Why are cities more liberal and left wing?

KingOfFairview · 08-08-2013 12:22PM #1

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 · 08-08-2013 12:26PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:30PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:35PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:42PM

lower density of boggers probably

The Backwards Man · 08-08-2013 12:46PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:47PM

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! · 08-08-2013 12:48PM

Air pollution.

Yellow121 · 08-08-2013 12:51PM

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

EdenHazard · 08-08-2013 12:53PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:54PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:55PM

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 · 08-08-2013 12:57PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:03PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:06PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:07PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:09PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:15PM

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

biko · 08-08-2013 01:20PM

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

mike65 · 08-08-2013 01:21PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:28PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:29PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:32PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:32PM

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

wp_rathead · 08-08-2013 01:33PM

ahh i fecking love sweeping generalisations

KingOfFairview · 08-08-2013 01:35PM

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 · 08-08-2013 01:37PM

biko wrote: »

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

Explain plz

onslow_murphy · 08-08-2013 01:50PM

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 · 08-08-2013 02:00PM

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 · 08-08-2013 02:01PM

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 · 08-08-2013 02:04PM

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

Why are cities more liberal and left wing?

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