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What is KYM's political slant/bias in your opinion?

Last posted Apr 10, 2012 at 04:14PM EDT. Added Apr 05, 2012 at 01:49PM EDT
43 posts from 29 users

See title.

I'm creating this thread in the hopes of redirecting some of the crap (but very interesting crap that should be discussed) from the comments section of Liberal Douche Garofalo.

I personally consider myself a liberal, but I think the accusation leveled at us ("us" as a community in general) by conservatives users that we have a liberal bias that sometimes skews the way we write about memes of a political nature is true. It's my hope that in the final judgment of whether or not any politically-charged meme is valid, we are able to see beyond our personal politics, however.

Can we try and share our thoughts without flame wars? (In fact, due to the fact that some people on both sides of this argument have argued that stating an unpopular opinion leads to "karma rape", may I suggest that people NOT touch the voting buttons on this thread? Unless someone is clearly trolling, I supposeā€¦)

Sorry, I didn't read OP well enough, so I'm going to answer more correctly.

I think we as a website don't have a bias, I would say that in KYM's very nature it is a site with a collection of neutral entries. We have memes involving mockery of both liberals and conservatives, but I would say with the web being how it is and American politics being how it is (not meaning that American politics is all there is on the web, but it IS a huge portion of what we tend to see), the conservative mockery is often more prevalent than liberal mockery.

Entries, and that is the only part really worth considering when looking at the site's bias as a whole, are generally very factual and talk more about the phenomena than our views on the memes themselves.

If you consider this website from a documentation standpoint, it doesn't matter whether we have more entries mocking conservatives or more mocking liberals, if we just document facts then there really can't be a bias, unless you view it like Colbert's statement "Reality has a well-known liberal bias."

But in that case, it's not a problem with the website, it's a problem with the culture (if you can really say that culture being specific ways can be problems).


The Political Compass is a good way of seeing the variety in people's political leanings. Upload the image you get from there to a hosting website and put it up here, if you'd like.

Economic Left/Right: -2.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.08

Whenever I take this test, it really reaffirms who I am politically.

I'm very much a libertarian as far as social issues go, I feel that people should pretty much be able to do what they want as far as their bodies and their relationships with others goes. I believe that there's nothing wrong with sex outside marriage or homosexuality, and I think that marijuana is better off being legalized and taxed than it is in the current War Against Drugs.

As far as economics, I tend to be pretty centrist, but left leaning of center. I think this is because although I don't abhor the free market, I believe that some regulation is required, such as ecological regulation and regulation against monopolies, to have an economy that doesn't hurt the people involved in it. As far as the free market goes, though, I am against bailouts and such nonsense. If a business, bank, or whatever doesn't have the money and has to declare bankruptcy, that's their own fault and their own problem. Footing their bill shouldn't be put on the public.

Last edited Apr 05, 2012 at 02:28PM EDT

A long time ago we had a thread where everyone took the test to produce the chart Chris has. Overall, most people where more leaning left and libertarian if I remember correctly.

Then again, seeing KYM's Target Audience of Highschool and College kids, I am not really that surprised.

I technically registered as "Independent." What I feel like I am is exactly the placement of Chris on his chart. I tend to agree with all of Chris's views; at least the views he stated in that post.

I was born in a Christian home but my views of society are far from what many Christians believe. I believe in the rights of gay marriage and relationships and I do believe sex before marriage is also okay. I'm very open minded and that's why I tend to lean toward Libertarian. I also agree with Chris's economic standpoints as well.

Last edited Apr 05, 2012 at 02:34PM EDT

Piano wrote:

by conservatives users

I don't recall any conservative but Mnemonic complaining about KYM's biases.

You must not read as many comments as I do. I feel like I see it a lot.

Here is a good example, but I'm pretty sure that's not the first place I've seen it come up.

