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I mean, I do feel like my ideas/community are the underdog and I'm not even all that rightwing (I'm pro stuff like basic income, but also against minimum wage).
by thriway 8y ago
I mean, I do feel like my ideas/community are the underdog and I'm not even all that rightwing (I'm pro stuff like basic income, but also against minimum wage).
The thing about underdog is this.
Our culture as produced in books/film/tv/music is dominated by left leaning beliefs.
If your conservate the media that naturally surrounds you does not reflect or celebrate your values.
Though I'm not saying they don't exist.
If you look at a demographic map of blue vs red, you will notice that blue = cities, red = rural. Even many blue states are only blue becuase of their cities.
This can create a feeling of "underdog" in both directions. Blue may feel like islands in a sea of red, red may see as wealth and power bring concentrated in blue lands.
The academic establishment is left leaning. That is a big one you leave out.
Finally regarding the lack of prominent left wing internet communities, this.
I live in the bay. If I want to have a honest discussion about say, basic income I can just step outside.
The same is not true of say, opposition to minimum wage. That will only get vitriol thrown at me and damage my personal reputation.
The left has few prominent internet communities because they don't need them. The right leaning people do, they are either very spread out in real life, or exist in communities that don't agree with them.
The same is true online. I don't need a left wing forum to discuss left wing ideas because every internet community I'm part of is predominantly left wing.
Basically if there is an internet community that's not expressily rightwing, it's community will be leftwing, so leftwing people don't need a space for themselves.
The lack of a prominent left wing forum is simply because the left is so dominant they don't need it.
Finally I we would note that "elite need the common man" is an accusation leveled at both parties.
For example my mother who is really right wing that most politicians who are pro immigration aren't interested in the welfare of immigrants, but just want more people to vote for them.
This lack of sincerity the motives both sides perscribe to each.
- itsmenotyou 8y ago"Basically if there is an internet community that's not expressily rightwing, it's community will be leftwing, so leftwing people don't need a space for themselves" I'd argue the exact opposite. Most of the big internet forums, reddit, 4chan, gaming forums are all right leaning to greater or lesser degrees, and most of the smaller forums I've come across in many many years of wasted time on the internet follow this pattern. The lack of a left wing forum is perhaps more due to the demographics of internet forums in general and the fact that forums as a medium are inherently a little abrasive and open to trolling.
- Density 8y agoThe largest internet forum Reddit is ridiculously left leaning and the mods actively suppress conservative opinions. (1) HN is left leaning, but I haven't seen any moderator action against right wing opinions. 2nd amendment rights posts used to eat a dozen downvotes each though. (1) http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2016/12/02/social-media-site-reddit-censors-trump-supporters.html http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2016/12/02/social-media-site-red...
- sokoloff 8y ago> I'm pro stuff like basic income, but also against minimum wage It seems obvious to me that UBI is a replacement for minimum wage laws. Context: I'm anti-minimum wage laws, full stop, with or without UBI. I'm also pro-UBI [at around $500-800/mo/adult].
- Cthulhu_ 8y agoIt doesn't to me tbf; UBI and no minimum wage means that employers are allowed to hire people for no wage. Then again, there's already loads of ways to get around minimum wage laws, see the gig industry, hospitality (e.g. anyone that depends on tips) industry, and prison labor (modern slavery).
- sokoloff 8y ago> no minimum wage means that employers are allowed to hire people for no wage With a backstop of "now you won't starve if you turn it down", that is much less problematic. Today, if someone's skills only create $6 of value per hour, they are economically unemployable. With UBI and no minimum wage, someone could pay them $5/hr and both would be better off than today.
- croon 8y ago> Our culture as produced in books/film/tv/music is dominated by left leaning beliefs. This could either be a conspiracy comprising of every author of every medium... OR It's because stories need sympathetic characters, and current Republican values aren't sympathetic. I'm not trying to be divisive or flippant, though I'm sure this will be the effect. But success in media is driven by believable sympathetic characters (alternatively explosions), the only two that currently come to mind was John Goodmans character in Alpha House, and Ron Swanson (clearly libertarian) in Parks & Recreation, both of whom are very sympathetic characters, that put people before politics, and neither of whom would accept the last couple of years of their party's behavior. TL;DR: It's either caused by a vast conspiracy, or the effect of what works in story telling, whichever you think is more reasonable.
- sheepmullet 8y ago> It's because stories need sympathetic characters, and current Republican values aren't sympathetic. What makes you think that?
- ForRealsies 8y agoHis cognitive dissonance dehumanizing the 'opposition'.
- croon 8y agoThings like this: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/11/26/senate-gop-tax-bill-hurts-the-poor-more-than-originally-thought-cbo-finds/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/11/26/senat... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbo-score-on-latest-senate-gop-health-care-bill/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbo-score-on-latest-senate-gop-... https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/28/senate-gop-health-care-bill-has-dismal-approval-rating-poll.html https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/28/senate-gop-health-care-bill-... https://www.forbes.com/sites/judystone/2017/09/18/graham-cassidy-bill-the-last-ditch-gop-effort-to-deprive-millions-of-healthcare/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/judystone/2017/09/18/graham-cas... https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2018/04/18/new-gop-tactics-wage-war-on-obama-era-protections/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2018/04/18... https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/11/30/gop-crafts-spending-bill-provisions-aimed-at-speeding-repeal-of-water-protection-rule/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/20... And this one is a two-fold: https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/21/supreme-court-upholds-employers-right-to-require-arbitration-to-settle-workplace-disputes-600923 https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/21/supreme-court-upho... Both that the Garland-seat was stolen, but also sad that the supreme court is so partisan (cuts both ways).
- jgh 8y agoI wouldn't really consider HN particularly left wing. It's fully capitalist and any thread that discusses social issues is full of libertarians. Anything that has a faint whiff of anti-capitalism is promptly removed from the front page. Sure there are _some_ wide-spread beliefs here that happen to align with the left, but I would suggest that HN is far more libertarian than it is left-wing.
- swebs 8y agoThe opposite of libertarian is authoritarian, not left. The general trend here seems to be more free speech, less government surveillance, more socialized medicine and Universal Basic Income (and by extension, more taxes). If you had to reduce that to a single label, it would be left-libertarian.
- oicie0uD 8y agoIt is a common observation that SV leanings vary when you look at social issues vs. looking at business concerns.