I’m curious about how Dopers have evolved politically from their parents’ views.
I am definitely further to the left than my mother (while she didn’t discuss politics much, I had the impression that she voted Republican in the days of Goldwater and Nixon and was somewhere in the moderate camp, which would make her at least mildly treasonous in the eyes of today’s GOP). My father was mildly left of center while I was growing up and shifted further left as he got older (he was even a regular reader of The Nation and may well have been a card-carrying member of the ACLU). So as an extreme centrist I’m probably in the middle compared to my parents.
I’m estranged from my dad and don’t really know his politics. I do know he was a card-carrying member of Teamsters, so I guess he leans at least somewhat left. My mom is a hardcore conservative who constantly posts Tea Party links and right-wing Catholic theology on Facebook. I marked that I am more liberal than my parents.
My father was an American Baptist Seminarian, pretty strictly religious, but very tolerant all around (had to be, he was an ADC caseworker). My mother was fairly moderate until their divorce turned her into an avid feminist, pretty far to the left of nearly everyone. I tend to be a pragmatic communist of sorts, meaning I think we need some drastic revisions to our social structure and its implementation but my ideal is no more correct than anyone else’s (compromise sucks, but steadfastness usually sucks worse). So I guess I am about as far “left” as my mother, more or less.
We need a much bigger sample in order to find out if there is a tendency for couples to be ideologically divergent (Carville/Matalin).
My parents were Republicans. My brother and sister are frothing-at-the-mouth right wingers. I’m the lone centrist voice of reason in the family. My sister is fond of asking: how did you grow up in this family and become a Democrat?
I’m about the same – the only thing we differ on really is abortion (my parents are against it, although it’s not a big issue with them at all), or drug legalization. But everything else? Hell yeah. If anything, my father’s the one who raised me as a liberal. You should hear him ranting about the right!
My mom follows the “Ooh, shiny!” method of being led from outrage to outrage by Fox News and her church. Not much thought involved there, and I expect her “If they don’t like it when I say MERRY CHRISTMAS that’s too bad!” stuff to start up again any day now.
My dad is actually within reach of my views. He thinks civil unions may be more appropriate than marriage, and he’s more worked up about illegal immigration than I am. He’s an avid Rachel Maddow fan and hates all things Fox News. For the most part I’m a more liberal version of him.
My parents were registered as democrats as far as I know. Politics was not discussed at all. I got the idea that they were moderate to apolitical. Pretty sure they each crossed party lines depending on the elections. I am more conservative than either. I think.
Although both my parents are Democrats, Dad leans toward the more conservative end of the party. He’s fiscally conservative and socially, well, I guess somewhere between moderate and liberal. He also swung toward the 'Pubs with Goldwater and Reagan.
Mom grew up a Roosevelt Dem during the great depression. Although she follows her church’s views on abortion and same sex marriage (or before the dementia set in), IOW against, she pretty much went with the party line otherwise.
In addition to me, they raised two others who are much more liberal than they are, one more socially liberal but Republican, one moderate and one who was pretty much apolitical.
My parents were Communists (although they had dropped out of active party membership before I was born, I think). I think I am probably not quite so far to the left as they were, so not only am I more conservative, I am more “liberal”.
I actually have no idea. Politics and money were two things my folks simply WouldNotTalkAbout with the kids, ever. And getting older hasn’t changed that, hehe.
About the same; my folks were good, solid, old-fashioned Hubert Humphrey liberals, and I’m one also. Some of my family are more like Robert Kennedy liberals. All of my family is getting up in years, so we’re pretty much paleoliberals. We try to adapt.
My parents never heard of gay rights, but I think I can say, with some confidence, they’d have been in favor.
More liberal. My dad came off as more conservative than he was, and my mom comes off as more liberal than she is, but they were both quite conservative (though my mother was a registered Democrat for years). I’m super liberal, along with one of my sisters. Another sister is a Libertarian, and the three boys are all various flavors of conservative.
About the same; possibly, slightly more liberal on some issues (the ones with big generational differences), but more conservative on others, like gun control.
I’ve always wondered whether there are particular demographics where children typically end up more conservative than their parents; I know lots and lots of people whose parents are much more conservative than they are, but very few families where it’s the other way around. (My cousin the RomneyPAC worker is an exception, but then our mutual grandparents were pretty hard-core Republicans, so maybe it skips a generation.) But, on the other hand, being a hippie pinko academic, I know fewer conservatives to begin with.
Foreign policy:
Dad was a hawk. Mom is a dove. I am a hawk.
Economics:
Dad was an enthusiastic capitalist. Mom doesn’t really like capitalism, but believes that welfare programs are enablers for bad habits. I think capitalism is a significantly lesser evil.
Abortion:
All three of us are Barry Goldwater conservatives. “That’s between the woman and her doctor, and nobody else’s business.”
Drugs:
Dad was, and Mom is, strongly anti-drug, including marijuana. My view is “Legalize them all, and let the idiots die.” Does that make me conservative or liberal?
Gay marriage:
Dad died before it became a big issue. I have no idea what Mom thinks of it. I am for it.
We agree completely. In fact, we all get to vote both in the UK and the Netherlands, and we vote for the same (lefty) parties in both countries. And every time we’re all considering voting for the greens, and every time there is a reason not to.
Can’t think of a single political issue we disagree on. Oh I know, papa takes an interest in US politics. Mum and I don’t get it, seems really boring and phony to us. They can just let me know when they pick someone.
