This. Except that when I saw that the welfare reform of the 90s did not collapse the nation, I drifted a slight bit to the right economically, but that was due to being shown to be wrong rather than getting older. Yet still I would be considered more economically left than before due to the huge swing that’s taken place in the past 15 years.
And my social views have changed, too – toward the left. But society has kept up with the changes and so I am probably still considered only in the top 75% of social liberals rather than having moved to the 90% bracket like I would have been in the 90s had I been pro gay marriage (I was neither for nor against it, not having heard of it.)
I came in to say this. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gained an increasingly stronger sense of community and that we as a country need to become less self-serving, not more. This will likely result in me finally registering as a Democrat, which is big, since I’ve been unaffiliated with any party since I first registered to vote.
My core values and principles have basically stayed the same. The biggest thing I would say that’s changed is my understanding of how the world works and the practicalities required for any political solution to work. In short, I’ve become more open and understanding of compromise.
In my teens and early 20s I was apolitical. I felt that culture was the true engine that drives change in society, and that politics was a bunch of Student Council nerds trying to find a trend and run in front of it, claiming leadership.
As I grew older I saw that politics did make a difference, even though I still feel culture is what is “beneath the hood.” It was very evident to me that if Bush had not been elected in 2000 we would never have gone to war with Iraq. That was not culture, that was a small group of depraved scumbags using political power to commit mass murder (it would be SO NICE to see Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld tried as war criminals in the Hague).
So politics is a change driver like culture, and politicians and their spawn (lobbyists, flacks, billionaire check writers) must be watched. Culture is much more interesting and fun to watch, because more unpredictable. I think I know why 50 Shades of Gray sold ten million copies in just a few weeks, and why it’s important. No politician made that happen, or can make it unhappen.
I voted yes, but now that I’ve written this out, I could have voted “it’s more complicated”.
I’ve become more libertarian. I used to be more liberal, so what’s changed is mostly my view on economics (which has become more free-market conservative).
I’ve become more disenchanted with the idea that government can solve our problems. I think that generally puts me closer to the conservative camp. On the other hand, I don’t really think private enterprise solves many problems either. I tend to think that cultural changes are the best solution to social problems and technological innovation is the best solution to economic problems. I’m not sure if those beliefs really fall anywhere on the standard political spectrum.
I’m completely disgusted with the hypocrisy and bigotry that I see in the Republican party. And I think we need a more nuanced discussion of fiscal issues than “taxes = bad”. So I’m still firmly to the left as far as this country goes.
I find it shocking that on a message board that leans left, most people have drifted left as they’ve gotten older. I too have gone from the far right to much more left-wing as I’ve gotten older.
If you had an option of moving left, I would have checked that. In high school I was an Ayn Rand devotee. I voted for Nixon. A few decades in the workforce changed all that.
I first started really giving thought to my political opinions when I was in High School and they were pretty much an amalgamation of the beliefs of my parents, mostly my father’s since he cared about it more than my mom did. My dad is a strong conservative, my mom a moderate liberal, and so I was pretty strongly conservative. At that time I held a lot of beliefs I was raised with simply because I hadn’t really thought them through. Within a few years, with the whole college thing, I became a libertarian. As a result, some of my views became more liberal, like I shifted from anti-Gay rights to pro-Gay rights, and a few became more conservative, like smaller government, but stuck on only the left-right spectrum, generally libertarianism is considered to be on the right, so I’m not sure if that constitutes moving right or not.
These days, I’m more or less a strong libertarian or possibly even a soft anarchist ideally, but do have some understanding for pragmatic approach and achievable steps toward an end and I really can’t where I might fall now. For instance, comparing Obama and Romney a dozen years ago I would have been at least had more I liked about Romney than disliked. Today, while I probably still have more in common with his views than Obama’s, I still end up disagreeing with both of them on a majority of topics.
For other anecdotal data points though, my dad has moved considerably farther to the right, my mom has stayed roughly the same, and most of my friends I went to high school with are either roughly the same or sort of stepped out of the whole left-right spectrum much like I did, though not necessarily in the same direction.
Personally, I think there’s some truth to the observation, but not because people’s views change, rather because the environment changes. At most times in the past, I think it would be the younger people coming up with new ideas and seen as liberal, and by the time they grew up, those ideas become established and in a sense they age into conservatism. I’m not so sure that’s necessarily true anymore because it seems to me that the political environment over the last generation or two, at least in the US, has gotten much more hostile and polarized and so ideas just sort of get stuck to one side or the other and pretty much stay there.
I started out in my teens as a radical left environmentalist, helped out in the McGovern campaign before I could vote. I felt quite superior to my solidly liberal parents who had spent years working in the Democratic trenches. My politics don’t seem to have shifted an inch since then.
What’s changed is that I don’t feel superior to my parents any more.
Also, I have found that political opinions don’t seem to have much bearing on how much compassion and helpfulness a person will bring to bear on a given situation. Which matters a lot more to me than it used to.
I grew up in a union household too and I have stayed left as I’ve grown.
My dad is the union worker in our family and he’s gotten more right. It’s because the right has done a good job of convincing him to abandon the reality of his past situation and his family’s situations and instead made him think only about the fantasy world that they have created. It’s sick.
I’m 51 now and, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve become increasingly more financially conservative. I’m completely down with the personal responsibility ideal that Republicans pay lip service to for others but, sadly, not for themselves.
I’ve always been somewhat of a miser, but now I’ve reached a state of unhealthy obsession, always looking for my next dime, constantly comparing bank interest rates and moving money around with abandon to earn that extra quarter of a percent interest this month. I continue to sacrifice and bargain-hunt, even though I truly no longer have a need to.
That stated, I’ve become a raging social liberal in my dotage. Of course I’ve also become more cynical as the hard right continues, inexplicably and hypocritically, to use selfish, discriminatory, and bigoted measures to affect those who have the least access to legal, financial, and educational resources through which to protect and defend themselves.
Of course I’ve also become more cynical as the hard right continues, inexplicably and hypocritically, to use selfish, discriminatory, and bigoted measures to affect those who have the least access to legal, financial, and educational resources through which to protect and defend themselves.