I don’t want to derail this, but why would delivering pizzas cause you to change political views? People have to eat; pizza feeds a lot of people for a low price, contains protein, carbs and fat. Why would you care what people on welfare eat?
I haven’t become more liberal, I’ve gained a better understanding of economics. And, since my view is that a strong economy is just about the best thing you can do for a nation, my beliefs might be called liberal, but they are in fact driven a conservative economic agenda. For example:
(a) A single payer system would be the least expensive means of providing healthcare (and healthy citizens cost the nation less than non-healthy citizens)
(b) Taxes are spent back into the economy within the year after that they are collected (as opposed to wealthy people who might remove the money from the economy by tying it up in investments). So, I am for higher taxes and for treating capital gains as standard income.
© Until we are willing to euthanize people for being homeless, homeless/near-homeless people are a drag on the economy because they have no base from which to get work and improve their situation. Aid to low income people is spent back into the economy immediately and does far more for the economy than tax breaks for the wealthy.
(d) There should be NO contractors in any military war zones. If the military can’t recruit enough people to do the work, then they need to bring back the draft. We should not be spending $1500/day on ‘contractors’. If people don’t want the draft, then they’ll have to accept that we’re not going to go sticking out noses into everybody else’s business. If Exxon wants protection at their off-shore facilities, they should hire Haliburton directly and leave the US Military out of it.
And… oh… how I could go on. BUT, just because my ideals align with what is now called liberal ideals, does not mean I’m a liberal.
But pizza tastes good! Stuff that tastes good is not appropriate for welfare recipients. They’re supposed to eat only unseasoned Minute Rice and dust mites.
I campaigned for John Anderson in my first presidential election and I am still staunchly independent (note lower case), but my views on some issues are more liberal than they were in my youth.
I was brought up as a good young republican, but now that I am older I have moved towards the center. I guess I became more Democratic as I got older.
I’d be lying if I said I haven’t changed in 30 years. That said, just not so radical and a bit more middle of the road as I’ve learned the world isn’t black and white. This is despite my tax bracket now being firmly in Republican territory.
When I was twenty, my voting philosophy was to “rat fuck the moral majority”. As I have now matured, I have added the second guiding principle of "and would support anyone that is fiscally responsible (Note: I consider those who talk about fiscal responsibility and then increase spending and cut taxes as being in the irresponsible camp.)
Because some people are pretty much made of poison. They’re bitter and insecure and simply can’t abide the idea of anyone being less miserable than they are, and are driven right around the bend by the notion that people they consider “beneath them” aren’t forced to wear sackcloth and self-flagellate 24/7.
You know, assholes.
I’ve gotten more cynical, and the political spectrum has moved around me a lot but I don’t think my basic position has changed.
I started a similar thread a few years before polling became available. The consensus was about the same, that no, people have not. But myself, I definitely have become more “right wing” as I’ve aged, although I am not right wing per se but rather more moderate or middle of the road. I was really a young leftist firebrand in my undergraduate days.
I’ve actually gone backwards from this. In my late teens I was an Ayn Randian Libertarian/Republican, but by the time I graduated from college I had shed all of that stuff and become a fairly hardcore liberal. I’ve mostly drifted even further left as I get older, with the single exception of gun control. I used to favor stringent restrictions on most types of personal gun ownership, but my views are considerably softer/more permissive now.
Surely he saw that they all had big screen TVs and brand new Escalades and mansions and blah blah blah.
People don’t change, it’s the world that does. You don’t become more rightwing as you grow older, but the changes you fought for and believed in become the norm and a new generation comes along with their changes and ideals.
Hell to the no. The US political scene has continued to move right without me.
I’ve moved steadily leftward during my life. I started off as a Goldwater conservative, was a moderate Republican as a young adult, was a Dem-leaning centrist/independent through my 30s and into my early 40s, and have been the solidly liberal guy you all know and love since about age 43 or 44.
I think the operative principle behind the quote that the OP refers to is that one’s political beliefs are more likely to be all about high-flying ideals when you’re young enough that your beliefs haven’t been tested by contact with the real world. And they’re more likely to take practicalities into account later on.
I’m not very old, early 30s. But in that time I’ve gone from a pretty far leftist to a center leftist (progressive).
I had a brief flirtation with right wingism around 2002-2004, probably as an unconscious response to 9/11 (terror management theory and all that).
However i doubt I’m who the OP is asking about, they are probably asking about people in their 60s. To my knowledge that is an urban legend, if anything studies show people move a bit to the left with age.
And as far as the OPs quote about people not having a brain if they are not republicans, that quote came from a time when republicans didn’t act anything like they do now (who knows how french politics in the 19th century worked though, I don’t). In the current political climate the right is almost a purely ideological movement, with very little pragmatism or rationality behind it.
Out of curiosity, what experiences did you have that turned you from left wing to right wing? I’m not being malicious, I’m genuinely curious how it affected you because I have not had experiences like that, but I have heard other people who have.
I have known people who lived in the bad parts of San Francisco, and I have known people who work in medicine and banking who said something similar about how it changed their political views.
claps hands
That was a really well written and thoughtful post.
Hell no. My dad to this day is a staunch Republican. Back in middle school and maybe the first couple years of high school I mostly agreed with him. My political views started to diverge from his when I was about 15 or 16 and now we couldn’t be more different.
My consistent view is to do what works. Socially, this means to interfere as little as possible, which makes me a loony lefty on a lot of issues.
Up until a few years ago, I was creeping left in my economic viewpoint. The last Wall Street round of bullshit — due mostly to a lack of regulation that’s the darling of the Tea Party and like-minded right-wingers — pushed me firmly into a much more liberal mindset with regard to businesses.
I agree. “Johnny, I hardly knew ye.” Until now.
Having grown up in a Union household, with the subsequent strikes and picket lines (anybody who thinks striking workers are enjoying time off just don’t know—you don’t get your usual pay. Choosing between beans and mac & cheese for weeks and months isn’t “vacation”.) I went to the left of that.
And there was a lot to address. Civil rights, women’s rights, the Vietnam war (now any unnecessary war), gay rights. What saddens me is that 40 years later we’re still fighting for the same things. It makes me tired, but not bowed. To me it all boils down to the same basic thing—the right to be. That all people can strive for what they need, unimpeded.
I don’t vote for the party or the man. I vote for the person with the most inclusive platform that has a chance in hell of being implemented. In that sense I guess I’ve become more pragmatic, but I’m still subversive in that I may no longer be able to carry the signs, but I can still 'Aye God write 'em.
So I guess I’ve gone further left.
I was never very interested in politics as a teenager so my political views as a young adult mirrored those of my parents, which was the “Rockefeller Republican” version of conservative. I don’t know where this place me today but from what I can tell, I am moving slowly left and barring some sudden enlightenment in the GOP policy makers, I don’t see myself moving right any time soon.