending on the local situation, specific policies etc. But I wouldn't nail my colours to any of those parties. I couldn't ever vote Tory though, too much of the old "Nasty" party remains and I still think any apparent leftward movement on their behalf is a trojan horse.

But generally I suppose it's Daily Mail conservative vs Economist/Financial Times conservative. There are several Tories of the latter persuasion I've met who have been perfectly nice and sociable even thought I don't agree with them, and several right-on lefties who are fuck-awful socially-inadequate arses.

-- Matt DC, Friday, 29 August 2008 03:52 (3 hours ago) Bookmark Link

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ this. I can cope with people who support conservative parties, but some conservative leaders are such repugnant shits that there's literally no excuse for supporting them. I've actively distanced myself from friends and relatives who voted for John Howard last year.

I draw the line somewhere between

a) economically liberal, small-business-minded conservatives

and

b) racist, gay-hating, war-mongering arseholes who spend 90% of their leadership padding their own pockets and licking the nobs of rich white men and the other 10% destroying everything they don't understand

Mmm that kind of evil is almost attractive!

What troubles most about the US political climate of the last 30 years is the degree to which positions are confused for ideology. For example, if you support abortion rights and oppose the death penalty, you're considered a liberal by most pundits (and people). You should be able to articulate what liberalism means to and for you, not use positions as stand-ins.

Yeah. Sadly, though, it's entirely possible to guess who a person votes for based on the CDs they've left outside for hard rubbish collection.

The electoral success of both Thatcher and Blair was built on breaking people away from traditional party allegiances in the run-up to power. Thatcher did it by harnessing the voting power of the aspirational working class, who had rarely voted Tory in such numbers before.

Blair did it by convincing lifelong Tory voters to switch to Labour, partly due to making reassuring noises about tax, and also the mess the Conservatives made of the economy. The consequence of this is that they've created an electorate that has loyalty to no one. Or at least, the bit that's important in winning elections has loyalty to no one, so all three major parties pander to its interests.

Of course, if you're on the left nowadays you don't really have a party to vote for, so people either don't vote, vote for minority parties, or vote Labour with a heavy heart in fear of something worse.

a) economically liberal, small-business-minded conservatives

i assume you mean socially liberal/economically conservative? but yeah i know a few people like that & theyre not bad

most of 'em are though

alfred, i think this is structural and not a recent problem. in parliamentary countries position AND ideology are much more outfront. (i think). binary elections compress everything.

xp 'liberal' has a bunch of different meanings.

Howard did it by riding an economic/mining boom and getting lucky with incredibly shit opposition leaders.

a) economically liberal, small-business-minded conservatives

i assume you mean socially liberal/economically conservative? but yeah i know a few people like that & theyre not bad

most of 'em are though

-- deeznuts, Friday, 29 August 2008 07:53 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

Yeah. Our major centre-left party was like that for a while, but the last guy turned it into a pro-Bush procession of bell-ends.

This year our new centre-left PM apologised to the indigenous population for past transgressions, and every single living past PM attended EXCEPT John Howard, because he's a racist haemorrhoid. Last I heard he was in the US preaching to Republican voters.

(what I was getting at there is that he stands out in a long line of nowhere-near-as-shit leaders on both sides)

and speaking of Howard preaching to american conservatives, remember this little fun bit from last year where he decided to go after Obama early on

I am prejudiced against people who will vote for McCain this cycle, but I wasn't against those who voted for Bush in 2000 (though I didn't). I gather I have a lot more time for religion than most people on ILX, and enjoy interacting with smart people, regardless of their political orientation or religious views.

Much to be preferred obv, better drinking spots and manners iirc

I don't think it counts as "prejudice" any longer

don't know if you're going to like manchester much deems

Ara you'll point me to a good spot there's a decent cove

Much to be preferred obv, better drinking spots and manners iirc

Good luck with that in Tory areas of England. You'd have more chance of a fun night out in Raqqa.

I do like their lamb