As someone who identifies with the Republican party, I don't feel like KYM has a political bias at all. I think we're only documenting memetic content from an internet that has political bias. And while I'm fairly familiar with the individual political opinions of the staff, I think they do a great job of writing content as objectively as possible.


I'm more of a communitarian than anything, though rather moderate.

Chris wrote:

Sorry, I didn't read OP well enough, so I'm going to answer more correctly.

I think we as a website don't have a bias, I would say that in KYM's very nature it is a site with a collection of neutral entries. We have memes involving mockery of both liberals and conservatives, but I would say with the web being how it is and American politics being how it is (not meaning that American politics is all there is on the web, but it IS a huge portion of what we tend to see), the conservative mockery is often more prevalent than liberal mockery.

Entries, and that is the only part really worth considering when looking at the site's bias as a whole, are generally very factual and talk more about the phenomena than our views on the memes themselves.

If you consider this website from a documentation standpoint, it doesn't matter whether we have more entries mocking conservatives or more mocking liberals, if we just document facts then there really can't be a bias, unless you view it like Colbert's statement "Reality has a well-known liberal bias."

But in that case, it's not a problem with the website, it's a problem with the culture (if you can really say that culture being specific ways can be problems).


The Political Compass is a good way of seeing the variety in people's political leanings. Upload the image you get from there to a hosting website and put it up here, if you'd like.

Economic Left/Right: -2.12
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.08

Whenever I take this test, it really reaffirms who I am politically.

I'm very much a libertarian as far as social issues go, I feel that people should pretty much be able to do what they want as far as their bodies and their relationships with others goes. I believe that there's nothing wrong with sex outside marriage or homosexuality, and I think that marijuana is better off being legalized and taxed than it is in the current War Against Drugs.

As far as economics, I tend to be pretty centrist, but left leaning of center. I think this is because although I don't abhor the free market, I believe that some regulation is required, such as ecological regulation and regulation against monopolies, to have an economy that doesn't hurt the people involved in it. As far as the free market goes, though, I am against bailouts and such nonsense. If a business, bank, or whatever doesn't have the money and has to declare bankruptcy, that's their own fault and their own problem. Footing their bill shouldn't be put on the public.

It's hard to take that test when I'm a SERIOUSLY fair person.


Who would've guessed that the Christian Texan would've gotten a right-standing result!? Shocking!

I'm not entirely sure of what the site's views on politics are as a whole, all I know is what mine are (even though they're somewhat conflicting at times)ā€¦ I am not against the legalization of gay marriage, mostly because I feel the government shouldn't have any say over people's marriages, just like how I don't think abortion should be illegalized because it gives the government too much power on a woman's choicesā€¦ I'm for the legalization of marijuana, though really only for taxation reasons. I'm against limitations on freedoms, especially those under the guise of protection, though I do feel like a lot laws we have do protect us. I am against socialized health care, due to the negative financial impact it has on doctors and hospitals, but I'm not against welfare and some other social aid programs (though they might need a little patching up here and there).

While I know I share political views with some users, and I conflict with others, I don't really think I can accurately gauge what side this site sits on. If I had to guess, I'd say more left, but only because it's the Internet.

Y'know, any time some political flame war pops up, I'm not sure who's trolling and who's being for realā€¦ Poe's Law at work, I supposeā€¦

I just taken the test

Economic Left/Right: -3.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.03



@RussianFedora
Since when someone lack of discipline just because he doesn't like politics.I'm curious.



@CitationNeeded
Don't worry, you're not alone. I'm not a fan of politic either.

Brucker's political compass:

Economic Left/Right: -4.88
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.05
[photo:280020]

You know, while I like these sorts of tests, I often feel that there is a lack of proper precision in the wording of the statements used to measure attitudes. The best example of this is probably on page 3, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." Do I agree with this statement or disagree? It depends a great deal on what the test is assuming the meaning of that statement to be. While I'm going to assume that they mean it the way that most people interpret it, i.e. "When one is wronged, it is acceptable to seek revenge," my personal understanding of the phrase (and I am not unique in having this interpretation) is rather, "If you feel a need to be avenged, don't escalate your restitution beyond the scope of the original crime."

