Mediaboss Marketing

A series of three studies has found that political liberals tend to see emotions as more functional than more conservative people. This comes in spite of the fact that more liberal participants reported less emotional well-being. The research was published in Motivation and Emotion.

Over the past few decades, society in the United States has become more polarized. Liberals and conservatives have come to report more animosity towards the other group than warmth for their own group. Both studies and casual observations indicate that at least some of this polarization might come from the way they see and evaluate the importance of emotions.

The commonly endorsed stereotypes about the two political orientations also revolve around their attitude towards the importance of emotions. According to these stereotypes, liberals are seen as bleeding-hearts, emphasizing the importance of emotions, while conservatives are seen as cold, emphasizing a lower value assigned to emotions.

Conservative memes expressing scorn for liberal emotions such as Facts dont care about your feelings and America runs on liberal tears also emphasize this difference. The authors of the new research see this contrast between the two political orientations as differences in their beliefs about how functional emotions are.

We define functional as beneficial for individuals for adapting to the environment or attaining their goals, they explained. Traditionally, emotion was often portrayed as a dysfunctional reaction that derailed rational thinking and signaled weakness and vulnerability. Unemotional stoicism was idealized as a sign of rationality and maturity. Recent academic approaches, while acknowledging that emotions are not always helpful, portray emotion as an essential suite of processes that evolved to guide peoples thoughts and plans in a manner that helps them achieve their goals.

With this, the researchers set up a series of three studies to examine whether people across the partisan spectrum hold differing beliefs about the functionality of emotion.

In the first study, they analyzed data from an online survey of 189 undergraduate student from a university in California (89% female). Researchers analyzed assessments of beliefs about the functionality of emotions, openness to experience, well-being (assessed as life satisfaction, depression and anxiety), the intensity of emotional experience, emotion regulation, political partisanship, and religiosity (or the importance of religion in the respondents life).

Results showed that the more liberal the participants were, the more they viewed emotions as functional. More liberal participants also reported less well-being and reported that they experience emotions more intensely than more conservative participants.

The second study analyzed data from an online survey of 629 Californian and Texan undergraduates (351 from California, 77% female). The researchers analyzed data on the grade the student expected to receive an the upcoming exam, students appraisal of the importance of the exam, beliefs about the functionality of emotions, and well-being. These data were collected before the exam. After the exam, students completed another survey from which researchers analyzed data on the received grade at the exam and students emotional response to it along with political partisanship and religiosity.

Results replicated findings of the first study about the link between liberal orientation and viewing emotions as functional. Analyses revealed that people more open to experience and female participants saw emotions as more functional. Participants who received the expected grade and had viewed emotions as functional were happier about the outcome than those who viewed emotions as less functional. This association was not found in students whose grade was lower than expected.

The third study was an online survey of 537 Californian and Texan university students who completed questionnaires before and after the 2020 U.S. presidential election (439 from California, 77% female, 66% voted, 10% not eligible to vote). The questionnaire completed before the elections asked about political partisanship, beliefs about the functionality of emotions, well-being, and assessed the extent to which participants endorsed individualizing versus social binding values.

Afterward, students completed assessments of the importance of the outcome of the 2020 presidential elections, whether they saw it as positive or negative, and their emotional response to the election. They were also asked to report on how they voted. Results showed that liberals viewed emotions as more functional than conservatives and replicated the main findings of the previous two studies.

The researchers then used the data to estimate progressivism.

We defined progressivism as the extent to which each participant prioritized the individuating moral foundations of Care and Fairness more than the socially binding moral foundations of Loyalty, Authority, and Sanctity when judging actions to be right or wrong, they explained. Further analyses showed that the link between liberalism and viewing emotions as functional was largely explained by liberal participants greater endorsement of individualizing than social binding values.

Our findings suggest though that liberals view emotion as a feature of rationality while conservatives view it as a bug. Across three studies, liberals viewed emotion as more functional than conservatives that is, as a healthy source of information about the self that provides direction in life rather than as a weakness and a waste of time, the study authors concluded.

The study makes a valuable contribution to understanding the nature of differences between people of opposing political orientations. However, it has limitations that need to be taken into account. Namely, all the participants were undergraduate students, they were overwhelmingly female and of liberal political orientation. Studies on the general population and more conservative groups might not yield equal results.

The study, Do liberals value emotion more than conservatives? Political partisanship and Lay beliefs about the functionality of emotion, was authored by Minyoung Choi, Melissa M. Karnaze, Heather C. Lench, and Linda J. Levine.

Originally posted here:
Liberals view emotions as a feature of rationality, while conservatives ...

The political spectrum contains more philosophies and viewpoints than simply left and right.

Within each side are various political leanings and beliefs.

On the left side, you have everything from left-moderate to liberal to leftist.

