Understanding American authoritarianism

[kupfernigk]

@euansmith

I can imagine their hair becoming entangled, like some hideous Rat King.

Quantum entanglement, meaning that if Trump flipped one way on one side of the Atlantic, Johnson would immediately flop the same way in spooky action at a distance.
Perhaps this also explains Blair and Bush III.

[kupfernigk]

@Mal_Tosevite

Let’s interrupt the circlejerk a bit, because let’s look at Political Compass’s analysis of the 2012 Presidential election:

Those questions are deliberately slanted.

@Mal_Tosevite

Should the government have a say in how much money you get to keep for yourself?

If it doesn’t, we have no government since nobody will freely hand over money.

@Mal_Tosevite

Should the government be allowed to force you to remove a woodstove from your home, citing CO2 emissions concerns?

Let’s rephrase that slightly as “Should the government be allowed to tell BP to close off a leaking oil well/stop fracking where earthquakes seem to be happening/ban lead from gasoline”. These are all about actions which can harm other people.

It seems in its attempts to identify authoritarianism of the Left as well as the Right, Political Compass shows us where its real agenda lie. [edit- It seems it was you who was cherry-picking the questions.]

[Mal_Tosevite]

@kupfernigk

Let’s rephrase that slightly as “Should the government be allowed to tell BP to close off a leaking oil well/stop fracking where earthquakes seem to be happening/ban lead from gasoline”. These are all about actions which can harm other people.

Let’s rephrase that slightly as “Should the government be allowed to tell Apple to open up a backdoor in iPhones so that the FBI can search terrorist suspects’ phones and hopefully prevent as many future terrorist acts as possible”. These are all about actions which can harm other people.

[anon73430903]

@Mal_Tosevite

Should the government have a say in how much money you get to keep for yourself?

Should bosses be allowed to underpay people for their work? If they didn’t then taxes would be lower because more people would have enough to live on.

I’m not a fan of government, but I’m even less of a fan of capitalism. It’s strange how capitalism never seems to be called out for it’s adherents own authoritarian actions.

[RogerStrong]

@Mal_Tosevite

@kupfernigk

Let’s rephrase that slightly as “Should the government be allowed to tell BP to close off a leaking oil well/stop fracking where earthquakes seem to be happening/ban lead from gasoline”. These are all about actions which can harm other people.

Let’s rephrase that slightly as “Should the government be allowed to tell Apple to open up a backdoor in iPhones so that the FBI can search terrorist suspects’ phones and hopefully prevent as many future terrorist acts as possible”. These are all about actions which can harm other people.

Those questions are not equal. The first question regards authoritarian action against only those causing harm to others. The second regards authoritarian action against people based on the possibility that one in hundred million of them may cause harm to others.

They should not push the graph into “authoritarian” by anywhere near the same amount.

[Mal_Tosevite]

@RogerStrong

Those questions are not equal. The first question regards authoritarian action against only those causing harm to others. The second regards authoritarian action against people based on the possibility that one in hundred million of them may cause harm to others.

Whatever you have to tell yourself to maintain a worldview that only right-wingers are authoritarian.

[RogerStrong]

@Mal_Tosevite

Whatever you have to tell yourself to maintain a worldview that only right-wingers are authoritarian.

I did not imply any such thing.

[kupfernigk]

@Mal_Tosevite

Whatever you have to tell yourself to maintain a worldview that only right-wingers are authoritarian.

Of course this is not the case. However, there are examples of left-wing authoritarianism that could have been cited (e.g. only being allowed to live where the State tells you) that do not automatically imply, as Political Compass did, that any support for government is “authoritarian”, which simply removes all meaning from the word.
[edit 2 - I now realise that you are cherry picking examples from the Political Compass test. I apologise to them; it is you that have agenda, not them.]

[edit - I’m currently reading Archie Brown’s Rise and Fall of Communism in which he makes an important point - the countries that NATO called “Communist” did not regard themselves as communist. (USSR stands for the Union of Socialist Workers’ Councils Republics). For them they were socialist, which was an authoritarian State run on communist lines and in which traces of capitalist thinking must be purged until communism was achieved, in which the State would wither away. If this sounds a lot like the Jewish dream of the Messiah and the eventual coming of the perfect society, remember that Marx was the grandson of a rabbi. McCarthy wasn’t totally wrong in conflating Communist and Jewish thinking.]

[Kimmo]

@doctorow

Back in 2009, I wrote about Bob Altemeyer’s “The Authoritarians”, a free/open text that summarizes 30 years of research into the authoritarian mindset. I recommend reading it now.

I second Cory’s recommendation - it’s enlightening stuff, and not a big read.

[Kimmo]

@RogerStrong

A Conservative is a liberal that’s been mugged.

That’s hooey. Sure some ‘liberals’ consider themselves such out of tribalism, but since one of its key tenets is open-mindedness, the alignment isn’t towards certain people and their views, but towards a faithful understanding of reality. Hence reality’s well-known liberal bias.

As such, you can take a liberal out of a sensible context, but you can’t really take the sense out of a true liberal.

[Kimmo]

Also, I’m so fucking sick of seeing the alleged grammar of ‘people that’ - it’s ‘people who’, dammit.

And furthermore, ‘entities who’.

[anon61221983]

(I kid!)

[anon50609448]

@Mal_Tosevite

Should the government have the right to tell you whether or not you can have an abortion?

Should the government have a right to tell you whether or not you can own a gun?

Should the government have a righ tto tell you whether or not you can marry someone based on your partner’s gender?

Should the government have a say in how much money you get to keep for yourself?

Should the government be allowed to force you to remove a woodstove from your home, citing CO2 emissions concerns?

Individual rights are balanced against group rights. But as for “how much money you get to keep for yourself” I have to say that “This representation of 350 million other people’s trust in the government is mine and the government should keep their grubby hands off of it” is a position I find outright stupid. What do you even think money is?

[anon73430903]

@kupfernigk

that any support for government is “authoritarian”, which simply removes all meaning from the word.

I really wish they would change it to statist, although there are still issues with that word it would feel more accurate and less insulting.

[anon50609448]

@anon73430903

I really wish they would change it to statist, although there are still issues with that word it would feel more accurate and less insulting.

Authoritarian and statist are radically different. I am a proud hardcore statist, and I come out -8.9 authoritarian on political compass.

[kupfernigk]

@anon50609448

Authoritarian and statist are radically different. I am a proud hardcore statist, and I come out -8.9 authoritarian on political compass.

Echoed. As a school student, in fact, I used to read The Statist, until it closed in 1967. It was a counterweight to The Economist, but as it wasn’t a cheerleader for the banks and the City, it didn’t get the advertising and so folded. But it’s why still today I believe in the importance of a mixed economy, and no secret agreements between governments and corporations.