Why are cities more liberal and left wing?

KingOfFairview

In most countries, including our own, the UK, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran, Turkey etc, cities tend to be more liberal than rural areas. In cities we are exposed to a wider variety of experiences. If this is what makes city people more liberal and left wing, does that suggest they have a more informed opinion? If not, what do you think causes this phenomenon?

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

KingOfFairview wrote: »

In most countries, including our own, the UK, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran, Turkey etc, cities tend to be more liberal than rural areas. In cities we are exposed to a wider variety of experiences. If this is what makes city people more liberal and left wing, does that suggest they have a more informed opinion? If not, what do you think causes this phenomenon?

Exposure to more varied groups would be my opinion. You're also going to meet a much wider range of nationalities, with wider ranging interests and come into contact with alternative sub-cultures, meaning you are less dependend on the media and your peers' and parents views.

At some point you realise that none of then are hamrless and some of them are actually quite interesting.

Wibbs

The word urbane comes from the same word as urban(urbanus; latin for city dweller), for the reasons the good princess gives. That has changed over the years mind you with the growth of mass media. This levels the playing field quite a bit as most of us are now exposed to the same info regardless of origin. In the west anyway.

ScumLord

They also have a large young population. You have young people leaving their small towns expecting a fresh start where anything possible. They don't have their family and friends telling them how to act and they can meet a person one day and never see them again making human relationships disposable.

Small towns get stuck in their ways, the old have their influence trying to hold back any change and the rest of the people are families and I've always found families don't like risky behaviour around their kiddies.

Dyr

lower density of boggers probably

The Backwards Man

Come spend three months with me in the backass of nowhere and I'll soon work that liberalness outa yis, ya big softies.

Frank Black

Being liberal and being left-wing are completely different.
There may be a higher percentage of people in cities who consider themselves to fall into one or both of these two categories, but the reasons for someone being one or the other would be different.

The PD's when they existed would have espoused a number of socially liberal policies, but no one would have suggested they were a left wing party.

Hande hoche!

Air pollution.

Yellow121

I'd consider myself left wing on a lot of topics by why the presumption here that left wing/liberal = better?

EdenHazard

Yellow121 wrote: »

I'd consider myself left wing on a lot of topics by why the presumption here that left wing/liberal = better?

Its boards, its pretty much the general trend throughout the site. I say that as someone whose left wing on pretty much every issue

anncoates

All the relatively non-mutant culchies quickly escape and come up to Dublin to work, study, mate and drink, leaving their parishes to the banjo strummers.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Class is an issue too in fairness. If you take Dublin as an eg you can see how general opinions could sway between different communities.

It's the same in rural communities to a certain extent.

Manach

Given the population shifts over the past century, with movement of people from rural to urban environments, the sense of tradition and past has been disassociated in the newer social groups. The a-la-carte socialism grab-bag of ideologies would seem to offer a quick-fix to rebuilding the sense of community at minimum cost without the inconvenience of learning from past endeavours.

tigger123

Manach wrote: »

Given the population shifts over the past century, with movement of people from rural to urban environments, the sense of tradition and past has been disassociated in the newer social groups. The a-la-carte socialism grab-bag of ideologies would seem to offer a quick-fix to rebuilding the sense of community at minimum cost without the inconvenience of learning from past endeavours.

I'm from a city, and not too sure I'd agree that there's a lack of tradition in urban environments.

castletownman

anncoates wrote: »

All the relatively non-mutant culchies quickly escape and come up to Dublin to work, study, mate and drink, leaving their parishes to the banjo strummers.

And all the city slickers who come down to the country for the summer stick out like a sore thumb. Ya can spot them a mile away. They're the ones that hog the small country roads in their 4x4's, are generally the loudest voice in a pub/restaurant and are usually the first one's to complain if their spoilt brats didn't get their way

ScumLord

Bambi wrote: »

lower density of boggers probably

Underneath it all everyones a bogger. If it wasn't for the muck slingers there wouldn't be any cities.

anncoates

castletownman wrote: »

are generally the loudest voice in a pub/restaurant and are usually the first one's to complain if their spoilt brats didn't get their way

If our money is keeping your quaint community from sliding back into famine, the least you can do is get a bloody move on with Oisin's baby-chino.

Yellow121

In the cities people have to hussle and bussle about, always bumping into people. That's why they have no manners.

biko

People in cities generally have more money. It's easy to be liberal when you have money.

mike65

Rural populations are comparatively stagnant, urban ones are dynamic. Rural villages have one teacher schools, cities have universities. This is no longer true but traditionally the countryside had very poor communications and little media, certainly no diversity of media whereas the cities did.

Sir Humphrey Appleby

Yellow121 wrote: »

In the cities people have to hussle and bussle about, always bumping into people. That's why they have no manners.

