So I did it; I bit. And not surprisingly, I had both liberal and conservative qualities. Don't believe me? Look immediately below. Interestingly, despite the longer list of conservative qualities, I scored 63% liberal. For the mathematically and politically illiterate out there, that means I would be 37% conservative.
Lettuce break it on down:
Liberal qualities
- You like cats more than dogs
- You like fusion cuisine
- You think it's okay for your partner to look at porn alone
- You use a modern browser
- You prefer the Met to Times Square
Conservative qualities
- You prefer action movies to documentaries
- You think kids should respect authority
- You like a neat desk
- You think self-control trumps self-expression
- You think the government should treat the lives of its citizens as much more valuable than those of other countries
- You think the world benefits from nations and borders
- You're proud of your country's history
Probably the most glaring thing here is how out of touch Time, as well as the mainstream media in general, is with what the terms "liberal" and "conservative" actually mean. Of course that leads to plenty of everyday assholes miss-labeling themselves, which continues the circle of political cluelessness.
What is possibly the most obviously conservative quality on the list, checks in as a liberal quality: "You think it's okay for your partner to look at porn alone". Suspend for a minute the media's often hateful definition of what a conservative is, and think about it. My partner, looking at porn alone, not harming anybody, choosing to do something wholly on her own volition, and me not giving a shit, is about as conservative as you can get.
That's me staying out of her decision to view porn alone, involving nobody else but herself. My strong agreement with that statement is conservative. Blah, blah, conservatives aren't supposed to look at porn. While some may not, a true conservative wouldn't give a shit if somebody else did.
Anyway, a quick rundown of the remaining liberal qualities has them categorized somewhat questionably, due to a lack of qualifier, but whatever; it's Time, not like they are purveyors of modern culture or scientificness. Similar thing with the conservative qualities. Really the only qualities that registered an "extreme" answer - complete agreement or disagreement, were the fusion cuisine one, the porn one, and the modern browser one.
Seriously?! You mean to tell me that part of the reason I scored as liberal is because I use a modern internet browser? CHILD PLEASE! I only use Chrome because Rush Limbaugh told me to.
But then we get to the "You're proud of your country's history" - to which I chose "somewhat agree".
As a 32 year old, becoming superficially politically aware at roughly the same time as the rest of my generation, you'd think I would have chosen "HOLY FUCK DISAGREE WOW", considering recent history. It truly has been one fuck up after another, as the mindblowingly stupid citizenry of this country continues to elect what are essentially corporations disguised as people.
While there is a lot of progress to be made, generally, for the vast majority of Americans, living here is a lot better than many other places around the globe. People are risking life and limb to get here.
First, and maybe foremost, 'Murica abolished slavery some hundred and fifty years ago (I'm proud of that). Gay rights, while still an abysmal failure, is at least moving in the right direction (proud of that). Religion is playing less of a role in policy making, and that's kind of cool. It appears the idea of the US having a reasonable conversation with Iran is at least on the table, and that's pretty sweet (though AIPAC is mere seconds away from waving a wad of cash in front of the government's face).
Then yeah, there's the constant push for more war, the special interest owning of DC, there's you being alive, the insane overpopulation, but relatively speaking, there are many things to be at least "somewhat" proud of, even despite the many despicable things from our history. And that's why I agreed somewhat.
The scary part comes with the (sometimes) unspoken equating of being even "somewhat" proud of your country's history with being a racist, sexist, intolerant, closed-minded, numbskull conservative. Because, truth is, that's what the media is referring to, when they say "conservative".
No comments:
Post a Comment