marxistprincess:

noandpickles:

marxistprincess:

The amount of bait-and-switch going on here is staggering. First, the study being referenced has absolutely nothing to do with Joe Biden. Second, it has absolutely nothing to do with moderate Democrats. Third, it has absolutely nothing to do with policy positions.

The study breaks college students down into six categories by self-identification: conservative men, conservative women, moderate men, moderate women, liberal men, and liberal women. Each student was asked to rate their level of agreement with statements like “I am actively working to foster justice in the world” and “My worldview inspires me to serve with others on issues of common concern.” Moderate and conservative men tended to rank the lowest in terms of statements like those.

So, first off. Students were asked to identify themselves as conservative, moderate, or liberal. With so little granularity in the options, it seems likely that most self-described moderate Democrats would fall into the liberal category, while the moderate category would capture mostly people who self-describe as moderate, full stop. That’s speculation, but so is any conclusion to the contrary. They just didn’t ask the right questions to capture any information about the group they now want to draw conclusions about.

Now, about the substance of those statements. None of the statements listed in the article even have implications of a particular political position. Statements like “I frequently think about the global problems of our time and how I will contribute to resolving them” aren’t measuring ideology, they’re measuring activism. A highly motivated fascist would rate highly on pretty much all of these.

This study has nothing to do with Joe Biden, didn’t study moderate Democrats, and didn’t ask about policy positions, and now it’s being used to say that Joe Biden is a Republican because moderate Democrats share policy positions with conservatives. That isn’t even a stretch, it’s just a lie.

(Note: I couldn’t find the full study because the link in the article leads to an unrelated study about religious diversity, probably because the article is from 2020 and the research group’s landing page is now presenting more recent research, so I’m limited to the findings presented in the Independent: “People worry that ‘moderate’ Democrats like Joe Biden are the same as Republicans. Our study suggests they may be right”)