All of these terms may seem confusing to someone who considers themselves either left or right.

You may be leftist without even realizing it.

You could be liberal and not a leftist.

Heres what you need to know about liberal vs. leftist and what the differences are between them.

While both liberals and leftists are on the left side of the political spectrum, there is a key difference between them.

The key difference is that liberals believe in more conservative practices when it comes to the economy.

Leftists believe the government needs to play more of a role in the economy.

For example, liberals believe that there should be more tax breaks for the wealthy and less government oversight overall.

Leftists believe that the wealthy should pay higher taxes to fund other social programs designed to help those not benefiting from capitalism.

To understand the difference between liberalism and leftism more easily, its a good idea to understand the history of each of these ideologies.

Liberalism can trace its roots back several centuries, but in terms of modern-day politics, the key point of time to examine is 19th-century England.

In England, there were two major political parties.

The Tories primarily expressed the interests of the Crown and those in the countryside.

The Whigs expressed the interests of the merchants and aristocracy.

In the mid-1800s, concepts like left and right didnt exist.

Neither of those parties would exactly fall into either of those categories today.

When the 1840s rolled around, however, the Tories and Whigs no longer did an accurate job of representing the people.

Thats because Britain was industrializing.

It needed new thinkers to contend with the new problems that society was facing.

These new thinkers proposed ideas that gave them the label new liberals.

Liberals wanted to know if capitalism worked for workers as well as those who owned factories.

They believed in the idea of the Invisible Hand introduced by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations.

This Invisible Hand would steer the market in the workers favor.

The idea was that a factory would open and hire new workers.

The worker would then be able to buy more goods with their wages.

To accommodate those needs, a new factory starts production, and more workers start working.

The cycle continues harmoniously.

The belief that was if they got this idea working fast enough through low taxes and free trade rules, the system would increase the value of the worker while keeping the price of goods low.

The problem is that the society that existed in the 1800s isnt the same as a modern society.

In the 1800s, taxes were only raised when wars started.

Because of that, wars were generally avoided whenever possible.

Thats a stark difference from today in which ongoing wars create extraordinary wealth for certain members of society.

The Whigs fell out of power and this new party, called the Liberal Party, took center stage.

The role of the Liberal Party was to keep the cycle of the economy going with very little involvement.

This practice continued for over 70 years until World War 1.

That all changed in the early 20th century when a new party emerged.

Called the Labour Party, this political group called into question whether the liberals were doing enough for society.

Thus began the concept of leftism.

Leftism began with roots in the Labour Party in England.

They saw the poverty that had grown worse over the years due to the liberal system of capitalism.

They believed that Adam Smiths Invisible Hand tended to profit industrialists more than the workers.

This wasnt what the country had in mind when it adopted the concept.

It ended up leaving the poor behind and struggling to survive while the state did nothing to help them.

The Labour Party would go on to replace the Liberal Party.

They introduced policies that many consider leftist today.

Some of those policies include disability insurance, the National Health Service, and old-age pensions.

They also expanded income taxes.

These ideas made their way across the ocean to the United States.

Amid the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was looking for ideas to help save the country from poverty.

Part of the reason he won his office was a leftist idea called The New Deal.

His main opponent at the time was Republican Herbert Hoover.

FDR championed liberal ideas about the market and the governments role in society.

The New Deal promised a stimulus package for everyone in the country.

It was the first time that the countrys residents would receive direct financial aid from the government they paid their taxes to.

Roosevelt would also go on to create several other social welfare programs designed to help and protect the working class.

These programs would continue to be a part of the political sphere into the second World War.

Even 40 years later, Presidents would take certain parts of leftism and use them as part of their political platform.

President Dwight Eisenhower, for example, expanded Social Security and helped low-income families with financial support.

Although he ultimately failed to get it through Congress, President Richard Nixon also tried to expand federal support for child welfare.

It was during the 1970s when leftism fell out of popularity.

Certain economists in the 1970s called for a return to a liberal market.

This was also trumpeted by then-presidential candidate Ronald Reagan.

He wanted to remove all the restrictions that the government had placed on the market.

In so doing, he believed the market would be able to release its magic and benefit everyone.

He strongly believed in Adam Smiths idea of the Invisible Hand steering the market and society as a result.

He wasnt the only political figure wanting to return to a liberal economy either.

Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was also voicing her opinions on the matter.

Between the two of them, they fought against the formations of unions, and unions in general, and also reduced taxes for the wealthy.

They also cut the budgeting of several social programs if not eliminating them entirely.

Utilities and various industries that were once run by the government were also privatized and run by corporations instead.

Thus began an age called neoliberalism.

Although these tactics started with the Republican side of the spectrum, they were also used by the left side of the political spectrum.

President Bill Clinton saw the popularity that neoliberalism had and promised to reduce further welfare programs.

