# Americans: Are you Conservative, Moderate or Liberal? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 21, 2017, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824 "2017-07-21T19:15:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/1 "2017-07-21T19:15:02Z")
Screw nuance-I’m not going to make a 47 choice poll. Just pick the one that you identify most with. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/2 "2017-07-21T19:22:53Z")
Libby lib LIBERAL. With none of the imaginary content the right wants to assign to me and none of the ‘shame’ or negative connotations they think there should be either. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/3 "2017-07-21T19:23:54Z")
I’ll just say moderate because i’m all over the place depending on the issue and the specifics. ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/4 "2017-07-21T19:24:25Z")
Liberal, leaning towards center. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/5 "2017-07-21T19:30:14Z")
Poll needs more cowbell. Or more choices. If you’re pretty far conservative on a bunch of things and pretty far liberal on a bunch of other things, that DOES NOT average out to “moderate”. Because you aren’t “moderate” on much of anything. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/6 "2017-07-21T19:33:22Z")
I chose “liberal” but my usual inclination is to be a special snowflake on these questions. I really do have some conservative notions as well as some contempt for some liberal concepts (those are not, by the way, fully overlapping categories, those two). I’m not sure an anarchist is liberal or “in a liberal direction from the center”. In fact I tend to agree with people who say the extreme left and right seem to bend around a loop and merge into each other (totalitarianism). ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/7 "2017-07-21T19:38:51Z")
That’s why I said “Identify most with”. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/8 "2017-07-21T19:59:08Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Poll needs more cowbell. Or more choices. > > If you’re pretty far conservative on a bunch of things and pretty far liberal on a bunch of other things, that DOES NOT average out to “moderate”. Because you aren’t “moderate” on much of anything. That’s easy. I’m an extreme moderate. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/9 "2017-07-21T20:06:34Z")
Love me, love me, love me - I’m a liberal. ---
**Author:** ![UncaStuart](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uncastuart/32/404_2.png) [@UncaStuart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncaStuart)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/10 "2017-07-21T20:14:59Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Libby lib LIBERAL. > > With none of the imaginary content the right wants to assign to me and none of the ‘shame’ or negative connotations they think there should be either. Big Ditto ---
**Author:** ![DinoR](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dinor/32/2821_2.png) [@DinoR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DinoR)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/11 "2017-07-21T21:16:44Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Screw nuance-I’m not going to make a 47 choice poll. In some ways this is more interesting IMO because that’s how typical poll questions about political ideology break down. 47 choices wouldn’t allow direct comparisons with that broader set of data. With just the three choices we can see that so far the board is more liberal than Democratic Party members. I’m one of the few moderates. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/12 "2017-07-21T21:19:56Z")
Well of course I’m a moderate. It’s all you other people who disagree with me who are extremists! And of course I’m a conservative. I want to conserve the political norms and values necessary to keeping our constitutional republic healthy, and not do stuff like elect someone who has no experience whatsoever in public service and is temperamentally unfit to hold power over other people to our nation’s highest political office. I want to conserve the natural environment of our planet. I don’t want to take a wrecking ball to things like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid that we have spent fifty or eighty years building. But, OK, no more fighting the thread. I have always self-identified as a liberal; liberalism is definitely the “ism” that best expresses the values and beliefs that I hold. I want to expand individual liberty (as against both Big Government _and_ Big Business) and to empower ordinary people to live their lives to the fullest (which includes things like arranging our society such that people’s lives aren’t crushed the minute a family member inevitably develops a serious health problem; and seeing to it that every person can get as much of an education as he or she can intellectually handle, even if they don’t come from a family with a hundred grand just lying around). So “liberal” is how I voted in the poll. ---
**Author:** ![Unabashed\_Fascist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/c2a13f/32.png) [@Unabashed\_Fascist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unabashed_Fascist)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/13 "2017-07-21T21:22:16Z")
I would say I’m more liberal than not, but I’m also a cheapsake, so I identify with a lot of _please stop taxing me_ crowd. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/14 "2017-07-21T21:33:51Z")
I might’ve called myself moderate when I was younger, as I’m pretty big on trying to see both sides. But I find that what I believe in is actually what is considered liberal in this country. There really isn’t much room for being a moderate. And this is why I resist the idea that moderation as you get older is normal. I’ve become less moderate. I think the actual issue is just that there are some extremist liberals who become a bit more moderate, and then conservatives who become more liberal. These are more common than people who were moderate to start with. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/15 "2017-07-21T23:11:10Z")
I mostly identify as liberal but I selected ‘‘Moderate’’ because I took a fairly convincing test that says I’m a moderate. I don’t know what to call myself these days. Progressive moderate, let’s say. ---
**Author:** ![Helena330](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/helena330/32/531_2.png) [@Helena330](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helena330)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/16 "2017-07-21T23:16:44Z")
I’m so liberal I can’t even see moderate from here. Surprisingly, I was pretty conservative when I was younger, mostly as a result of my dad’s influence. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/17 "2017-07-21T23:30:05Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > That’s easy. I’m an extreme moderate. Hmm. I pegged you at moderately extreme. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/18 "2017-07-21T23:32:18Z")
Conservative, but also hold liberal views on perhaps 30% of issues. ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/19 "2017-07-21T23:44:20Z")
I’ll shock the room and go with liberal. ---
**Author:** ![CelticKnot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/celticknot/32/3392_2.png) [@CelticKnot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CelticKnot)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2017, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824/20 "2017-07-21T23:47:00Z")
Who needed a poll? Just reading the posts here is pretty revealing. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/americans-are-you-conservative-moderate-or-liberal/791824.md?page=2)