Is the Left better informed?

[Aggie]

A thought occurred to me in another thread:

Is a left-leaning 'average jane' genuinely more informed than a right-leaning 'average joe'? 
_{make what you want of the gender specificity, but it's not part of the question}

I get the distinct impression that there's a larger correlation between independent investigation and leftist viewpoints (multiculturalism, environmentalism, socialism) than occurs on the right.  It's not exclusive by any means, but I also get the impression that your average left-winger gets their opinions and ideas primarily from documentary films and non-fiction books, whereas your average right-winger gets their opinions and ideas primarily from talk radio and TV.  I'd hazard a guess that the influence of the internet is about equal on both sides (but that materials sought out on the 'net tend to be those that confirm a particular viewpoint and do not lead to abrupt about-faces in opinion). 

This could raise a separate question - if what I propose has some merit, do personal preferences in media consumption help shape one's political views?  In other words, does a higher need for sensationalism and easy-to-digest soundbites inherently predispose one towards a right-wing political viewpoint?


My original intent is to focus the discussion on the 'moderate' political consumer, so to speak, and neither the pundits nor the fringe elements.  I am of the opinion that there are well-educated and extremely intelligent people on both sides of the political spectrum that generate many of the primary ideas and opinions that make up a well-balanced conservative or liberal perspective, and that both sides hold a genuine conviction that their perspective can lead to a well-functioning society.  I am also of the opinion that the mouthpieces on either side are willing to bend the truth to spread their message.  That being said, this is the Monastery, so wander where you will!

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

While I have some ideas regarding left and right leanings on different populations I would think that, as presented, the argument applies mostly to North American and perhaps more directly to the US of A. Please correct me if I'm wrong but my perception is that Canadian politics are far less bitter and destructive that the ones in the US. On the same token, I would contend that left and right in Europe are quite different from their US counterparts, to the point that a center right president like Sarkozy in France seems in many aspects further to the left than a supposedly left leaning president in the US.

I am very curious about what is the general media consumption of an European inclined to the right, and I suspect that it is quite different from the US variety.

Now, I've seen a number of graphs and statistics that purport that the average IQ in a 'blue' state is higher than in a 'red' state, but I think there are other elements, some related to how authority is seen and enforced and some related to general empathy to those who don't belong to the group.

Definitively, the average person will be inclined to follow those news outlets that are more compatible with their belief systems (which is perfectly logical, watching someone saying something fundamentally different from your core beliefs is quite easily infuriating), but it is quite likely that the ideological choice is made well before the media choice (see an example here).

[Aggie]

While I have some ideas regarding left and right leanings on different populations I would think that, as presented, the argument applies mostly to North American and perhaps more directly to the US of A. Please correct me if I'm wrong but my perception is that Canadian politics are far less bitter and destructive that the ones in the US. On the same token, I would contend that left and right in Europe are quite different from their US counterparts, to the point that a center right president like Sarkozy in France seems in many aspects further to the left than a supposedly left leaning president in the US.

Yes, I'll concede that my frame of reference is North America, with an eyeball to the US.  However, I think the argument applies greatly Canada, and from what I can tell, to the UK.  The difference in Canada is that at the current time we don't have the foaming-at-the-mouth variety of media (yet, it's coming soon) to the same degree.  The most highly visible talk-radio host that I can think of is Charles Adler, who I actually find fairly balanced in his approach, if occasionally a bit bombastic (he stands to the right overall, but does a good job of promoting critical thought and calling out those parroting gibberish). That being said, satellite radio has given direct access to American talk radio to those inclined to it. Bubba the Love Sponge has a surprisingly large following among the young, white and working in Alberta - I've heard the show played on site and referenced numerous times in the past year.  It's not overtly political but has a definite right-wing appeal to it, IMHO.


I agree with Zono about people following the news outlets that are compatible with their belief systems, but OTOH know that some people would simply find NPR (for example) hellishly dull even if they agreed generally with the content presented, or alternatively may find Fox News ridiculous and over-stimulating even if they generally agree with the sentiment.  

Hollywood might be a good (albeit more subtle) example - blockbuster movies tend not to have overt political overtones, but they do tend to enforce certain stereotypes and outlooks (good vs. evil, justification of violence or military force against antagonists, subservient roles for women).  They also tend to be very exciting - even a fairly bad blockbuster can be somewhat entertaining if the special effects budget is high enough.  Documentary films or well-directed dramas can take a more nuanced look at issues, but don't have the same broad appeal (and can be dead boring even when they are quite well-made).  The audience of either type of movie is going to be influenced by the values presented at some level.  Michael Moore has done a good job IMHO of bringing enough sensationalism and average-guy appeal to leftist documentary filmmaking to get his message out to the people who would not have responded to or sought out less entertaining examinations of the subjects he covers.  His movies are definitely infotainment, but there's a dearth of that on the left side of the dial. I feel that the right often does a much better job of bringing mass appeal to the message, whereas often the minds generating liberal thought take it for granted that those inclined to agree with them are willing to go straight to the source and get informed of their own accord. This sets up a self-fulfilling prophecy of liberal intellectual elitism.  The reality is that much of the centre doesn't really want to work too hard for their information, so they will gravitate towards what is easily consumable regardless of the ideological backing. 

