# RWs are not stupid; it's much worse than that **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 23, 2012, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856 "2012-05-23T17:55:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/21 "2012-05-23T20:38:33Z")
Oops, thanks. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/22 "2012-05-23T20:53:30Z")
Ir does seem to me, though, that the studies on which Mooney is relying are limited by a bipolar approach. There are **more than two sides** here, and if they’re different kinds of people, then there are more than two different kinds of people, politically/psychologically speaking. If we have one set of psychological generalizations applicable to (what is usually meant by the word) conservatives, and another applicable to (wiumbtw) liberals, then I doubt either set of generalizations would apply to libertarians or communists or fascists; each of those sets – I expect – would have its own very different psychology. I hope that will be studied in the future. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/23 "2012-05-23T20:56:09Z")
[Here’s](http://www.newsday.com/opinion/oped/goldberg-analyzing-the-republican-brain-1.3695554) a RW response to Mooney’s book, from Jonah Goldberg. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/24 "2012-05-23T21:48:01Z")
From an [_In These Times_](http://www.inthesetimes.com/inperson/13214/chris_mooney/) interview with Mooney: > [@](#): > > **For years, the left has been very critical of scientific research on genetics and intelligence. Do you think that this was a case of the left rejecting science for ideological reasons? What are the differences between left-wing and right-wing approaches to opposing science?** > > I’m prepared to say that any liberal or leftist who seriously wants to deny that humans are the product of evolution, and that this is a central key to understanding our present day behavior—including our political behavior—is guilty of science denial. > > But that said, you’ve got to get the evolutionary logic right. There is definitely bad science out there that seeks to apply evolution incorrectly to who we are today. > > I think that the left campaign against “sociobiology” was definitely ideological in nature. It was driven by misplaced egalitarianism. That’s a chief liberal value and chief liberal emotion: We care about equality. It’s a wonderful thing, but it can certainly drive biased reasoning in some cases. > > The difference between how left and right use science is both psychological—e.g., science is more friendly to liberals, because they’re more tolerant of uncertainty and ambiguity—but also moral and emotional. Both sides like science when it supports their values; but they have very different values. The left uses science to promote equality and to protect people from harm and to make the world better. The right prizes using science to support free enterprise and its other ideological goals. > > Because liberals are emotional creatures too, there is nothing that says they can’t err or misuse science. However, they do so for very different reasons, and they also change and update their views more easily over time. So the misguided left campaign against “sociobiology” from the 1970s is basically, at this point, a historical relic. And thank goodness for that. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/25 "2012-05-23T22:29:46Z")
The articdle [Political conservatism as motivated social cognition](http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/resources_files/ConsevatismAsMotivatedSocialCognition.pdf) is a good read. But Right Wing Authoritarianism is correlated with dogmatism, so I don’t see why this would be surprising. In the US the RWA’ans have overtaken the conservative movement, pushing out the libertarians and more moderate GOPers. Goldwater was offended by the 90s GOP, which was fairly moderate compared to todays. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/26 "2012-05-23T22:47:49Z")
> [@Sinaptics](#): > > Do you have any statistics on the amount of liberals or democrats that don’t support nuclear power? As a liberal, I’ve never understood this myself. It’s the cheapest, cleanest, most abundant power source available ATM. Sure the cleanup is a bit of a mess, but if done properly, no worries. I always thought it was the hardcore environmentalists that railed against nuclear power. But nobody listens to them anyway. > > As for ZimmermanMartin thing, I didn’t like the way the police just dismissed it from the outset. I thought there should be a more thorough investigation. I thought Zimmerman’s story was questionable on a number of points. That’s all. Just more investigation and no white-wash (no pun intended). Well, then you would be a liberal for whom my examples don’t apply. As I would contend I am not a conservative to which the OP’s examples apply. ---
**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:** [May 23, 2012, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/27 "2012-05-23T22:51:48Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > Gee, what an insightful OP. > > :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: Prove it wrong, then. Show us somewhere where your opinion on a political issue has changed due to the revelation of new facts. Because that’s all the OP asserts–that conservatives will not listen to liberals when they present fact after fact–that a conservative just doesn’t think that way. As for me, I think there is a different way people think, but I don’t think it clearly lines up with right wing vs. left wing. It’s just all about how well you accept things that differ from your preconceived notions–how resistant you are to change. Someone with a “conservative” mindset who grew up with American liberal teachings would cling as much to that ideology. The fearful thing sure doens’t hold up, as I’m fearful but also liberal. I may have thought I was a conservative, but I’m not. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/28 "2012-05-23T22:53:47Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > No one can know who wrote the article or whether or not it was intended as a joke. Hence it proves nothing about whether any group of people are or are not willing to accept facts. On the contrary, the fact that one can’t tell whether it’s a joke says a lot. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/29 "2012-05-23T22:58:42Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > IOW, the problem appears to be, not that RWs are not **intelligent,** but that they **won’t** use their brains to deal with facts, but only to rebel against them and substitute “facts” more to their liking and defend those. > > Well. > > What can we do about **that?!** :eek:☹ Wait until they die. A great many people will never change their mind no matter the evidence, and can only be dealt with by enduring them until they die and are replaced by equally inflexible people with a more advanced set of inflexible dogma. Who in turn need to be waited out by the progressives of _their_ generation. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/30 "2012-05-23T22:59:24Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > On the contrary, the fact that one can’t tell whether it’s a joke says a lot. Well, I’ve never before heard of Poe’s Law (Conservapedia has something to say about [that,](http://www.conservapedia.com/Poe%27s_law) too, and it ain’t no parody) being manifested in something as elaborate as an alternative theory of physics. Not that this couldn’t be the first time. ---
**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:** [May 23, 2012, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/31 "2012-05-23T23:00:36Z")
(Honestly, I think most of the Christian Right Wing are not actually conservative, save for on the issues of abortion and homosexuality… And my opinions on both of those have changed–I’m moderate on the first, and completely left-wing on the other.) ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/32 "2012-05-23T23:08:50Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > As for me, I think there is a different way people think, but I don’t think it clearly lines up with right wing vs. left wing. It’s just all about how well you accept things that differ from your preconceived notions–how resistant you are to change. Someone with a “conservative” mindset who grew up with American liberal teachings would cling as much to that ideology. That is a good point. Conservative and liberal are relative and ever-changing terms. There are plenty of old school 70’s hippie types still around who are remarkably impervious to new facts as well. That applies to holdovers from any philosophy or political orientation including some radical leftist ones yet they are quite ‘conservative’ by at least one dictionary definition of the term. If there is such an innate mindset, you may just see it more often in older right wing people today because larger numbers of them were raised that way but that doesn’t have anything to do with the merits of the different general political orientations in today’s terms. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/33 "2012-05-23T23:15:39Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > That is a good point. Conservative and liberal are relative and ever-changing terms. Well . . . here’s a somewhat contrary view from [_The Right Nation: Conservative Power in America,_](http://www.amazon.com/Right-Nation-Conservative-Power-America/dp/0143035398/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224007314&sr=8-1) by conservative British journalists John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge: > [@](#): > > The exceptionalism of the American Right is partly a matter of its beliefs. The first two definitions of “conservative” offered by the Concise Oxford Dictionary are “adverse to rapid change” and “moderate, avoiding extremes.” Neither of these seems a particularly good description of what is going on in America at the moment. “Conservatism” – no less than its foes “liberalism” or “communitarianism” – has become one of those words that are now as imprecise as they are emotionally charged. Open a newspaper and you can find the word used to describe Jacques Chirac, Trent Lott, the Mullah Omar and Vladimir Putin. Since time immemorial, conservatives have insisted that their deeply pragmatic creed cannot be ideologically pigeonholed. > > But, in philosophical terms at least, classical conservatism does mean something. The creed of Edmund Burke, its most eloquent proponent, might be crudely reduced to six principles: **a deep suspicion of the power of the state; a preference for liberty over equality; patriotism; a belief in established institutions and hierarchies; skepticism about the idea of progress; and elitism.** Winston Churchill happily accepted these principles: he was devoted to nation and empire, disinclined to trust the lower orders with anything, hostile to the welfare state, worried about the diminution of liberty and, as he once remarked ruefully, “preferred the past to the present and the present to the future.” > > To simplify a little, **the exceptionalism of modern American conservatism lies in its exaggeration of the first three of Burke’s principles and contradiction of the last three.** The American Right exhibits a far deeper hostility towards the state than any other modern conservative party. . . . The American right is also more obsessed with personal liberty than any other conservative party, and prepared to tolerate an infinitely higher level of inequality. (One reason why Burke warmed to the American revolutionaries was that, unlike their dangerous French equivalents, the gentlemen rebels concentrated on freedom, not equality.) On patriotism, nobody can deny that conservatives everywhere tend to be a fairly nationalistic bunch. . . . Yet many European conservatives have accepted the idea that their nationality should be diluted in “schemes and speculations” like the European Union, and they are increasingly reconciled to dealing with national security on a multilateral basis. American conservatives clearly are not. > > If the American Right was merely a more vigorous form of conservatism, then it would be a lot more predictable. In fact, the American Right takes a resolutely liberal approach to Burke’s last three principles: hierarchy, pessimism and elitism. The heroes of modern American conservatism are not paternalist squires but rugged individualists who don’t know their place: entrepeneurs who build mighty businesses out of nothing, settlers who move out West, and, of course, the cowboy. There is a frontier spirit