In Survey, College Students Identify Progressive Policies as "Middle"

[pbrower2a]

Given that college undergraduates are still typically between ages 18 and 22, that means that current ones were born between 1990 and 1994... and that is a very liberal-leaning age group.  (Older college students tend to be either grad students or part-timers). These young adults have no memory of the Cold War even at its end. For them, "socialism" is not some sinister plot hatched in Moscow or Beijing.

College students can think outside the box -- much unlike non-college youth of like age who work for example in a box store. Someone struggling for survival might believe what an employer tells him and is more likely to watch far more TV than a full-time college student. (A college student who watches much TV is likely a dropout). College students are unlikely to get their information (or should I say, propaganda?) from a certain alleged news channel whose first letter is F.

[pbrower2a]

A college study about college students.... nothing more needs to be said.

Do you really doubt the results regardless?

I doubt that it's of any value.  "Kids" (yes, I'm using that term because I'm old) are still exploring their ideals and opinions on the issues.  Many fall into group-think while others are still tied to those taught to them by their parents.  Give me a survey based upon 30-somethings and I'd be more inclined to give it a little more weight.

For real groupthink try employment in box stores and chain restaurants, or in  certain religious bodies.

[pbrower2a]

What's the difference between being 62 and being 22? If you are now 62, then you are unlikely to be around in 2060, and how unlivable the world will be then or how nasty the political order or economics will be in 2060 will not  matter. You will almost certainly be dead because you are unlikely to reach age 98. If global warming has taken over, then people may have been waging some horrible wars over a smaller land area that might not be as productive of food because it is more desert-like in much of it and there might be some tropical diseases reaching such places as Paris, Beijing, and Chicago.  If you were born in 1991 you will be middle-aged.  You have good cause to want the world to be livable when you are in your late 50s. If those who truly rule us bungle things or manage the economy for quick gain they might neglectfully so mess up the world that you will endure the Malthusian 'checks' of war, plague, and famine -- all nasty ways to go. Wars, plagues, and famines also bring out the worst in people

If you are 22 you can see the world from a long view  in your own interest. Someone forty years older might do so, but only out of charity.  If you are 62 and all you see is how your investments perform, then you might find quick-buck profiteering as a way to make your last years more economically comfortable.

[pbrower2a]

What's the difference between being 62 and being 22? If you are now 62, then you are unlikely to be around in 2060, and how unlivable the world will be then or how nasty the political order or economics will be in 2060 will not  matter. You will almost certainly be dead because you are unlikely to reach age 98. If global warming has taken over, then people may have been waging some horrible wars over a smaller land area that might not be as productive of food because it is more desert-like in much of it and there might be some tropical diseases reaching such places as Paris, Beijing, and Chicago.  If you were born in 1991 you will be middle-aged.  You have good cause to want the world to be livable when you are in your late 50s. If those who truly rule us bungle things or manage the economy for quick gain they might neglectfully so mess up the world that you will endure the Malthusian 'checks' of war, plague, and famine -- all nasty ways to go. Wars, plagues, and famines also bring out the worst in people

If you are 22 you can see the world from a long view  in your own interest. Someone forty years older might do so, but only out of charity.  If you are 62 and all you see is how your investments perform, then you might find quick-buck profiteering as a way to make your last years more economically comfortable.

So what's your solution to the inherent immorality of old people? Take away their right to vote?

My main problem with this survey is that I fit pretty comfortably into their category 'progressive', even though I think everyone on this forum could agree that, by world standards definitely but even also by American standards, I'm a pretty right-wing fellow.

Well, I am very left wing myself and I am in my late 50s. 

Youth too can be very immoral too. Violent crime is largely a pathology of troubled youth and young adults.

College students typically have no loyalty to commercial entities. Once a college grad gets a job as a manager trainee even for an awful employer (as in retailing), that adult quickly learns the company line and can no longer have the intellectual independence of a college student. Working 50-60 hours a week in a corporate setting obviously limits one's connections to people who might have other views. Expressing political values contrary to those of the top management is inconsistent with going up the corporate ladder. If the Company Way is to regurgitate what is said on FoX News Channel, then one had better not cite Rachel Maddow.

College graduates who enter the public sector or non-management positions can have more independence of thought. So it is with public employees, journalists, creative people, waiters, bartenders, clergy, medical professionals, and maybe people in the family business (especially if the owners are liberals). It might not be that professionalism keeps one independent.  If one is a geologist or accountant for an oil company it is wise to parrot the company line on global warming. 

Many people must sell out to the most rapacious and despotic figures in our economy to survive, let alone thrive, in Corporate America.  When they do they can no longer be overt liberals. If the company says that someone like George W. Bush is wonderful, it is best to say likewise even if objective reality indicates something much to the contrary.   

[pbrower2a]

Actually, 58% reported that they had a job. Still, I don't really understand the point you were trying to make here, since most of the ideological questions aren't related to economic matters.

Working a job, whether it's good or not, shapes your worldview differently than enduring college exams and lectures. That's all I was after.

If anything, holding a cr@ppy job and going to college might make one less sympathetic to profits-first bureaucracies than doing exclusively one or the other. Someone who checks merchandise at a box store and has no college education may encounter no contradiction to the idea that working people can expect to be treated badly. Someone who has college education but little working experience may see the world through rose-colored glasses. Someone who attends college while holding onto a cr@ppy job might find out who Karl Marx is and find him relevant.