That example is more of a matter of social baggage of the phrase itself, but in other statements, the issue being raised can be confused by wording. On page two, there was a statement that read. "A genuine free market requires restrictions on the ability of predator multinationals to create monopolies." Well, by definition, a "genuine free market" has no regulation, but I don't think that's what they mean. Since the test is about measuring personal opinion, what they really mean is "I believe that the market should be regulated to protect against the ability of predator multinationals to create monopolies."

Other examples: "A significant advantage of a one-party state is that it avoids all the arguments that delay progress in a democratic political system." Well, yes, but I'm guessing that agreeing with this statement would be measured as meaning that I support the idea of a one-party system, which I do not. "Mothers may have careers, but their first duty is to be homemakers." Not a problem for me, but if you're either a person who feels mothers should not have careers or a person who feels a mother's first duty is not to be a homemaker, then you'd disagree, but you wouldn't be on the same part of the political spectrum, would you? "It is important that my child's school instills religious values." Important to me, yes, but that doesn't mean I think public schools should be teaching religious values, soā€¦? "Sex outside marriage is usually immoral." This is odd for the reason that I would disagree with "usually", but that's not the point of the statement, I'm pretty sure. "These days openness about sex has gone too far." Honestly, I felt there were far too many ways to interpret this, so I took a response at random.

Maybe I'm over-analyzing, but it is notable to me that I fell in the green quadrant here, when many previous tests of this type have placed me in the red quadrant, although I'm usually close to the line nonetheless.

BUTā€¦ I don't think that there has been as much discussion of the matter that I really wanted to cover in this thread as I wanted. I'm not surprised that most users fall in the green quadrant, but the question is how do we react when something (meme-wise) arises that challenges those sensibilities? I'm a strong believer in impartiality when it comes to free speech and free press (the latter of which is, IMHO, where we fall as a site), but how much does the fact that most of us share the same general political leanings affect our coverage of politically-charged memetic content?

Last edited Apr 05, 2012 at 07:47PM EDT

Economic Left/Right: -4.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.59


Same as Aristo, I have no idea what this means.


As for my stand.

I have no trouble with things like abortion, same sex marriage, or anything like that. Nor do I care whether people are religious or not, or that it should be of value politically or socially. Things like that are a matter of choice, it shouldn't make a person socially less or more accepted. Therefore things like gay couples adoption children isn't something I care about. If it's a loving family, then let them.

Things like that can also be seen back online with me. I don't care about furries, bronies, or any fandom. You like it, then so be it. Who am I to judge a person for his preferences. Of course there are choices and opinions I disagree with, but I don't care about the stuff you like. Therefore I also hate bashing or generalising, people shouldn't be grouped and shunned for one choice they made.


As for KYM. Stay neutral.

If something is worth researching or being documented, as a professional site we should be able to look around stuff like this. But I don't think KYM has reached that point. Of course everyone has articles he likes to spend more or less time in, but that's a personal choice most of the time. It doesn't concern KYM in general, nor should it. If people decide to use the comments to discuss a topic, it doesn't change the quality of the article or its research.

Entries are here to cover facts. Of course we can add general opinions if they matter for the value of research, but our own opinions don't belong in an entry. There's a reason the rules for entries read the following:

  • DO write about what happened from an objective point of view, not about yourself or personal opinions.
Last edited Apr 05, 2012 at 09:53PM EDT

This is just a way to show where I'm coming from personally. Turns out, it's not so different form anyone else's. However, that's not the point of the thread.

I do think there is bias on the site. I don't think it is as present in the writing of the articles, but I do think that in matters of an event (e.g., Trayvon Martin,) people prefer a certain approach to it in the comments and sometimes in the article itself.
Ā 
I haven't looked at many political articles, but I feel as if the most conservative commenters will not like any neutral portrayal of an issue, and the most liberal commentors will not either. However, if most of the news used in the article is gathered from CNN (which anecdotally, tends to be slightly liberal,) then more conservative commenters will have more of an issue with the articles and will be more vocal about it than the more liberal ones.

