Right on the Couch Are conservatives nuts?

NRO ^ | March 22, 2006 | Jonah Goldberg

[neverdem]

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March 22, 2006,

7:35 a.m.

Right on the Couch

Are conservatives nuts?

Remember the cocky, arrogant kid in nursery school, the one who always thought that he had all the answers and that he could do whatever he wanted, and was always ignoring what the teacher had to say? Chances are this bully grew up to be a conservative.

Right now, I have no doubt that some liberal readers are nodding their heads and saying, "Yes! That makes total sense. Conservatives are such bullies!"

Well, according to the latest "scientific" study this is nonsense. In fact, it's the other way around.

Here's the lead from a story in the Toronto Star about a new study in The Journal of Research Into Personality: "Remember the whiny, insecure kid in nursery school, the one who always thought everyone was out to get him, and was always running to the teacher with complaints? Chances are he grew up to be a conservative."

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley — of course — found that of the roughly 100 kids they tracked for 20 years, starting in nursery school, the whiny kids were more likely to become conservatives.

UC Berkeley professor Jack Block's theory, according to the Star, is that insecure kids look for "reassurance provided by tradition and authority, and find it in conservative politics. The more confident kids are eager to explore alternatives to the way things are, and find liberal politics more congenial."

Ah yes, in Berkeley, Calif., nothing is more rebellious to the status quo than being a liberal. Why, they must be pariahs at the local organic food co-op. I mean, it's just plain heroic to embrace liberal politics in a town where residents cast 90 percent of their votes for John Kerry and only 6.6 percent of their votes for Bush.

But don't nominate these mavericks for a Profiles in Courage award just yet. If you read down to the 15th paragraph in the story, you'll discover that there was "a .27 correlation between being self-reliant in nursery school and being a liberal as an adult." In other words, self-reliance explains seven percent of the variance between kids who bravely became liberal and tykes who supinely embraced conservative politics.

One obvious problem with this sort of analysis is that the single best predictor of partisan affiliation is the political orientation of your parents. In Berkeley, the most liberal majority-white city in America, most kids are going to be liberal because their parents are liberal. If one or two of the whinier kids turn out to be conservative, it might have more to do with the fact that their parents are whiny conservatives. Heck, if I lived in Berkeley, I might be whiny too.

To call these sorts of studies entirely useless is probably unfair. No doubt Block has more or less accurately charted the path of his subjects. And even he concedes that the study tells us little about the rest of the country. But it's also pretty clear that Block wants to find psychologically satisfying explanations for what makes people conservatives. It's not hard to imagine that if the whiny, sniveling brats turned out to be liberals, he would explain this as proof that liberals are born more emotionally sensitive and with a greater acuity for spotting injustice.

One reason this isn't hard to imagine is that this is a very, very old game. Ever since Theodor Adorno came out with his scandalously flawed Authoritarian Personality in 1950, liberal and leftist social scientists have been trying to diagnose conservatism as a psychological defect or sickness. Adorno and his colleagues argued that conservatism was little more than a "pre-fascist" "personality type." According to this school, sympathy for communism was an indication of openness and healthy idealism. Opposition to communism was a symptom of your more deep-seated pathologies and fascist tendencies. According to Adorno, subjects who saw Nazism and Stalinism as similar phenomena were demonstrating their "idiocy" and "irrationality." Psychological counseling, many argued, could cure these maladies. But for some it was too late. In 1964, an ad in the New York Times reported that 1,189 psychiatrists determined that Barry Goldwater was not "psychologically fit" to be president.

In 2003, another Berkeley study, led by John T. Jost, reviewed four decades of research of conservatism and found that conservatives tended to be fear-driven dogmatists, terrified by ambiguity. The study linked Ronald Reagan, Rush Limbaugh, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. The findings were hardly surprising since they basically recapped the branch of "scholarship" launched by Adorno.

Yet another Berkeley professor, George Lakoff, has convinced leading Democrats that psychology is the best way to tackle politics. People see things through "frames," according to Lakoff, and if Democrats could simply recast those frames in their favor, conservatives would see the light. Howard Dean calls Lakoff "one of the most influential political thinkers of the progressive movement."

Perhaps the more revealing psychological insight can be found in the fact that so many liberals think disagreeing with them is a form of psychosis.

