Article: Conservatives can still baby boom their way into a majority

[wonky]

From an article in the Washington Examiner allegedly quoting a study:

Deep in the study, “The Dating Preferences of Liberals and Conservatives,” the authors cite indications that conservative families are having more children than liberals and that could change the political tilt of the nation, according to their simulations. And, they added, it could happen faster than their tests show.

“If conservative couples have more children than liberal couples, as some studies report,” they wrote, “unless birth rates change, and liberals become more politically engaged at higher rates than conservatives to offset the population difference, the simulation may not fully capture the speed with this assortative mating might exert a noticeable effect on political outcomes.”

I say “allegedly” because I haven’t read the study, though I read one of the links provided and it didn’t say much about conservatives quiverfulling their way to the top.

Amongst other tidbits:

For example, most conservative daters were white and they preferred other whites. They also liked to date those who “share their relationship status.” And they preferred to date somebody who shares their tobacco usage.

Liberals, meanwhile, were more likely than conservatives to date out of their own race and were more open to somebody “who does not share their body type.”

Plausible? Silly? The Examiner isn’t super familiar to me, but I know it claims to be conservative in outlook, so I take it with a grain of salt.

Does this assume flat or no immigration? Does it assume the positions of the political parties remain stable?

In any case, I can see greater reproduction boosting conservatism, sure, but are these newly-minted conservatives going to be conservative in the same way their parents are? How do we define conservatism?

[Little_Nemo]

The article seems to assume that children will grow up agreeing with their parents’ political beliefs. What happens if all those children of conservatives rebel against their parents by becoming liberals? Sure the children of liberals will rebel against their parents by becoming conservatives but, as the article points out, the liberals have already outflanked the conservatives by not having as many children. And the liberals have even tricked the conservatives into bearing the expense of raising the future liberal majority.

Well played, liberals, well played.

[BigT]

I actually have no doubt that conservatism will continue for this reason. The thing is, what conservatism means will change. As always, liberal wins will be incorporated into the conservative platform, albeit with a delay.

And, yes, this happens in reverse, but it happens less often, as, most of the time, new ideas, created with more information about how things work, wind up being better than old ideas. Conservatism’s main purpose is not to be right, but to put a check on going overboard, embracing change for change’s sake.

[Qin_Shi_Huangdi]

Doubtful as this does not take into account immigration and the fact that usually more conservatives become liberals then vice versa.

[deltasigma]

I would say that Roman Catholics, especially of the Guido persuasion are pretty conservative as a general rule - at least in my family they were. I can tell you for a fact that political affiliation is in any way influenced by nature or nurture, then it’s more like the relationship between matter and anti-matter.

I have noticed a tendency for some of those people to revert to the more [del]troglodyte[/del] conservative leanings of their DNA donors later in life, but by that point all their kids have to do hold the Depends hostage until they acquiesce.

[Happy_Lendervedder]

Mike Judge beat the author of this article to the punch, and he called it “Idiocracy.”

[bump]

They’ll have to outbreed the Hispanic immigrants, who from what I’ve read, are the primary reason that the US birth rate is still a tad above 2.

[Exapno_Mapcase]

The notion that the lower classes were outbreeding the upper classes goes back to the 19th century and was a major driver behind the eugenics movement. Although conservatives like to call that a liberal program it was advocated by people on both sides, since the upper classes had both.

After a while it shifted to more specific groups, like Catholics and immigrants from Catholic countries like Poles and Italians. Then it was Puerto Ricans. Then other Hispanics. Blacks were always in the mix.

The hatred toward the Other was always the same, just directed differently. It’s absolutely hilarious to see conservative hate come full circle to become a positive for their side. There’s a group of historians rolling on the floor somewhere laughing too hard to breath.

It’s always been nonsense. The British had this attitude for their lower class, but modern day studies have shown that higher class Victorian parents wound up with slightly larger families because so many poor children died in childhood. And in virtually every culture ever studied, the number of children a family has decreases as economic levels go up, resulting in population predictions for third world countries winding up wildly overstated as families shrink.

Family size is not predictable generations into the future. Polarization is not predictable decades into the future. Immigration and internal movement is not predictable decades into the future. If that weren’t enough, if you were going to try to straight line trends into the future, then whites themselves will be a minority, so the children of conservative/conservative couples will be a minority of a minority and probably not sizable enough to swing elections.

The data they’re seen may be real. The interpretations are laughable. Who is making the interpretation? A conservative columnist at a conservative newspaper. Hmmm. The full actual paper can be found online. To absolutely no one’s surprise, it doesn’t quite back up the interpretation given to it.

You are free to resume laughing.

[BrainGlutton]

What, the Quiverfull thing again?! :rolleyes:

[Lightnin]

@Happy_Lendervedder

Mike Judge beat the author of this article to the punch, and he called it “Idiocracy.”

Cyril M. Kornbluth, in turn, beat Mike judge to the punch and called it “The Marching Morons”.

[BobLibDem]

One would think if there were any truth to this, conservative would be very much in favor of free contraception for the poor.

[BrainGlutton]

@BigT

Conservatism’s main purpose is not to be right, but to put a check on going overboard, embracing change for change’s sake.

By that standard, the American RW is not really conservative any more. They’re reactionary revolutionary radicals.