I'm not quite sure how many active users KYM has, but I feel as if those who complain about the bent of KYM are extreme in their own opinion. They probably feel as if most media is terribly biased, especially if the article involves an issue they feel very strongly about.
Ā 
I don't think the articles are biased enough to merit any consideration at this point, but again (and much like everyone else, it seems) I don't care much for politics. If anything, then perhaps as much of the news on an issue should be gathered from AP sources. Some news won't be carried by the AP like the Miami Heat's hoodie picture (which is important to document if the event is to be documented as a Web-phenomenon itself,) but at this point, suggestions and comments on the issue should always be considered by entry and database moderators to see if the complaint of wording or reporting of truth should be changed in some way. Moderators tend to be fair-minded people, so if multiple people read the complaint, they should be able to determine if it is valid.

How do we react when something (meme-wise) arises that challenges those sensibilities?

As far as this site goes, I just record and write what I find on other sites, although I have to say that what I generally write about doesn't have much to do with politics or even that much with social leaning.

As far as my enjoyment of specific memes, I tend to dislike the more political ones, although I can find humor in both conservative and liberal bashing on occasion.

tl;dr I try not to inject my own opinion into entries


I guess that's where I stand. Pretty much everyone got somewhat the same, no? Everyone so far aside from Patrick is in the green box.
Personally and more specifically, I believe that choice is very important, and the government shouldn't be able to restrict aside from the most radical things. Individual success isn't more important than the greater good, we should all be friends, blah blah blah world peace and stuff.

I'm in the green box, but really close to the middle. I haven't written anything politically charged yet, but how I feel is that I'm here to research the phenomena and not project my own political views. I believe most people here are the same.

Myself I believe that certain order is required to run a competent society. Else, corruption would become rampant and, after all, humans are the ones making the laws and they are not beyond greed. Having some order is ok, but Human Rights, Liberty and Freedom should never be compromised, as they should be the core values of human beings.

Contradictory? Maybe. Let's say I will exercise my freedom to take your life or property. How about using my freedom to use my insane amount of money to take your family as slaves. Sounds fair? No. Laws ideally should prevent that.


Also, alignment. Which is the Evil? Left or Right?

Last edited Apr 06, 2012 at 09:38PM EDT

I find that KYM is rather liberal in its content. And since this is a user driven site, and the internet as a whole leans toward the left, it is not surprising to see such.

I consider myself an ardent centrist. I loathe political parties as a whole, whether it's the Democrats, Republicans, Conservatives, New Democrats, whatever, because they all mean to do the same thing- to institute their own political agendas into place. I don't care if the agendas are good or bad, it's simply undemocratic to let elected officials act on behalf of millions of people. Neither do I support free democracy, because people as a general, are stupid and bandwagoners, and will follow whatever appeals to them at that very moment. I see governments as a necessary evil, merely to keep the populace in check so society functions well enough. It's the only way human nature comprehends.

Twins the Serendipitous Serval wrote:

I find that KYM is rather liberal in its content. And since this is a user driven site, and the internet as a whole leans toward the left, it is not surprising to see such.

I consider myself an ardent centrist. I loathe political parties as a whole, whether it's the Democrats, Republicans, Conservatives, New Democrats, whatever, because they all mean to do the same thing- to institute their own political agendas into place. I don't care if the agendas are good or bad, it's simply undemocratic to let elected officials act on behalf of millions of people. Neither do I support free democracy, because people as a general, are stupid and bandwagoners, and will follow whatever appeals to them at that very moment. I see governments as a necessary evil, merely to keep the populace in check so society functions well enough. It's the only way human nature comprehends.