Not sure I would agree that city dwellers have "no manners".
On the hustle and bustle, those interested how we humans evolved socially in the new city enviroments of the late 19th and early 20th centuries could do worse than reading the work of Geog Simmel particularly his The Metropolis and Mental Life.

ScumLord

mike65 wrote: »

Rural populations are comparatively stagnant,

They're not stagnant at all. Small towns are breeding grounds, the movement of people is typically the same. Young couple from the city move out to a small town to raise a family and the children move back to the city. Small towns are safer, have fewer bad influences and the schools are smaller so children don't get lost in the herd as much as in cities.

I think small towns are a better place for people to spend their childhood in, the tight nit community makes a more well balanced and respectful person. When us country folk move to a city it takes us awhile to stop saying hello to people on the street and other such niceties they don't bother with in the city.

Blisterman

The trend even exists within cities, the closer you get to the city centre.

Look at the results of last London mayoral election.
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2012/4/11/1334160276471/Factmint-map-of-Londons-2-008.jpg
Red are the constituencies which voted Labour, blue is Conservative.

Pherekydes

In cities you can see, up close and personal, the effects of right-wing policy: exploitation, poverty, homelessness, etc.

wp_rathead

ahh i fecking love sweeping generalisations

KingOfFairview

Frank Black wrote: »

Being liberal and being left-wing are completely different.
There may be a higher percentage of people in cities who consider themselves to fall into one or both of these two categories, but the reasons for someone being one or the other would be different.

The PD's when they existed would have espoused a number of socially liberal policies, but no one would have suggested they were a left wing party.

Yes, I know. Point still stands.

KingOfFairview

biko wrote: »

People in cities generally have more money. It's easy to be liberal when you have money.

Explain plz

onslow_murphy

I would agree that people in cities are more liberal on social issues ( at least from a philosophical standpoint ) but they have often a cutthroat individualism about them which is more associated with right wing economics , people in rural Ireland are often quite collective in outlook , helping each other out , lending each other stuff etc

Knasher

Conservationism is generally all about self reliance and relying on small groups that are immediately close to you, your family, your neighbours, your church or your village. Liberalism is about relying on society at large.

Simple fact of the matter is that there is more society to depend on in cities.

Take for example gun control in the US. In New York city the average response time for police to a crime in progress is 8.7 minutes. In the state of Montana it is 1 hour 20 minutes. It is reasonable for a person in a city to have the expectation that the police will protect them, and that guns therefore just make their lives more dangerous. A person in Montana would have to be pretty insane to expect that somebody over an hour away will have much of an effect on a crime in progress, so a gun is much more important to feel protected. The reality of somebody in a rural area is simply different, and conservative politics is simply focused more on these people.

Crooked Jack

KingOfFairview wrote: »

In most countries, including our own, the UK, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran, Turkey etc, cities tend to be more liberal than rural areas. In cities we are exposed to a wider variety of experiences. If this is what makes city people more liberal and left wing, does that suggest they have a more informed opinion? If not, what do you think causes this phenomenon?

Do you have any proof for any of this or is this just some townie superiority bullshit?
I cant speak for Britain, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran or Turkey but what I do know is that in the relatively short amount of time I have spent in Belfast and Dublin I've found more right wing nuts than in 27 years of living in rural south armagh.
Perhaps it's not places, maybe it's just people. Different people with different ideas.

floggg

biko wrote: »

People in cities generally have more money. It's easy to be liberal when you have money.

Ironically though "liberal" policies treat the poor better than "conservative" ones tend to.

And conservative policies tend to favour the existing wealthy.

A case of people voting against their own interests I gyess

KingOfFairview

onslow_murphy wrote: »

I would agree that people in cities are more liberal on social issues ( at least from a philosophical standpoint ) but they have often a cutthroat individualism about them which is more associated with right wing economics , people in rural Ireland are often quite collective in outlook , helping each other out , lending each other stuff etc

This is a good point actually. However, it doesn't seem to translate into political viewpoints.

KingOfFairview

Crooked Jack wrote: »

Do you have any proof for any of this or is this just some townie superiority bullshit?
I cant speak for Britain, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran or Turkey but what I do know is that in the relatively short amount of time I have spent in Belfast and Dublin I've found more right wing nuts than in 27 years of living in rural south armagh.
Perhaps it's not places, maybe it's just people. Different people with different ideas.

Your anecdote doesn't really trump centuries of political evidence here and abroad. Of course there are many exceptions, but the trend is clear.

floggg

Knasher wrote: »

Conservationism is generally all about self reliance and relying on small groups that are immediately close to you, your family, your neighbours, your church or your village. Liberalism is about relying on society at large.

Simple fact of the matter is that there is more society to depend on in cities.

And also more of society to see.

It's easier to have a somewhat insular view and think only about your own immediate group in a rural area as they are the people with whom you interact most.

Whereas a trip on the red line Luas really makes you see the need for drug intervention services, child services and educational assistance for disadvantaged areas!