One could extend this argument with the way one's tastes change with age to predict that people of certain demographics may be getting pre-programmed towards a prevailing ideology based on their media habits - one would suspect that the media diet of the average 12-16 year-old boy (including violent videogames, blockbuster movies, certain music genres, etc) does not exactly promote a pacifist viewpoint.  One's tastes do tend to refine with age, but I would still contend that in North America a significant step to the left requires stepping outside of the status-quo media feed and doing some independent investigation.  Of course, involvement in a particular subculture may allow one to take up one of many ideologies without much critical thought.


I suppose part of my argument here is that liberal ideologies by default often promote individual exploration and tolerance of differing opinions, whereas conservative ideologies by default tend to promote homogeneity and conformance to shared values. Therefore, I'd expect the majority of left-leaning moderates to be better informed simply because being individually informed is valued more greatly than it is by right-leaning moderates, with the above caveat regarding subcultural compliance.

[Griffin NoName]

I don't think the question can be applied to UK poilitics in the same way because other factors creep in - eg. class.

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

I suppose part of my argument here is that liberal ideologies by default often promote individual exploration and tolerance of differing opinions, whereas conservative ideologies by default tend to promote homogeneity and conformance to shared values. Therefore, I'd expect the majority of left-leaning moderates to be better informed simply because being individually informed is valued more greatly than it is by right-leaning moderates, with the above caveat regarding subcultural compliance.

Then I suppose there is some other non-discussed element to the picture; let me talk about one apparent contradiction, according to several studies education in the US is below the average* compared to other developed countries, nevertheless when you see the voting patterns from the 2008 election Obama had a significant lead with the younger population brackets. One would expect that the lower the education level the more to the right their politics**, yet the pie seems to be firmly split in half with a small portion changing sides (and defining winners) on each cycle.

There is also the possibility of an evolutionary factor that would split populations into roughly equal "cooperative" and "defensive" individuals. If a clan is too "cooperative" it would be susceptible to extermination by an aggressive clan. OTOH a too "defensive"/aggressive clan would risk extermination by choosing warfare over cooperation. A balance has to be struck between cooperation and the ability to defend a community, and perhaps the evolutionary way to achieve this is by splitting the population with those opposing traits***.

*this may account for a right wing bias in the US though.
**blacks and hispanics being the obvious exception.
***an equivalent argument is seen while observing the behavior of other social species, where some individuals are more risk takers and other more conservative (with lowercase 'c') in their approach, ie: who will try that potential new food/poison, as seen in rats, crows, parrots, etc.

[Swatopluk]

I think main factors are
a) the amount of info (in the neutral meaning saying nothing about quality) available/consumed
b) the quality of said info
c) the individual ability to filter info based on quality

Take conspiracy theorists (can be found on both sides of the political divide). They are usually very 'informed', i.e. they process large amounts of data. But they (from our point of view) have a distinct lack in the quality of the filtering department.
I think in large parts of the US (esp. rural) there is a shortage of info in general combined with a very low quality, i.e. access to high quality info is severely limited (few libraries and those existing purged, the only local newspapers, radio and TV channels are run by religious RWers etc.).
And then there is a general apathy that will not take the effort to get informed in the first place (while mindless entertainment is available).

I think of major importance is the environment in the formative years. In an environemnt as described above people do not learn to develop proper critical filters. If RW is dominant the defect will mainly be found on that side. A hypothetical nationalist leftist climate would shift it to the other.
Caveat: serious 'leftism' tends to be more overtly intellectual. Marxism-Leninism tried to present itself as 'scientific' as opposed to the knownothingism prevalent on the (US) right. Old-fashioned East Asian communism might come closer to being a mirror image with its extreme hostility to intellectuals of any kind (even on their own side) and the emphasis on the rural (Pol Pot's stone-age communism being the most extreme example).

[Aggie]

I'm not sure a lack of info is as plausible a factor these days (fair point on libraries) with national broadcasts and the internet, but there is certainly a lot less variety in personal experience and differing viewpoints.  There's definitely apathy towards the outside world because outside events (other than the economy) do not really touch home.