He also finished the North American Free Trade Agreement that George H. W. Bush started in his presidency.

Clinton brought together a new form of democrats that he called the New Democrats.

Tony Blair, also left-leaning, wanted to continue Thatchers work in terms of freeing up the market.

He wanted to modernize the welfare system by reducing it and keeping government involvement out of the economy as much as possible.

All of these changes led to the current economic state as it is today.

That brings both concepts to the present time.

You can see elements of liberalism in certain political figures and leftism in other political figures.

Joe Biden, a Democrat, is also a liberal.

He supported NAFTA as a bill and also pushed for the Affordable Care Act.

The ACA is market-based rather than true universal healthcare.

Excerpt from:
Liberal Vs. Leftist (Whats The Difference?) - The Cold Wire

Meet Marit Stiles.

Marit who?

The incoming leader of Ontarios Official Opposition is a veteran of politics. Yet she remains a political unknown.

The NDP is hailing its new chief as a premier in waiting. Yet how long that wait will be remains utterly unknowable in politics.

The only certainty, after a formal coronation Saturday, is that Stiles is the New Democratic Partys unchallenged leader literally. For there were no challengers in this most anticlimactic race in the Ontario partys history.

Four months ago, Stiles declared her candidacy in front of a handful of supporters in the back patio of an empty Bloor Street restaurant. As the front-runner in a race with no one else running, she never looked back.

The NDPs one-person non-event provoked much mirth in the rival Liberal party, where veterans contrasted it with their own leadership race (which boasted several worthies as of last month). Proof, these Liberals asserted snootily, that the NDPs top prize wasnt even worth a fight.

As we now know, their mockery has been turned on its face and the Liberals are looking red-faced.

Last week, a group of long-time Liberals issued a peculiar online appeal for the leader of another party Mike Schreiner of the Greens to rescue theirs. It amounted to a public repudiation of the veterans already actively campaigning for the Liberal leadership and has been denounced as a Hail Mary, fumble, turnover and own goal in one.

Today, Stiles is having the last laugh. At the moment of her ascension, the Liberals have descended into self-immolation.

The first to stand for the NDP leadership, she is the last woman standing while the Liberals are left squirming. Her anointment is no accident, so lets give credit where credit is due.

Stiles sewed up the race before it could even open up lining up organizers and fundraisers, building up support in caucus and among the grassroots. She achieved a formidable lead so fast that her aspiring rivals never made it to the starting line.

Stiless triumph is a testament to her competitive edge, but also a winning personality.

Whether those elements will ever add up to a winning party with a persuasive platform that connects with the public is as unknowable as her vision which still remains hard to see clearly. One of the casualties of having no competition is that there wasnt a single leadership debate to test her ideas, or put forward fresh thoughts. No serious policy proposals, no deep think or rethink.

Few doubt Stiles will energize a party that lost its mojo after 13 years under Andrea Horwath. But personality and imagery will only get you so far, while policy alone wont get you where you need to go.

Politicians need verve but also vision and a visceral connection to voters who can smell inauthenticity no matter how many times you lapse into scripted message tracks and references to ordinary folks. Perhaps Stiles is biding her time, for she has yet to offer the big reveal.

Three years out from the next election, Stiles has room to grow as a leader beyond her polished poise as a longtime party apparatchik, TV talking head, union activist, school trustee and MPP. Like other progressive movements that thrive on social media but sometimes miss the mark with mass media, the NDP of Stiles has to strike a better balance to grow its audience and voter pool.

Its not just about diversity, but the adversity faced by all working Ontarians or those without work who once looked to the NDP for answers, not just questions and criticisms. New Democrats cannot define themselves solely as the party of the woke class without losing the working class and the union movement that co-founded the party decades ago.

Otherwise, the NDP will continue to lose in its former strongholds in working class Windsor and Timmins, and its toeholds in multicultural Brampton and Toronto, where Doug Fords Tories are on the march with a message about affordability. Will the NDP fight Ford head on after losing to him in the last two elections, or will it continue to obsess about first taking on the rival Liberals?

In 2018, the NDP lost its best chance to win power against a supposedly unelectable Ford and seemingly unlikeable Liberals. Horwath heralded the consolation prize of Official Opposition status as a moral victory, rather than a voter morass.

And in 2022, Horwaths NDP was the only major party whose share of the popular vote went down by a devastating 10 percentage points to 23.7 per cent. The Liberals under an unpopular Steven Del Duca still grew their share more than four points to 23.9 per cent nosing out the NDP to finish second in the popular vote.

The good news for Stiles is that she won the NDP leadership unchallenged. The bad news is that the lack of a challenger has deprived the NDP of the dramatic relaunch it was hoping for.

Stiles has inherited a party that peaked in popularity two elections ago. Even with a new leader, more of the same wont get the NDP where it wants to go.