Knasher

floggg wrote: »

It's easier to have a somewhat insular view and think only about your own immediate group in a rural area as they are the people with whom you interact most.

It sounds as if conservatives are more selfish but I think that is a little unfair. I think that conservatives and liberals are equally guilty of only thinking of people in their immediate group, liberals just have a larger cross section of society immediate to them.

Frank Black

KingOfFairview wrote: »

Yes, I know. Point still stands.

What point? - You're asking a question, when you should actually be asking two.

It's like asking 'Why is youth employment and annual rainfall so low in Spain?'

There's no correlation between the two.

Jester252

So what with the Urban vs. Rural heat lately?

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

biko wrote: »

People in cities generally have more money. It's easy to be liberal when you have money.

Not sure I agree with you there: the more money people have the more conservative they tend to get with it.

Socially, though, I don't think it makes much of a difference.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Yellow121 wrote: »

In the cities people have to hussle and bussle about, always bumping into people. That's why they have no manners.

You've obviously never been to some of the more intolerant places of rural Ireland!

Yellow121

Princess Consuela Bananahammock wrote: »

You've obviously never been to some of the more intolerant places of rural Ireland!

I have but I was messing. Why are people taking this seriously? I thought it was a joke thread.

KingOfFairview

Frank Black wrote: »

What point? - You're asking a question, when you should actually be asking two.

It's like asking 'Why is youth employment and annual rainfall so low in Spain?'

There's no correlation between the two.

There is correlation (unless you mean 19th century classical liberalism), there just isn't causation.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Yellow121 wrote: »

I have but I was messing. Why are people taking this seriously? I thought it was a joke thread.

As was I, Bruce. As was I.

Crooked Jack

KingOfFairview wrote: »

Your anecdote doesn't really trump centuries of political evidence here and abroad. Of course there are many exceptions, but the trend is clear.

If this is the case present this evidence then. Don't just make a sweeping generalisation with no proof.

BraziliaNZ

What's the reason behind people from inner city Dublin being far more narrow minded and racist etc than someone from a wealthier background? Is it down to education? Or that lazy unambitious people ended up in these areas and mated with other lazy unambitious people thus creating loads of them?

Yellow121

Princess Consuela Bananahammock wrote: »

As was I, Bruce. As was I.

Put a smiley on it, this one: or this one: :P or this one: I think that's all, maybe you could get away with this one:

Duckworth_Luas

BraziliaNZ wrote: »

What's the reason behind people from inner city Dublin being far more narrow minded and racist etc than someone from a wealthier background? Is it down to education? Or that lazy unambitious people ended up in these areas and mated with other lazy unambitious people thus creating loads of them?

What are you talking about? They're from Dublin so obviously they are intellectual, liberal, urban sophisticates. A second Age of Reason is about to blossom in Finglas any day now!

Jimoslimos

Crooked Jack wrote: »

I cant speak for Britain, Russia, the US, Egypt, Iran or Turkey but what I do know is that in the relatively short amount of time I have spent in Belfast and Dublin I've found more right wing nuts than in 27 years of living in rural south armagh.

Need information on sample sizes.

floggg

Knasher wrote: »

It sounds as if conservatives are more selfish but I think that is a little unfair. I think that conservatives and liberals are equally guilty of only thinking of people in their immediate group, liberals just have a larger cross section of society immediate to them.

I wouldn't say that. I'd be socially "liberal."

I believe in spending on education for disadvantaged areas, social welfare, medical care and all that other good stuff liberals believe in that costs me money through tax but neither me nor my family need (at the moment).

I'm pro-choice even though I'm a gay man.

I believe in restorative justice even though myself and my loved ones are much more likely to be the victims of crime than we are likely to be criminals.

There may be a degree if selfishness in that I would like go think I would looked after if I ever found myself in a tough spot but that is a reasonably remote prospect at the moment (in my mind at least) and that i believe liberal policies make a better society, but I think it's very much a less immediate form if selfishness than a conservative mind set.

Any benefits from liberal policies to me are going to be indirect and long term.

I just think that a lot of times they are just the right things to do.

KingOfFairview

Crooked Jack wrote: »

If this is the case present this evidence then. Don't just make a sweeping generalisation with no proof.

I'm not making a case for you on something that is common knowledge just because you are unaware of it. If you honestly can't see the relationship, I can't help you.

Read up on a bit of history and voting patterns if you like.

BraziliaNZ

Duckworth_Luas wrote: »

What are you talking about? They're from Dublin so obviously they are intellectual, liberal, urban sophisticates. A second Age of Reason is about to blossom in Finglas any day now!

Well, in general cities would be more open minded, but you can find cretins as bad as any culchie when it comes to being worldly in many parts of Dublin.

KingOfFairview

BraziliaNZ wrote: »

Well, in general cities would be more open minded, but you can find cretins as bad as any culchie when it comes to being worldly in many parts of Dublin.

Of course.