A very terrible joke I got sent by email illustrates this (unintentionally) quite well: (warning: it's offensive and not the sort of thing I'd tell for humour):

The Red Cross just knocked at our door and ask if we could help towards the floods in Pakistan. I said we would love to, but our garden hose only reaches the bottom of the driveway.

 _{incidentally, 99.5% of the small-town boys I work with would find that hilarious}

I do see a lot of pseudo-intellectualism on the left, in terms of the alternative health industry.  Many alternative-health freaks people are easily suckered into claims of miraculous properties in the supplements that are being hawked.  Now don't get me wrong, I have a cupboard full of vitamins and am a big fan of "superfoods", but I keep a healthy dose of skepticism, and have had at least a few years of post-secondary biology and chemistry to help decipher the claims (generally speaking, if it's not dead obvious that there's a plausible accepted mechanism for activity, you should best assume the placebo effect. Try it if you like, but try to stick to cheap placebos).  Lots of people read a book by Dr. Whoever* and leap wholeheartedly into that version of healthy living.  The subculture places value in reading and getting self-informed, but a certain (probably significant) proportion lacks the base information to assess the new information they are acquiring, or in some cases, willfully disregards dissenting views from the "medical establishment" as conspiracy against the alt-health industry.  I've seen industry-sponsored astro-turf campaigns set up against certain pieces of legislation which would prevent the makers of certain products from stating claims of what they were supposed to cure (without proper research being performed); coincidentally, the maker of an affected product was orchestrating the "grassroots" campaign.  The local health markets were openly supporting it because they'd read the pamphlets, and not the actual legislation.


_{*Hard to tell what's good science sometimes; even Linus Pauling was accused of quackery.}

[Griffin NoName]

I'm not sure a lack of info is as plausible a factor these days (fair point on libraries) with national broadcasts and the internet....

But it depends what that info is, as you go on to say. The average Sun reader here is getting duff info.

[Aggie]

I suppose that's my point.  If the type of newpaper format that one prefers is the Sun, then one is simply not going to be as informed or get the same detail of information as one who prefers something like the Economist**.  As a student, a flatmate and I chipped in on a Sun subscription because they threw in tickets to an NHL hockey game (2) and a professional lacrosse match (2).  The tickets were worth much more than the subscription price, so essentially they paid us to read the Sun.  I used to finish one of those things over breakfast.  An Economist rarely gets finished in a week, unless I am doing plenty of air travel or tackle the audio edition while driving.  

There's probably something in the quantity of information one consumes.  Someone with a limited information intake isn't required to do any critical analysis to sort out the contradictions and inconsistencies between sources.  It's a skill that needs practice, so anyone getting the majority of their info from a single source may not be as adept at sniffing out bullsh*t as a person used to sorting through dissenting arguments.

What I'd be interested in knowing is whether a more informed viewpoint is closer to "correct" in any objective sense.  If so, do informed viewpoints show any correlation with political position (either direction, or perhaps neutral)?  Similarly, does a less-informed viewpoint show any correlation with political position? 

<sub>*we have 'em here too, and from what I gather it's similar quality; if it's worse in the UK then.  They run repeats of the scantily-clad ladies - the fact that a daily feature is devoted to a scantily-clad lady is telling.

**who insist on describing themselves as a newspaper despite a magazine format.  I would wager the Economist is one of the best newspaper values in terms of words/$.  I suppose they are a right-wing publication (in terms of economics), but compared to American standards they are socially liberal, IMHO.</sub>

[Griffin NoName]

What I'd be interested in knowing is whether a more informed viewpoint is closer to "correct" in any objective sense. 

"More informed" surely implies having information across a spectrum. I wouldn't think of someone as "more informed" just on quantity (ie. quantity can all be biased). In terms of political leaning, surely it comes down to whether the person has tendancy towards Marxism or Capitalist models etc.? Since, IMHO this will dictate where they look for information, it is perhaps chicken and egg.

[Aggie]

I suppose by quantity I meant breadth. I try to examine opposing arguments for things I strongly disagree with, to see if what I think has merit.  You need to look at opposing viewpoints to do that.  Re: Michael Moore (since I've been yakking about him) see the film Manufacturing Dissent.

_{personal note:  I'm pondering whether my method of info-gathering gives a particular bias, or whether my upbringing, personality, etc. is more influential.  Probably the latter.  BC, eh?}

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

Under ideal circumstances I would contend that a well informed individual should be a centrist, understanding the center as a point of balance* (ie: too many regulations will likely impact job creation, too little regulation will likely impact job creation, too many taxes will likely impact economic growth, too few will likely impact economic growth, etc), but the "center" no longer is a point of balance related to what is desirable for society, but the equal distance from the shouting voices, and that "center" has been moving dangerously to the right over the past 3 decades. Under those conditions expressing a desire for balance is inherently "left of center" (if the options are between no regulation at all and "some" regulation, "some" would cover too little, the right amount, and too much).