to the Right – unsurprisingly, since so much of its heartland is made up of new towns of one sort of another. > > The geography of conservatism also helps to explain its optimism rather than pessimism. In the war between the Dynamo and the Virgin, as Henry Adams characterized the battle between progress and tradition, most American conservatives are on the side of the Dynamo. They think that the world offers all sorts of wonderful possibilities. And they feel that the only thing that is preventing people from attaining these possibilities is the dead liberal hand of the past. By contrast, Burke has been described flatteringly by European conservatives as a “prophet of the past.” Spend any time with a group of Republicans, and their enthusiasm for the future can be positively exhausting. > > As for elitism, rather than dreaming about creating an educated “clerisy” of clever rulers (as Coleridge and T.S. Eliot did), the Republicans ever since the 1960s have played the populist card. Richard Nixon saw himself as the champion of the “silent majority.” In 1988 the aristocratic George H.W. Bush presented himself as a defender of all-American values against the Harvard Yard liberalism of Michael Dukakis. In 2000, George W. Bush, a president’s son who was educated at Andover, Yale and Harvard Business School, played up his role as a down-to-earth Texan taking on the might of Washington. As a result, modern American conservatism has flourished not just in country clubs and boardrooms, but at the grass roots – on talk radio and at precinct meetings, and in revolts against high taxes, the regulation of firearms and other invidious attempts by liberal do-gooders to force honest Americans into some predetermined mold. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/34 "2012-05-23T23:19:58Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Prove it wrong, then. Show us somewhere where your opinion on a political issue has changed due to the revelation of new facts. For my part, I used to be anti-nuke like any good environmentalist, but my brother, who an engineer (and a self-ID’d “radical libertarian”) convinced me the plants are safe and clean with today’s technology. Which is something I really **want** to believe, because I don’t want every single drop of oil and lump of coal and cubic yard of natural gas remaining in the Earth’s crust to be pumped out or dug up and burned to release its CO2 into the atmosphere; nor do I want this wonderful industrial civilization to collapse for lack of a power supply (no, small **ain’t** beautiful); there’s got to be a third option. (I might have to re-evaluate yet again in light of Fukushima . . .) ---
**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:** [May 23, 2012, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/35 "2012-05-23T23:53:11Z")
Here’s the thing: Partisans, whatever the slant, are more likely to believe something negative about the other side without examining it critically. We see it here all the time. Studies even back that up: [Link.](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/03/each_party_has_its_fanatics_97748.html) > [@](#): > > A few years ago, an Emory psychologist scanned the brains of self-described partisans. Partisans were able to notice the hypocritical statements of the opposing candidate but not the inconsistencies of their preferred candidate. Ideology, it was determined, showed effects similar to drug addiction. I’m sure the OP does not need to be reminded of the large number of Democrats who thought Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance. If not, it’s in the same link. Or, the persistent belief that _Citizens United_ somehow created the idea of corporate personhood. Or that we need to “eliminate corporate personhood”. Or that GW Bush had a fake Texas accent. What the thing RWers have “going” for them is an entire media complex (mainly talk radio) devoted to feeding them misinformation. They believe it because it’s what they want to believe, and there are any number of “experts” out there telling them, with an air of authority, any number of falsehoods. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/36 "2012-05-23T23:57:43Z")
An ideology can be blind to its internal contradictions as well as facts. Take the “liberty over equality” thing from post #33’s excerpt-well that just says it all right there: if some aren’t equal to others, then they lack the freedom that these others enjoy, so it just devolves into “freedom for me, the heck with you” to maintain the facade. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2012, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/37 "2012-05-24T00:44:07Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Prove it wrong, then. Show us somewhere where your opinion on a political issue has changed due to the revelation of new facts. > > Because that’s all the OP asserts–that conservatives will not listen to liberals when they present fact after fact–that a conservative just doesn’t think that way. Nope, can’t be bothered. An OP that poisons the well like that is unworthy of reasoned response. ---
**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:** [May 24, 2012, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/38 "2012-05-24T00:52:26Z")
People making assertions around here have to prove themselves right. No one is obligated to prove them wrong. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/39 "2012-05-24T01:52:17Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Right Wingers, I’d guess. Sorry, thought all the Dope would know that. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2012, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856/40 "2012-05-24T02:21:38Z")
> [@](#): > > **Science.** In a nationally representative survey—only 18 percent of Republicans and Tea Party members accepted the scientific consensus that global warming is caused by humans, and only 45 and 43 percent (respectively) accepted human evolution. “Of course, like every other man of intelligence and education I do believe in organic evolution. It surprises me that at this late date such questions should be raised.” – Woodrow Wilson, 1922 It’s **really** taking longer than we thought . . . [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rws-are-not-stupid-its-much-worse-than-that/622856.md?page=3)