You've kinda backed yourself into a corner there. Yes, governments are a necessary evil, but that doesn't mean we can't try to figure out the best way to manifest it.

Can't take it seriously with that blatant political bias it's got.

Last edited Apr 07, 2012 at 02:34AM EDT

The best proven way to manifest it is a capitalist republic. It's pretty much the default standard type of government today, and although I don't like it, it works out pretty well. That's why I'm against occupy, because no radical changes are needed in the governmental structure. Now, social issues like same sex marriage have a long way to go, and I'm all for advancements in those areas, but don't fight something that works.

Once again, I've got a lot of things to say in response to things people have said in this thread, but this time, I think I can boil it down to something that may not be tl;dr.

"Good" and "bad" are not a part of this discussion, in my opinion. If you're in the green quadrant, then the people in the blue quadrant will seem like they are evil TO YOU. The fact is, there are very few people who are truly evil. (Well, it depends on how "evil" is defined, actually, but I'm keeping it short.)

Extreme case: Was Osama bin Laden evil? By our standards, sure. But I believe that in his own mind, for whatever twisted reasons he used to rationalize his choices, attacking America and killing thousands was something that served a greater good of some sort.

Back to the simpler cases we're dealing with in this thread, Aristo urges, "you have to tell me if this is acceptable", Hiroman asks, "Which is the Evil? Left or Right?" and farther back, Quantum claims, "Itā€™s hard to take that test when Iā€™m a SERIOUSLY fair person." This test measures where you stand politically, and there is no good or evil, acceptable or unacceptable, fair or unfair, or any other value judgment. One simply appears on the graph wherever one appears, and that location isn't about whether one is good, but about what one is likely to think is the best way to run a society/government.

Brucker wrote:

Once again, I've got a lot of things to say in response to things people have said in this thread, but this time, I think I can boil it down to something that may not be tl;dr.

"Good" and "bad" are not a part of this discussion, in my opinion. If you're in the green quadrant, then the people in the blue quadrant will seem like they are evil TO YOU. The fact is, there are very few people who are truly evil. (Well, it depends on how "evil" is defined, actually, but I'm keeping it short.)

Extreme case: Was Osama bin Laden evil? By our standards, sure. But I believe that in his own mind, for whatever twisted reasons he used to rationalize his choices, attacking America and killing thousands was something that served a greater good of some sort.

Back to the simpler cases we're dealing with in this thread, Aristo urges, "you have to tell me if this is acceptable", Hiroman asks, "Which is the Evil? Left or Right?" and farther back, Quantum claims, "Itā€™s hard to take that test when Iā€™m a SERIOUSLY fair person." This test measures where you stand politically, and there is no good or evil, acceptable or unacceptable, fair or unfair, or any other value judgment. One simply appears on the graph wherever one appears, and that location isn't about whether one is good, but about what one is likely to think is the best way to run a society/government.

QFT.

I have but one humble request: please change your name to "Brucker is the voice of reason."

Brucker wrote:

See title.

I'm creating this thread in the hopes of redirecting some of the crap (but very interesting crap that should be discussed) from the comments section of Liberal Douche Garofalo.

I personally consider myself a liberal, but I think the accusation leveled at us ("us" as a community in general) by conservatives users that we have a liberal bias that sometimes skews the way we write about memes of a political nature is true. It's my hope that in the final judgment of whether or not any politically-charged meme is valid, we are able to see beyond our personal politics, however.

Can we try and share our thoughts without flame wars? (In fact, due to the fact that some people on both sides of this argument have argued that stating an unpopular opinion leads to "karma rape", may I suggest that people NOT touch the voting buttons on this thread? Unless someone is clearly trolling, I supposeā€¦)

I don't believe our community in general has a bias. This community is very accepting of varying political views- we have our political extremists and our moderates of most ideologies.

Of course, for the most part there is a liberal majority on the internet. That is a statistical phenomenon. As we document internet culture, we therefore appear to have a liberal bias- because liberalism has on the internet the upper hand.