Properly informed has become "left of center".

*there are caveats, for example if several species of tuna are going extinct the right thing to do is to stop fishing tuna (to restore balance) but such measure would be perceived as one sided.

[Griffin NoName]

Yes I agree Zono. I think you have expressed it very cleaarly.

[pieces o nine]

Joining the conversation late...
I agree that Zano's last comment is a good summary.

I can only speak to 'better informed' subjectively, based on having lived in 5 different US states in various time zones, and in cities therein with varying political leanings. I think I would also parse the term 'better informed' as a well educated and thoughtful person can hold either conservative or liberal views, or a combination of the two depending on the topic.

There is a world of difference between the Conservatism of a William F. Buckley, Jr. and a Rush Limbaugh, or between a Christine Todd Whitman and a Sarah Palin. (Similar distinctions can be made between the liberalism of a Marian Wright Edelman and a Jenny McCarthy.) In my own experience (smaller cities bordered by insulated rural communities) much of the population is seriously undereducated, despite 24/7/365 access to 'information'. I am regularly amazed and dismayed by the pervasive lack of interest in or knowledge of *any* real history, whether local or global. Attempts to correct serious misunderstanding and/or ignorance with historical [fact] generates blank stares, accusations that I 'hate the country/the vets/white people/men/ad nausem' or a blanket dismissal that the data aren't in the Bible. For this reason alone, I tend to view liberals and progressives as better informed than their conservative counterparts -- even as I determinedly close my eyes to people wearing Che Guevara shirts who know *nothing* about the man, his times, or his actions.

Although it triggers a whole other side discussion, I see strong attachment to literal (albeit carefully cherry picked) interpretations of religious scriptures and dogmas going hand-in-hand with strongly conservative, strongly nationalistic, and strongly militaristic views. (The irony that both religions and states tend to begin with dissenters from the status quo is lost.) This type of thinking can be bolstered by reams of 'information' with little or no factual or educational content, which creates a population ever more hostile to moderation or ability to tolerate developments in human knowledge.

[Lindorm]

This discussion is in a way really illuminating the differences in political discourse and thought between the USA and large parts of europe. What is thought of as "left" in the USA, as Aggie hints at, seems to be largely a series of lifestyle standpoints -health food and alternative medicine good, smoking pot  good and the to my ears very strange equating of liberalism with some sort of leftist standpoint.

To put it bluntly, a political left that does not dare to discuss class and class inequalities is not much of a political left to me. Maybe some sort of alternative lifestyle that I can sympathize with to some extent, but hardly a political alternative. Individualism and mass consumption is still individualism and mass consumption, even if it is done with Whole Foods, Macintosh computers and Toyota Prius cars instead of McDonalds, HP and gigantic SUV:s .

What I also find puzzling is that so much of USA:ian radical activism is focussed on actions and the whole personal choice-as-political-standpoint, instead of for example trying to do some genuine grassroots labour organizing campaigns. One book that was very influential for the USA:ian activist scene was "Days of War, Nights of Love: Crimethink For Beginners". published in 2000. While the book does have it's points, it also falls short on the colletive issues. Saving the environment becomes a matter of dumpster diving, not using soap and glueing the locks to petrol stations. But where are the collective issues? This emphasis on identitarian and individualistic issues led to a lot of strife within Swedish activist and anarchist groups during the 1990'ies, but thankfully we have now moved on with several important lessons learned.

Coming from a trade-union perspective as I do, I find it a pity that more people didn't read the excellent "Troublemakers Handbook" parts I and II instead - a very good collection of texts about grassroots organization and union activism in the US, Canada and Mexico.

Again, from my european activist perspective, I would certainly agree with you that The Economist is a liberal newsmagazine -in the classical liberal sense. They are very strong advocates of deregulations, privatization of public utilities, introducing competitive tendering just about anywhere, and generally subscribe to the idea that market forces does things best. Hardly a leftist perspective, I'd say. Of course, being classical liberals, they are also somewhat, at least superficially, concerned with human rights, freedom of expression and all that -up to a certain point. Akbar S Ahmed has a both hilarious and very incisive analysis of the ideology of The Economist in his book "Post-Modernism and Islam" -not the only thing in that book worth reading by the way, it's a quite good one!

As to whether leftists are better informed than rightists, I'd say that it depends ever so much on how you define things that it almost becomes meaningless. From my perspective as a union representative, I'd say that I would not only want people to be informed, I would want them to have convictions and resolution, and a willingness to act upon them, too.