Donnie Darko and US Political Ideology

If you asked me a week ago how I felt about politics, I would have described myself as a libertarian. Today, I honestly don't feel comfortable labeling myself.

Why the change in attitude? I went to my university's political science class, that's why. Which, by the way, is the University of Texas at El Paso, which if the Washington Monthly is any judge, is the 7th best university in the whole of the US, ranked between Stanford and Harvard. Pretty good placement for a guy who was homeless a month ago.

In any case, I'm a-sittin' in the big ole lecture hall and this slide pops up on the projector:

Yes, folks, I downloaded the PowerPoint, so that's precisely what was displayed.

Then, to my amazement, Prof pulled out his laser pointer, and we went over some examples: how would someone over on this point on the line feel about gun control? What about someone on this point on the line?

I was overcome by a surreal sense of no longer being in the real world, for I had been transported into a scene in a classic movie. Well, classic to me, anyway.

It was truly horrific. Watching Donnie Darko from the comfort of my computer (as, interestingly, I had mere days before the class), everything was safe. Kitty's nonsense about fear and love wasn't real, and thus was just one big cosmic joke.

Suddenly I had a dark realization, an unhappy epiphany: the threat is real. I knew what I had to do, even if my memory was a little fuzzy on what to say. My hand shot up, and my brain tried to recall Gyllenhaal's lines as well as it could manage.

Unfortunately, lecture halls are big. I was never called on. Shame, really.

So after the day's classes were through, I returned to my computer and looked up the relevant portion of the script:

"

Donnie Darko: Life isn’t that simple. I mean who cares if Ling Ling returns the wallet and keeps the money? It has nothing to do with either fear or love.
Kitty Farmer: Fear and love are the deepest of human emotions.
Donnie Darko: Okay. But you’re not listening to me. There are other things that need to be taken into account. Like the whole spectrum of human emotion. You can’t just lump everything into these two categories and then just deny everything else.

So let's go back a couple centuries.

Back then, "liberal" meant something completely different. People who believed in small government, private property, and laissez-faire capitalism were called "liberals" back then. The root of the word, after all, is the same as the root of "liberty" — specifically the lack of government intervention.

Same thing with "conservative:" it indicated someone who holds "to traditional attitudes and values" and is "cautious about change or innovation." A multi-billion-dollar program for a system which shoots rockets at other rockets could definitely be considered pro-military-spending, but could hardly be called "conservative."

So what happened? How is it the label "liberal" became attached to things which were decided not liberal, and the label "conservative" attached to things decidedly not conservative? Those things, after all, have nothing to do with liberalism or conservatism.

Well, that's simple enough to answer. The real Jim Cunninghams corrupted the language.

Imagine a world where "fear" had becomes synonymous with "sinfulness" and "love" had become synonymous with "good." It's not difficult; we easily identify it in all of Kitty's lines. Well, that's precisely what's happened with political discourse in the United States.

Truth is, the battle was fought and lost long ago. Even if I had gotten a chance for my little insurrection, nothing would be gained from it. I can't even really fault the professor; he's merely explaining how the vast majority of Americans think about politics.

Still, Donnie's core point rings true: the political number line rules out, like, the whole spectrum of political ideology. (And no, the Nolan chart isn't right, either, although it does earn the dubious distinction of "less wrong.") Every political issue should be considered on its own merits, rather than trying to conform to an oversimplified formula which allows one to put their politics on autopilot, numbing themselves to the diversity of available options. If you want to support gay marriage but believe abortions are murder, that's cool. If you want slash funding for welfare while having the state fund (better?) universal health care, that's cool too.

The Nolan chart ideologies are traps for the weak-minded. Maybe it's too late to save the corruption to the language, but it's not too late to free ourselves from oversimplified political thinking.

In conclusion, referring to liberals, conservatives, "moderates," and libertarians respectively:

I feel you, man. I also took a political science class in my first year on university.

I swore myself never ever to take this shit serious. Their concept of Democracy was so surreal, I was wondering if they extracted it from the political environment of Germany or Star Trek.


Your explanation of "liberal" certainly still applies as a political stance here in Germany. However our liberal party was butchered by the conservative wing driven media outlets in the last legislative session. Parties addressing censoring or Freedom of the Thought are rather minor in popularity.

In a culture like US where the concept of Freedom is valued by each party as an instrument for gaining popularity, I could at least understand the development of the concept "liberal" there to a perverted one. Freedom is no such keyword in the political landscape of Germany, hence more of a minor priority concept for the political agenda of a party.

Some years ago I would have considered myself also left-wing but in the political environment of Germany meaning rather socialist. As of now, I am more the moderate kinda guy, evaluating case to case.

Did read, got nothing to add really. Had similar feelings at my own university years back. What a fucking disaster.

To be honest I consider myself quite well versed in US politics (for an average european that is so comparing myself to low level) and the polarity Cronk describes is quite baffling to me as a spectator. I can't imagine myself being an american voter these days. There's people doing everything for jesus and there's people trying to disarm everyone so that the government can protect them. Holy shit.
I know how rigged the two party system is by them districts, fundings etc. but I'll be damned if it makes any sense to me.

Oversimplifying political views = easy to understand without too much thinking from regular human => less thinking = easier to lure through media and stuffs.

Now who is Nolan? Is he legitimate to teach you?
Were his ideas theft and used wrongly?

I've read the post, but not all the replies (sorry about being in a hurry).


But one thing I've asked myself for quite some time now is: Do we really need so many representatives nowadays?

In Brazil we have 513 congressmen.. WTF?! We have internet now a days, people should be able to vote on political issues for themselves! Thus considering each of them on their own merits..

Can we have, like, 1 president and 1~3 representatives per state, or something more efficient? (Answer is, of course we can, but that messes with the Status Quo of the power)

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Biroso wrote:

But one thing I've asked myself for quite some time now is: Do we really need so many representatives nowadays?

In Brazil we have 513 congressmen.. WTF?! We have internet now a days, people should be able to vote on political issues for themselves! Thus considering each of them on their own merits..

In the past I've wondered if I should run for Congress under a campaign platform of direct representation. By which I mean: I would have no particular policy whatsoever, but instead an infrastructure for gathering public opinion in real time.

Here's how it would work: Instead of having a huge staff in the capital, I'd have a small staff in the constituent district itself. The primary function of this staff would be to collect Social Security cards and driver's licenses (or state ID cards, for those who do not drive) from walk-ins, verify residency in the district, and create accounts for a website. (There would also be some network security concerns.)

What would be the function of the website? Little more than a CSPAN stream and a poll on how I should vote. Also quite possibly some links to the texts of bills in progress; no analysis, which can be biased, just the text itself. Whichever position wins the poll determines how I vote.

All of this would be free to the user, yet would cost some money to operate. So yes, there would be sponsorship... in the form of banner ads on the site. In terms of campaign contributors, I'd probably be looking towards Google. This would be as far as the donor influence would penetrate; the voting itself would be entirely democratic (in the true meaning of the word).