(c) 2006 Tribune Media Services

	http://www.nationalreview.com/goldberg/goldberg200603220735.asp

[.cnI redruM]

Could also be entitled "How To Tell Your Researcher Is A Liberal."

>>RE: THAT CONSERVATIVE WHINER STUDY [Jonah Goldberg]

As I mentioned in my column, the correlation which supposedly proved that whiny kids grow up to be conservatives was .27. Any number of Derb-like statistics types have inundated me with email that I wasn't hard enough on this point. This reader speaks for many:

Thanks for the article Jonah. At the George Mason (go Patriots!) School of Public Policy we're taught that if you don't have a .6 correlation you don't have publishable research. A .27 correlation with a sample size of 100 is random noise but I guess if you are a Berkeley liberal that's all you need.
<<<

In cost estimation, you want your r^2 Adjusted to get over 0.90, or else neither the US Army or the OSD CAIG will except your CER as valid for estimation. 0.27 LMAO!!!!!!!

[iluvlucy]

"In 1964, an ad in the New York Times reported that 1,189 psychiatrists determined that Barry Goldwater was not "psychologically fit" to be president.
In 2003, another Berkeley study, led by John T. Jost, reviewed four decades of research of conservatism and found that conservatives tended to be fear-driven dogmatists, terrified by ambiguity. The study linked Ronald Reagan, Rush Limbaugh, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. The findings were hardly surprising since they basically recapped the branch of "scholarship" launched by Adorno."

I remember some of this. I have a question that still remains unanswered. If these "psychiatrists" (of course they are all men of science and objective thought) can diagnosis a total stranger based on a few sound bites from TV or the radio, please answer me why they insist on doing evaluations in their offices? It seems via the phone at half the cost would be just peachy.

[Carry_Okie]

Psychiatry puts morality into the hands of a state licensed agent backed by police power, with no financial interest in a cure.

Hence its central role in imposing cultural Marxism.

[robowombat]

Apparently this dweeb:

John T. Jost
Department of Psychology
6 Washington Place, 5th Floor
New York University
New York, New York 10003
U.S.A.

Home Page
Phone: (212) 998-7665
Fax: (212) 995-4018







Although he is not yet 40 years old, John Jost has published over 50 journal articles and book chapters and has received numerous awards and honors. His active research interests include stereotyping, prejudice, and intergroup relations; social justice; political psychology; and the theory of system justification. Awards he has received to date include the Gordon Allport Intergroup Relations Award, a Fellowship at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, the SPSP Theoretical Innovation Prize, the International Society for Self & Identity Early Career Award, and the Erik Erikson Early Career Research Achievement Award in Political Psychology. Jost is Editor-in-Chief of Social Justice Research and is on the Governing Council of the International Society of Political Psychology (ISPP) and the Executive Committee of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology (SESP).




Books:

Jost, J. T., Banaji, M. R., & Prentice, D. (Eds.). (2004). Perspectivism in social psychology: The yin and yang of scientific progress. [Festschrift in honor of William J. McGuire.] Washington, DC: APA Press.
Jost, J. T., & Major, B. (Eds.). (2001). The psychology of legitimacy: Emerging perspectives on ideology, justice, and intergroup relations. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Jost, J.T., & Sidanius, J. (Eds.) (2004). Political psychology: Key readings. New York: Psychology Press/Taylor & Francis.
Journal Articles:

