Welcome to my blog: Political Ideology

Hi, my name is Max and I'm a senior in high school living in Seattle.

In my government class, we recently took a political ideologies survey at http://www.people-press.org/quiz/political-typology/. The survey said my ideas aligned with those of an opportunity democrat. As I didn't have much of an idea about this group i was interested to see how we were connected. In this blog, I would like to explore my commonalities to this ideology and what caused me to have these views.

The quiz describes Opportunity Democrats as:

• Democratic-leaning 
• Financially comfortable
• Liberally inclined
• Supportive of the environment, immigration, and homosexuality
• Strong belief that hard work is enough for most people to get ahead
• Less likely to see structural barriers facing blacks and women
• Supportive of U.S. engagement abroad and involvement in global markets

These descriptions seem accurate as I find I have a liberal attitude and support democratic candidates more than others and I strongly believe in the protection of our environment and natural resources. From what I know immigrants strengthen the economy over time so I support that view as well. I am also supportive of homosexuality and the ability to be what you are. Finally, I think diplomatic national relations with other countries and our involvement in the global market is key to our countries longevity and overall quality of life

The only statement I don't think applies as well as the others is my ability to see barriers in society holding back black people and women. I know that even though there have been laws passed to equalize pay gaps between gender and that discrimination based on race is illegal but even I as a white male can see that there are still social barriers and stigmas stopping black people and women from full life and liberty.

As I am only just learning about political ideology groupings something that would be important is to look at other groups than mine and find out what makes them similar or different to mine. One group that interested me was on the opposite side of the spectrum of mine. This group is core conservatism. On many issues, the majority of votes from core conservatives were opposites to those of opportunity democrats. 

There are many categories where our two groups differ but two of the most important ones, in my opinion, are social and economic issues. 
Socially, Core Conservatives are in majority on the opposite side of the views of social issues than opportunity democrats. Take their view of the religion of Islam and its relation to violence. Almost 80% of core conservatives believe that the Islamic religion is likely to promote violent action among its believers. Whether this is true or not it is very close to the opposite of the views that 75% of opportunity democrats hold who believe Islam does not promote violence. 

Another difference between our two groups is that most Core Conservatives believe that the economic system in this country is generally fair to most Americans whereas more than 60% of opportunity democrats believe quite the opposite in that they think that large corporations are unfairly favored because of the power behind their interests. This could stem from the relationship of many powerful corporations having conservative interests and being supported by conservatives.

Something else to address though is political socialization, where do our beliefs come from? This is the process of how people gain their political identity throughout their lives. There are hundreds of ways people can be influenced politically and these can be slimmed down into just a few umbrella categories. These are gender/ethnicity, family, peer groups, school, religion and news media. Personally, I think my beliefs have been most affected by family, peer groups, and schooling. I think this is in part due to the city I live in being one of the most liberal in the U.S. and my family/friends mostly being liberal democrats.