Many political debates here have included references to The Political Compass, which uses a set of 61 questions to assess one’s political orientation in terms of economic left/right and social libertarianism/authoritarianism (rather like the “Libertarian diamond” popular in the US).
And so, every so often I will begin a thread in which the premise for debate is one of the 61 questions. I will give which answer I chose and provide my justification and reasoning. Others are, of course, invited to do the same including those who wish to “question the question”, as it were.
It would also be useful when posting in these threads to give your own “compass reading” in your first post, by convention giving the Economic value first. My own is
SentientMeat: Economic: -5.12, Social: -7.28, and so by the above convention my co-ordinates are (-5.12, -7.28). Please also indicate which option you ticked. I might suggest what I think is the “weighting” given to the various answers in terms of calculating the final orientation, but seeing for yourself what kind of answers are given by those with a certain score might be more useful than second-guessing the test’s scoring system.
Now, I appreciate that there is often dissent regarding whether the assessment the test provides is valid, notably by US conservative posters, either because it is “left-biased” (??) or because some propositions are clearly slanted, ambiguous or self-contradictory. The site itself provides answers to these and other Frequently Asked Questions, and there is also a separate thread: Does The Political Compass give an accurate reading? [size=2]Read these first and then, if you have an objection to the test in general, please post it there. If your objection is solely to the proposition in hand, post here. If your objection is to other propositions, please wait until I open a thread on them. (And for heaven’s sake, please don’t quote this entire Opening Post when replying like this sufferer of bandwidth diarrhea.)
The above will be pasted in every new thread in order to introduce it properly, and I’ll try to let each one exhaust itself of useful input before starting the next. Without wanting to “hog the idea”, I would be grateful if others could refrain from starting similar threads. Finally, I advise you to read the full proposition below, not just the thread title (which is necessarily abbreviated), and request that you debate my entire OP rather than simply respond, “IMHO”-like, to the proposition itself.
To date, the threads are:
Does The Political Compass give an accurate reading?
Political Compass #1: Globalisation, Humanity and OmniCorp.
#2: My country, right or wrong
#3: Pride in one’s country is foolish.
#4: Superior racial qualities.
#5: My enemy’s enemy is my friend.
#6: Justifying illegal military action.
#7: “Info-tainment” is a worrying trend.
#8: Class division vs. international division. (+ SentientMeat’s economic worldview)
#9: Inflation vs. unemployment.
#10: Corporate respect of the environment.
#11: From each according to his ability, to each according to need.
#12: Sad reflections in branded drinking water.
#13: Land should not be bought and sold.
#14: Many personal fortunes contribute nothing to society.
#15: Protectionism is sometimes necessary in trade.
#16: Shareholder profit is a company’s only responsibility.
#17: The rich are too highly taxed.
#18: Better healthcare for those who can pay for it.
#19: Penalising businesses which mislead the public.
#20: The freer the market, the freer the people.
#21: Abortion should be illegal.
#22: All authority must be questioned.
#23: An eye for an eye.
#24: Taxpayers should not prop up theatres or museums.
#25: Schools shouldn’t make attendance compulsory.
#26: Different kinds of people should keep to their own.
#27: Good parents sometimes have to spank their children.
#28: It’s natural for children to keep secrets.
#29: Marijuana should be legalised.
#30: School’s prime function is equipping kids to find jobs.
#31: Seriously disabled people should not reproduce.
#32: Learning discipline is the most important thing.
#33: ‘Savage peoples’ vs. ‘different culture’
#34: Society should not support those who refuse to work.
#35: Keep cheerfully busy when troubled.
#36: First generation immigrants can never be fully integrated.
#37: What’s good for corporations is always good for everyone.
#38: No broadcasting institution should receive public funding.
#39: Our civil rights are being excessively curbed re. terrorism.
#40: One party states avoid delays to progress.
#41: Only wrongdoers need worry about official surveillance.
#42: The death penalty should be an option for serious crimes.
#43: Society must have people above to be obeyed.
#44: Abstract art that doesn’t represent anything isn’t art at all.
#45: Punishment is more important than rehabilitation.
#46: It is a waste of time to try to rehabilitate some criminals.
#47: Businessmen are more important than writers and artists.
#48: A mother’s first duty is to be a homemaker.
#49: Companies exploit the Third World’s plant genetic resources.
#50: Mature people make peace with the establishment.
#51: Astrology accurately explains many things.
#52: You cannot be moral without being religious.
#53: Charity is better than social secuity.
#54: Some people are naturally unlucky
#55: Schools and religious values.
#56: Sex outside marriage is usually immoral.
#57: Gay couples should not be excluded from adoption.
#58: Pornography should be legal.
#59: Adult bedroom activity is no business of the state.
#60: No one can feel naturally homosexual.
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**Proposition#61: It’s fine for society to be open about sex, but these days it’s going too far.
SentientMeat** (-5.12, -7.28) ticks Strongly Disagree.
Going too far … how, exactly? If anything, society still seems to be a little prudish in airing the messy and undignified details or the possible negative physical or emotional consequences. And if someone is relaying what you consider to be Too Much Information well, how about ignoring them?
This proposition, to me, seeks to identify those authoritarians or conservatives who consider honest dialogue about sex to be somewhat crass, tacky or unnecessarily intrusive to their sensibilities, as though it were a hobby everyone shared but *“hey, I don’t harp on about gardening every minute do I?”. The difference, I suggest, is that a lack of honesty and forthright discussion of the details, however embarrassing, has far more negative consequences than an ignorance of how to care for bougainvillea. Humans are sexual beings, and it is rather immature and psychologically unhealthy to pretend otherwise: an inability to discuss sex in an open and adult manner seriously threatens the foundation of any relationship. (Of course, I find Cosmopolitan magazine and Sex in the City a bit one-dimensional, but I’m glad they’re there, and I certainly don’t think they’re “society going too far”.)
I suspect that the main example that such Agreers might point to “these days” is the sexualisation of children. While tabloid headlines of “Pre-Teen magazine offers oral sex advice to 11 year olds” and the like are often cough overblown, clearly there is some threshold at which children don’t need to know everything: even a -7.28 social libertarian like me would not advocate showing explicit sexual images to 5 year-olds since they might well be disturbed rather than educated. But this educative threshold curve, I suggest, must still pre-empt what that aged child will do or find out anyway. I found out that penises entered vaginas at about aged 6 when I looked in a family medical handbook, and its functional line-drawings merely precipitated an “ah ha! Now I get it” rather than an “Arrrggh! Scour my young brain of this horror!”. At around age 8, discovering that my parents had sex regularly rather than just for babies was similarly untraumatic (although, of course, a bit ewwww). And from then on, all the gory details would pop up in the playground anyway but usually with unhelpful and often frightening myths and lies sprinkled liberally throughout. Hearing the “straight dope” from a trusted adult authority would have been far preferable, no matter what tabloid headlines it produced. I firmly believe that detailed sexual education from a young age (8 or 9, say) increases sexual responsibility rather than diminishing it.
However, this is but one possible aspect of #61, and I try to steer clear of anticipating people’s justifications. So, anyone who ticked Agree (or Strongly Agree), I’d be interested in your reasons, whatever they are.
P.S. The next, final, thread will be called “Ultimate Political Compass”: please debate only #61 here and save your observations or opinions on the whole series for then.