Here's my chart:

Here, just because I thought it would be interesting to see them all combined:

[photo:282006]

Even though you can see there are a few people who are clear outliers, we still are pretty much clumped together overall. The corners of the little triangle in the middle represent the mean, median, and midpoint of the dataset, and since they were so similar, I didn't bother to label which was which. I did some further analysis of the data, but it's not likely that even the above chart says much of note.

Brucker wrote:

Here, just because I thought it would be interesting to see them all combined:

[photo:282006]

Even though you can see there are a few people who are clear outliers, we still are pretty much clumped together overall. The corners of the little triangle in the middle represent the mean, median, and midpoint of the dataset, and since they were so similar, I didn't bother to label which was which. I did some further analysis of the data, but it's not likely that even the above chart says much of note.

Nice work. Results weren't surprising at all, but it's nice to have solid evidence that KYM, as a whole, is quite liberal.

I don't think we're too biased though, at least, no moreso than your average website. The bias is there alright, but we do generally try to stay fair and balanced (lol Fox News).

Also, Ace?

Last edited Apr 09, 2012 at 12:49AM EDT

After looking at that chart that Brucker posted I figured I could be the odd one out and set myself into that unused red quadrant, seeing as how I tend to be more faithful of goverments than your average internaut.

Furthermore I consider myself neither left, nor right. I aim to be neutral in every situation and only base my political judgement on facts.

Am I?

Nope. Turns out even I am in the leftie bracket too. It also appears that I am occupying the same vector as MDF. Perhaps me and MDF are more politically aligned with each other than I thought.

I'm curious now if me and MDF started talking about controversial political matters, would we agree on the same things?

You know what may make this confusing for me is that I'm not sure the measurement basis used here is the one I've seen in the past. Subtle tweaking of the questions can lead to a measurement of something completely different. Actually, several months ago, a friend of mine posted a chart similar to this on Facebook that was from an article arguing that the remnants of the old hippie movement should really be joining ranks with the Tea Party, since they really believe the same things. The trick in that particular case was that the vertical axis was a measurement of how much people believed in free will. In my view, that measurement is a red herring. Nazis didn't believe that people would naturally change their ways, so they forced them to; some groups by simply killing them off by the millions. Other political ideologies might believe that people can not change, and so advocate molding society itself to fit the needs of the individual. So it's what people do about human nature that matters politically, far less than what they view human nature to be in the first place. That was a clearly different yardstick in that case, but what about here? I think I ought to read the site again to figure out what these axes really mean.

Oh, and BSoD, falling on the same general spot on the map wouldn't guarantee that you agree about any particular issue, it only shows that you agree on average. Some quizzes like this that I have taken in the past have taken certain hot-button issues such as abortion, same-sex marriage, and gun ownership and measured them, but separately from the rest of the issues since they can be all over the place. Gun ownership for instance is an issue where my wife and I reverse; while she's the conservative one and I'm the liberal, I'm much more in favor of people being allowed to own guns for self-defense, hunting, and what-not, although I do agree at least that I have no personal desire to own a gun.

Look at me.

Nearing the middle.

Makes sense, I'm a very fair person based on the hybrid fusion of society and my opinions, so the quiz was difficult for me to answer, but I got there.

Blue Screen (of Death) wrote:

After looking at that chart that Brucker posted I figured I could be the odd one out and set myself into that unused red quadrant, seeing as how I tend to be more faithful of goverments than your average internaut.

Furthermore I consider myself neither left, nor right. I aim to be neutral in every situation and only base my political judgement on facts.

Am I?

Nope. Turns out even I am in the leftie bracket too. It also appears that I am occupying the same vector as MDF. Perhaps me and MDF are more politically aligned with each other than I thought.

I'm curious now if me and MDF started talking about controversial political matters, would we agree on the same things?

I would disagree, but only out of spite.
j/k

Skeletor-sm

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