In other political news: Ill be hosting Two Women in Power Still Fighting for Fairness at the Democracy Forum at Toronto Metropolitan University on Feb. 9 with the federal and provincial ministers responsible for the status of women, Marci Ien and Charmaine Williams (registration is free).

JOIN THE CONVERSATION

Anyone can read Conversations, but to contribute, you should be a registered Torstar account holder. If you do not yet have a Torstar account, you can create one now (it is free)

Sign In

Register

Read the original here:
Liberals laughed at Ontarios new NDP leader. Whos laughing now?

The trans-teen social contagion, and its conflict with parents rights, is now so well-established even the prestige progressive press has been forced to notice. The New York Times caused a stir last week by asking families, educators and teens: Should parents be informed when a teen identifies as transgender and doesnt want mom and dad to know?

Yes. Obviously. Whats striking about the article is just how many once-progressive parents struggle with this question but are also starting to wonder if things have gone too far.Liberals who cheered for gay rights and tell their kids Be your true self suddenly have a teen who insists being his or her true self means irreversible surgeries and infertility.And they want this at an age when its not even legal to get a tattoo.

Like Saturn, the revolution devours its children. These words were written in 1793, by a Frenchman appalled at the madness the French Revolution unleashed. He was right: Revolutions have a momentum of their own. And Americas sexual revolution follows the same pattern. What began with war on the rules governing sex has become war on every natural bond and limit even those of our biology.

And this revolution is devouring American children.

Parents who cheered on earlier stages of the revolution now stand helplessly by as state-empowered ideologues do an end run around their loving authority and butcher their troubled teens under their noses. Meanwhile, a chilling recent case in Virginia shows the path this carves for even darker forms of freedom waiting in the wings for those children liberated from their parents oversight.

Is it time to put the brakes on? Too late, sorry! Having liberated sex from babies and liberated marriage from procreation, the revolution isnt stopping now. Far from it: Activists want to liberate identity from biology and kids from their parents. And they have friends in the White House: President Bidens Assistant Health Secretary Rachel (formerly Richard) Levine, who is transgender, is hell-bent on protecting trans kids, which is to say undermining parents authority to stop their own children from making irreversible surgical decisions based on gender identity.

Levine is only the tip of the iceberg. A growing body of state law favors kids freedom over parents authority. In Washington, for example, laws governing doctor/patient confidentiality and school-based health centers combine to mean a Washington-based 13-year-old girl can get testosterone injections at school, without any need for her parents to consent or even know its happening. In Oregon, too, minors can access transgender interventions at taxpayers expense and without their parents consent.

The revolutionaries will tell you this simply reflects progress in our understanding of childrens rights. But take note: Nave youngsters struggling for independence are a target for predators. And the most vulnerable youths are those who lack attentive, authoritative loving parental oversight.

This has no doubt always been true. But the gender-activist push to undermine parental authority is pouring fuel on the fire. Take the chilling recent story of Sage, a 14-year-old from Virginia who was trafficked for horrific abuse not once but twice after the teens school hid her gender identity from her parents. Sages liberation from loving parental authority, driven by an activist lawyer who bullied her to lie to judges, turned out to be into the sadistic hands of rapists and sex traffickers.

And make no mistake: There will be many more Sages.

Recent laws enacted by Californias LGBTQ+ fanatic state Sen. Scott Wiener have turned the Golden State into a legislative sinkhole, where parental authority evaporates the moment you say gender even if you live out of state.

Once in California, a young person need only get themselves declared abandoned in a family court and have the state assume custody, and hey, presto: no more No from Mom and Dad. And as investigative writer Abigail Shrier shows, this will create a predators paradise.

Sign up for Devine Online, the newsletter from Miranda Devine

Its not the case that every activist working to emancipate teens from parental authority in the name of gender is a closet sex trafficker or child molester. But theyre still carrying water for them.

Disillusioned ex-liberals: Its time to pick a side. If we accept that a 13-year-old can consent to a double mastectomy or hormones that will sterilize her for life, what else can she consent to? You may still have some fondness for the movement flying under the banner of LGBTQ+ rights. But look at where its going. Its waging war on parents loving authority over their kids, replacing the natural bonds of family with a wasteland of for-profit body mutilation and creating a perverts playground.

Whether its No to their kids or No to government meddling, its time to defend the right of Mom and Dad to say No. No more liberation. The revolution stops here.

Mary Harrington is a contributing editor at UnHerd and author of the forthcoming Feminism Against Progress.

Visit link:
Even liberals balk at where gender wars are headed

Sabrina Maddeaux: Billions in COVID supports may have been abused, and the Liberals don't seem to care  National Post

Read more:
Sabrina Maddeaux: Billions in COVID supports may have been abused, and the Liberals don't seem to care - National Post