Interesting stats! Gallup is showing that Democrats have shifted leftward socially and Republicans have shifted right, but not as much as the Dems did left. The economic side should not be a huge surprise (showing that Americans as a whole trend conservative) but it is showing some movement.
One takeaway is that polarization is increasing on both social and economic issues. We all feel that, but it’s always good to see numbers. Another takeaway is that this is why I despise conversations about the “Overton window”. It’s completely different for different slices of our politics. These numbers clearly indicate that the Overton window is actually shifting left socially and remaining relatively static economically (in a place we all here likely dislike, but it’s been consistent).
Yeah but thanks to America’s Overton window "left"now means “pro choice and pro contraception”. In a sane world view those are centrist issues
I do not believe that these statistics corroborate that view, but I’m open to hearing out your analysis!
Social media has been steadily increasing social issue polarization for over a decade, with a substantial increase in use since covid quarantine. The algorithms are designed to maintain engagement for as long as possible by providing the user with media similar to the media they spend the most time viewing or commenting on.
Just look at what’s happened to Facebook Boomers. It’s curated confirmation bias, that will only worsen with use.
providing the user with media similar to the media they spend the most time viewing or commenting on.
And also that increased engagement is directly correlated with anger. Social media companies have a financial incentive to drive partisanship- when a user gets angry, they are more likely to post stuff, which in turn causes the algorithm to show them more stuff that makes them angry, which makes them more likely to post stuff, etc. And all the while the company is collecting all that ad revenue. Behind the Bastards did an episode on Facebook and they said that at one point in time, Facebook’s recommendation algorithm was weighting posts that users marked as “angry” five times heavier than posts marked as “happy”.
So if you’ve ever wondered why an anonymous YouTube account gets recommended right-wing shit-heads like Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, Tim Pool, or Charlie Kirk so quickly, it’s because of that. Not only do they intentionally try to inflame the right with made-up stories about the left (“They’re coming to make your guns get gay married to illegal immigrants!”) the left gets angry at just how blatantly, stupidly wrong those stories are. Thus, engagement.
I also think the internet is the primary driver for this, but I’m sure it’s a vastly complex set of circumstances on top of that. I don’t know how we fix this… Increased polarization is always going to tend to negative outcomes. Even if you “win” that first inevitable conflict, there will be another one. I think even my political enemies have a vested interest in fixing this, although their answer would likely just be “restrict the internet once in power”.
The issue is voters ideology may have shifted more politically to the left, but they keep voting for right wing politicians hoping they will align with their beliefs. And we know they don’t
Part of the problem I noticed today is a lot of political parties that are “left” or “right” in name are not even like that anymore. Some are more center now, for example. Some of the parties here I don’t even think are left when they say they are. They have some right winged tendencies in certain areas but not on others. The lines are blurred.
Heck, Democrats are even consistently voting more rightward, as the party tries to woo conservative moderates.
Is it because the ideas of what a liberal and conservative is have shifted way to the right on the political spectrum in the last 25 years?
That would reflect differently in the stats, so no, I don’t think so. If that was the case, you would see a shift in one direction, not a split showing each direction getting more “intense”.
Ehh The Overton window still matters here when we’re talking how far something has shifted on a political scale.
No. Modern “liberals” and conservatives are both neo liberals. Who broke differently concerning social involvement where economic liberalism said there should be none. Economic liberalism being the archetype for what we define right wing as, namely capitalism. The realistically you don’t get any further right wing than economic liberalism.
According to the flawed theory however. It assumed that individuals would never behave selfishly. Economic liberalism would be socially neutral. We know for a fact that that assumption was utter bullshit from the moment it was made. Humans in the absence of any obvious negative repercussion will always behave selfishly. Worse yet with the Supreme Court ruling that a CEOs ultimate responsibility was to maintaining a company’s bottom line. That absolutely made it necessary to exploit others. Through social oppression and authoritarianism. Meaning that at best, economic liberalism could not only never be neutral. But was mildly authoritarian even in its base state.
Those that we call liberals, Democrats. Are and have always been staunchly extremely right wing. Ever since the anomaly that was fdr. They have in every instance possible tried to worm work requirements into any social assistance program ever allowed. So as not to reduce the power of the ownership class. Every solution for them must be a market-based solution. Though at least they are somewhat genuine about it.
Conversely those we call Republicans / conservatives are wildly authoritarianistic. Often fascistic. While they often use the same platitudes about market-based solutions. They have no genuine desire to change or fix anything. They simply wish to use the market and the bias built into it to enforce the hierarchy they desire. But generally are exactly as right wing as our Democrats are.
Bonus facts. One of the other parties that gets a lot of mention are libertarians. The thing to know about Libertarians is they aren’t. In the United States what’s commonly referred to as libertarian or right-wing libertarian if people are at least trying to be even remotely correct. Are actually (economic) liberals. Thus they by nature of thinking they can be neutral. Are slightly more authoritarian than democrats.
