Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Just for fun: a cheeky British take on the political spectrum

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I stumbled across a website called The Political Compass which attempts to take classification of political views beyond just “left” and “right.”  It offers a quiz placing respondents on a political quadrant from left to right in one dimension, and authoritarian to libertarian in the other.

The site also includes a take on where some historical figures would fall on the quadrant, including the current crop of presidential candidates. A bit of the above-captioned cheek (or European perspective, depending on your point of reference):

While Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel are depicted on the extreme left in an American context, they would simply be mainstream social democrats within the wider political landscape of Europe. Similarly, Hillary Clinton is popularly perceived as a leftist in the United States while in any other western democracy her record is that of a moderate conservative.

Who needs labels like lefty, liberal or progressive, when I can precisely plot myself at (-3.25,-5.59)?

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Comments

  1. is also used by the Libertarian Party in the United States.

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    I scored a 4.88 on the x axis and 0.10 on the y axis. 

      • you didn’t notice that 😉

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        I was horrified 😉

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        Not only do I share a birthday with her husband, my political philosophy as espoused by a British quick test puts me in her company.  ARGH !!! 😉

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        On a more serious note, my attitudes towards personal freedoms have changed over the past 5 years.  Especially as it relates to sex and drugs.  Which had brought me down on the Y axis from when I first took this test.

    • I scored a -4 for Economics and a -1.85 on Social.  🙂  And they keep telling me that I’m not a real Democrat!

    • [This chart] is also used by the Libertarian Party in the United States.

      Which alone is very nearly enough to exclude it, along with anyone inclined to cite it as a useful or relevant tool, from all serious political discussion.

  2. i know it will surprise many who have read my comments here, especially joeTS, but compared to me, ghandi was an uptight rightie.  my scores: econ -8.63, social -6.92.

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    a question i wish they had asked: “do you think killing in self defense is justified?”  it would be interesting to see how answers to this would shift the dot.

    • We must have been separated at birth. (Economic -4.5, Libertarian -3.54) 

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      I noticed a double negative weasely wording in one of the questions:
      “A same sex couple in a stable, loving relationship, should not be excluded from the possibility of child adoption.”  Is there a reason that the question is purposely convoluted?  Why not just ask, “Should a gay couple be allowed to adopt?”

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  5. A while ago I was taking this test every week or so for a year (I think 2005 and some of 2006) and tracking where I was over time. I think my economic went about -9 to -7 over that time and social around -7 to -6 (I need to find that spreadsheet). Taking it today I got (-6.63,-5.83), so not surprising, but I don’t believe Kucinich is to my right (he was my candidate in 2003 and was pretty much lined up with me then), and Gravel is no where near as economic left as they show him, so I think they tend to exaggerate the conservativism of American politicians.

  7. Maybe I misread some questions.
    Maybe I need to learn more about the presidential candidates.
    Maybe I need to shave my head and move to Tibet.

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    Economic: -6.13
    Social: -4.46

  8. Economic Left/Right: -2.50
    Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.10

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    I would have thought of myself as a hair to the right on economics, and a hair below the axis for libertarianism (I guess I’m becoming more of a libertarian over time, despite my better judgment).

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    But hey, I’m proud to be in the Nelson Mandela quadrant…

  9. Economic Left/Right: -6.00
    Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.38

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    I guess that means I should avoid reincarnating in China!

  10. Looks like a -3.75 on economics and -4.56 on the social scale. I’m a little surprised that my economic score isn’t a bit more to the center, but I guess it’s all pretty close!

    • We came out just a bit north and west of Ghandi  -6.38 / -1.18

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      But it didn’t ask very good questions, ioho.  How did people answer the “people with inheritable defects shouldn’t be allowed to reproduce” question?  I suspect that would answering yes would make one authoritarian, and answering “no” would make one libertarian, but the libertarian position regarding reproductive choice effectively leads to the same outcome.

  15. On my test, the lower right quadrant of world leaders is empty.

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    My numbers:

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    X: 2.88
    Y: -2.56

  16. Economic Left/Right: -4.88
    Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.77

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    Fun experiment, although I’m not clear on how things like spanking or astrology point to any particular ideology.  Then again there was that whole Nancy Reagan/Sydney Omarr thing…

  17. -2.00, -4.82

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    As has been said, this is a fun game but not exactly accurate.  There’s no way I am that far left of Stephen Harper, that close to Kucinich, or on a line with Pope Benedict.

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    A similar doodad is the Presidential Selector.  There was a really interesting one where you gave opinion on blind quotes, and saw how they matched up.  I forget where it was though…

  19. (-1.25, -.36)
    Hmmm. Rather amusing, but somehow, I’m not buyin’ it.
    I’d be interested to know just how these “questions” were arrived at and how they were weighted.
    Probably says more about the designers than it says about us.

    • one of my favorite Far Side cartoons shows a white-coated scientist standing before a blackboard.  The blackboard is chock-a-block with an intricate equation.  Somewhere in the middle is this little box with the words “and then a miracle occurred”.  😀

  20. Economic: -4.75
    Social: -7.95

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    I wonder what button I pushed to move me from -2.13 (when I took this test a year ago) to -4.75.  My social numbers remained the same.

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    Any guesses where our state leadership would fall?  How about the MA-05 candidates?

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