Jost, J. T., & Banaji, M. R. (1994). The role of stereotyping in system-justification and the production of false consciousness. British Journal of Social Psychology, 33, 1-27.
Jost, J.T., Banaji, M.R., & Nosek, B.A. (2004). A decade of system justification theory: Accumulated evidence of conscious and unconscious bolstering of the status quo. Political Psychology, 25, 881-919.
Jost, J. T., & Burgess, D. (2000). Attitudinal ambivalence and the conflict between group and system justification motives in low status groups. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 26, 293-305.
Jost, J. T., Glaser, J., Kruglanski, A. W., & Sulloway, F. (2003). Political conservatism as motivated social cognition. Psychological Bulletin, 129, 339-375.
Jost, J. T., & Hunyady, O. (2002). The psychology of system justification and the palliative function of ideology. European Review of Social Psychology, 13, 111-153. [Awarded the SPSP Theoretical Innovation Prize]
Jost, J.T., & Kay, A.C. (2005). Exposure to benevolent sexism and complementary gender stereotypes: Consequences for specific and diffuse forms of system justification. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 498-509.
Jost, J. T., & Kruglanski, A. W. (2002). The estrangement of social constructionism and experimental social psychology: History of the rift and prospects for reconciliation. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 6, 168-187.
Jost, J. T., Pelham, B. W., & Carvallo, M. (2002). Non-conscious forms of system justification: Cognitive, affective, and behavioral preferences for higher status groups. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 586-602.
Jost, J. T., & Thompson, E. P. (2000). Group-based dominance and opposition to equality as independent predictors of self-esteem, ethnocentrism, and social policy attitudes among African Americans and European Americans. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.
Kay, A. C., & Jost, J. T. (2003). Complementary justice: Effects of “poor but happy” and “poor but honest” stereotype exemplars on system justification and implicit activation of the justice motive. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85, 823-837.
Kay, A.C., Jost, J.T., & Young, S. (2005). Victim derogation and victim enhancement as alternate routes to system justification. Psychological Science, 16, 240-246.
Kay, A., Jimenez, M. C., & Jost, J. T. (2002). Sour grapes, sweet lemons, and the anticipatory rationalization of the status quo. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 1300-1312.

[He Rides A White Horse]

Current Communist Goals

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.

Yet another Berkeley professor, George Lakoff, has convinced leading Democrats that psychology is the best way to tackle politics. People see things through "frames," according to Lakoff, and if Democrats could simply recast those frames in their favor, conservatives would see the light.

[tacticalogic]

Google RJWF + TMAP. Then try RWJF + "Clinton Health Care Task Force"

[neverdem]

Wanna see the real difference between dems and Republicans? see the conclusion: The Clintonistas parlaying with Iran in the Balkans

Former NY Times Reporter: '93 Pulitzer Should Be Revoked The MSM in the Balkans

Vive l’Inégalité ... Privileged French students demonstrate to preserve their entitlement. Theodore Dalrymple's take on it.

From Vietnam to Iraq, Army hero meets duty to country Medal of Honor recipient

It's nothing against Goldberg's column, but if I had to prioritize, I'd read these links first.

From time to time, I’ll ping on noteworthy articles about politics, foreign and military affairs. FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.

[FreeKeys]

I've never quite been able to figure out why liberals self-identify with qualities such as "bright", "non-conforming", and "hanging loose", then turn around and demand a system of government that represses creativity and initiative, stifles individuality, robs the productive to support the slothful, and demands a high degree of unthinking conformity.

Liberals seem to think they are libertarians, but until they learn that economic freedom is more important to the health of a free society than sexual license, they will remain Stalinists in drag. ;) 

-- Mr. Jeeves at http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1600965/posts?page=3#3

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[Hardastarboard]

Adorno and his colleagues argued that conservatism was little more than a "pre-fascist" "personality type." According to this school, sympathy for communism was an indication of openness and healthy idealism. Opposition to communism was a symptom of your more deep-seated pathologies and fascist tendencies. According to Adorno, subjects who saw Nazism and Stalinism as similar phenomena were demonstrating their "idiocy" and "irrationality."

Nazism and Communism are similar phenomena. National Socialism (Nazis) is more based on racial ideology, but is overwhelmingly socialist in nature, where Communism is more based on class struggle rather than race, but all of that ultimately comes down to bitter struggles between superiors and inferiors. The two ideologies just define who's who a little differently. In the end, they both require brutal coercion to achieve Utopia, and of course brutal coercion is anathema to Utopia.

These psychology types have no understanding of politics or economics whatsoever, and need to STAY the EFF out of those fields. The abbreviated name "Nazi" for National Socialist has allowed liberals to hide how similar these ideologies are.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Stalin gave us many early warnings about Communism/Socialism. One was his comment that it didn't matter who voted, only who counts the votes. You will see that throughout liberal studies - the data don't matter, only who analyzes them.

In this case it was those who were labeling the kids. As Jonah says, dissent to a liberal sounds like a whine. We also know that they are prone to changing their evaluations if the cumulative data don't agree with their predetermined outcomes.

[iluvlucy]

NY that figures.

I used to work at a psychiatric unit in the Navy. Most of the staff was in out and out competition with the inmates. The patients used to get mad at me because they would hear me laughing during the change of shift reports.

They would never believe me when I told them much of the laughter was at the expense of the staff.