Well, no shit, the entire strategy of conservativism at any point in history has been to prey on the dumbest demographic of humans and form them into a support base.
There are two kinds of conservatives 1) idiots 2) Grifters who prey on the idiots
Except conservative Republicans led the abolition of slavery. The parties have flipped over time.
EDIT: republicans of the time were progressive. Democrats were conservatives “preying on the dumbest”.
Those were progressive Republicans. The party Lincoln started was progressive at the time.
The current Republican party is conservative, but that wasn’t always the case.
Yup this is true. Democrats were conservative at the time.
I wish everyone treated that as a matter of fact like you all did.
The Republican party was not a conservative party then. That was the “flip” you’re referencing.
Ur right. Democrats were conservative at the time.
Sure, and even now establishment Democrats are also quite conservative. Biden is just a Republican from 20-30 years ago. The main difference is he plays on the “enlightened centrist” type of idiot, rather than the religious/white nationalist flavor.
The party title doesn’t mean so much as the actual policy and political philosophy.
Yeah. Too many party loyalists regardless of policy. Their party can do no wrong.
That’s a neato fact! That’s probably why the comment you’re replying to didn’t mention any transient party names, just conservatism.
It is! Glad you found it interesting. Party loyalists are dangerous to democracy.
Yeah they didn’t say parties thus my edit
Right, so “the conservative republicans led the abolition of slavery” is wrong. The progressive republicans did that. That does nothing to refute the point you’re replying to, which only mentioned conservatives and progressives, not republicans and democrats.
thus my edit
The entire tangent into dems vs repubs is still unnecessary, but I do appreciate your edit.
fair. it was pre-emptive because i worry some people hear liberal and think democrat instead of just liberal
Got that half right. Abolition is never conservative, people. By definition.
Hah, I always knew my political beliefs were proof of my genetic superiority.
But seriously, this isn’t necessarily saying what some people assume it’s saying. I don’t have much confidence in “controlling for socioeconomic variables” so I think membership in an intellectual class and therefore adherence to the beliefs common among that class may be the explanation for this phenomenon (rather than “smart people can figure out what the right answer to politics is”).Edit: I’ve thought about it and I think it’s unfair for me to cast doubt on the study’s controls without listing specific objections. I withdraw my comment, at least until I have time to read the full study carefully.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289624000254?via%3Dihub
The original study:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289624000254?via%3Dihub
Main points:
Within-families, intelligence predict left-wing beliefs. DNA-based predictors of IQ also predict political beliefs within families. Our results imply that being genetically predisposed to be smarter causes left-wing beliefs.Abstract:
Intelligence is correlated with a range of left-wing and liberal political beliefs. This may suggest intelligence directly alters our political views. Alternatively, the association may be confounded or mediated by socioeconomic and environmental factors. We studied the effect of intelligence within a sample of over 300 biological and adoptive families, using both measured IQ and polygenic scores for cognitive performance and educational attainment. We found both IQ and polygenic scores significantly predicted all six of our political scales. Polygenic scores predicted social liberalism and lower authoritarianism, within-families. Intelligence was able to significantly predict social liberalism and lower authoritarianism, within families, even after controlling for socioeconomic variables. Our findings may provide the strongest causal inference to date of intelligence directly affecting political beliefs.
Any study that related intelligence to opinion is inherently inflammatory. It invites dismissiveness instead of engagement, excuses rude behavior, and presumes that certain opinions are so dumb the holder is incapable of growth. I get the satisfaction in giving me a hard time, but if we ever want to be any kind of enlightened we’re going to have to disagree without insulting each other.
Consider that scholastic opportunity is much much higher in urban environments and that city folk tend to be more liberal. Consider that intelligence is difficult to define or measure - for instance, urbanites can’t tell the difference between a yellow jacket and a dirty dobber. That qualifies as stupid on some life tests. These are just two logical example of how confounding variables might lead to inaccurate and sloppy findings.
For the record, modern Rs aren’t conservative. They have no integrity and how can you stand for anything if you lack that? They are opportunistic amoral power hungry manipulators. However, you can’t see their excessive narcissism and conclude that Ds are good, that’s just a weird inverted ad hominem.
Winston Churchill said anyone under 30 who’s not a liberal has no heart. Anyone over thirty who isn’t conservative has no brain.
Political leaning is way more than “opinion” there buddy. Lol wow.
What a strange, defensive comment. Science and facts aren’t “inherently inflammatory”
“Political conservatism is associated with an increased negativity bias, including increased attention and reactivity toward negative and threatening stimuli”
Wow! That’s more than a little pejorative.
I mean the study seems pretty straightforward. If you take it to be pejorative, that might say more about you than the study.
Its not like the link between high intelligence and left-wing beliefs is new. Its extremely well established. IQ is a significant predictor of political beliefs. There are hundreds of studies that demonstrate and reproduce this.
The addition this study made was to control the variation for within family variation, which further confirmed the already known claim that IQ predicts political beliefs, extending it to within family variation. Effectively the same genetic markers for intelligence predict political belief. It shouldn’t really be a shocking conclusion.
What about smart people falling for conspiracies and outdated beliefs, like Watson? Outliers?
Edit: downvoted for asking a question.
They didn’t say it was true 100% of the time, they said there was a correlation and it and seems to be predictive.
Reality knows conservatism is inherently “stupid”.
Lemmy eats this stuff up
And every single time a new study comes out that shows conservative brains are basically defective conservatives deny the truth.
there are stupid people on both sides. psychology is a very left-leaning field as is academia.
regardless, if this study is true, here’s a study that shows that the more intelligent you are, the more intolerant you are: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2020-55298-001
