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Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]

by Trag (Monk)
on May 21, 2004 at 22:50 UTC ( [id://355490]=perlmeditation: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

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Re: Political alignment of the Perl community
by bl0rf (Pilgrim) on May 21, 2004 at 23:39 UTC
    I think this discussion is detrimental to the well-being and brotherhood of the monks. Perl is a tool, it will answer whoever wields it no matter their political orientation.

          Perl is a tool, it will answer whoever wields it no matter their political orientation.

      And a dog will love its master no matter what others may think of him and no matter his politics.

      Hmmm... Politics. What a wonderful way to describe the process...
      PoliMany
      TicsBlood sucking creatures

      I suppose you are correct. This post was actually inspired by the boycott O'Reilly thread, and Wassercrats opinions on books containing information on how to hack and lockpicking. Seeing as so many people were against his opinions (I'm not commenting period), I was curious to see if Wassercrats is more right wing authoritarian than the rest of the community, and this is where some of the friction comes from. I am sorry for any unrest this post has caused.


      our @item = reverse (114, 101, 107, 99, 97, 104, 32, 108, 114, 101, 80, 32, 114, 101, 104, 116, 111, 110, 97, 32, 116, 115, 117, + 74); local $my = reverse ")meti@\ ,rhc (pam tnirp";eval $my;
        Asking about political orientation usually leads to flame wars and angry users. You can see this sort of thing on http://use.perl.org if you are interested. That will also confirm for you that not everyone who uses Perl has the same political orientation.
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Re: [Seriously off-topic]] Political alignment of the Perl community
by Abigail-II (Bishop) on May 21, 2004 at 23:46 UTC
    That test takes 6 pages of questions. Here's one that just takes one page, and 10 questions: World's Smallest Political Quiz. But in your test, my results were near the results of the Dalai Lama.

    However, I don't feel anything for the US Libertarian party, I do believe in a strong (but not an authoritarian government). I'm a socialist - union member, and member of a socialist party.

    Abigail

      I also took the 10 question test - leaving all the 'M' (maybe) selections in place. The graph plot was dead center Centrist, but the Centrist score was only 30.18% while the Libertarian score was 35.63%. I'm no statistician, but that seems strongly biased to me.

      Update: Ok, I reread the page as Ven'Tatsu suggested and of course he is right! Mea Culpa.

        You miss-read the page, the table is the percentages where all respondants have fallen. Your rank is just bellow the grid. I almost made the same mistake, then notince the line just above the table "2,760 users have taken the quiz so far. Results are renewed after each submission"
      I took the 10 question test and answered according to the way things are in the U.S. except I answered yes for "Repeal regulations on sex for consenting adults" and no for "People are better off with free trade than with tariffs" and I was determined to be an authoritarian. For an American, it seems like I'm more of a centrist.

      I don't like that test, but it's posted on a clearly biased web site, so I'm not surprised.

Re: Political alignment of the Perl community
by chance (Beadle) on May 21, 2004 at 23:32 UTC
    I don't like that particular quiz alot. (I've taken it before), and come out just barely right wing libertartian, when I know for a fact I'm a full blown tin-foil-hat libertarian.

    using the very first question of an example:

    "If economic globalisation is inevitable, it should primarily serve humanity rather than the interests of trans-national corporations."

    First of all, I think there is an inference in there that you are either for "humanity" or you are for "trans-national corporations" (and therefore against humanity). The question of mutual exclusivity would probably make a fine question in and of itself (and I'm not trying to start an argument about that here ....) but I think its pretty cruddy to sneak in to a test like that

    Secondly, is this question asking me to make a prediction about the future (given certain assumptions), or a normative statement in relation to the proper role of government?

    anyways ...... I'd bet there is a substantial contingent of both 'flaming liberal' and 'tin-foil-hat libertarians' around here.
      anyways ...... I'd bet there is a substantial contingent of both 'flaming liberal' and 'tin-foil-hat libertarians' around here.

      What's the difference?


      our @item = reverse (114, 101, 107, 99, 97, 104, 32, 108, 114, 101, 80, 32, 114, 101, 104, 116, 111, 110, 97, 32, 116, 115, 117, + 74); local $my = reverse ")meti@\ ,rhc (pam tnirp";eval $my;
        The flaming liberals forgot to wear the tin foil hat - duh!
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by blue_cowdawg (Monsignor) on May 22, 2004 at 02:47 UTC

        good test to see if you aren't sure.

    The test Trag suggested surprised the hell out of me and had me down as a -4.50 on the economic scale giving me leftist leanings. The government scale of -0.56 (slight Libertarian leanings) which doesn't surprise me. If I had been born in the mid 1700s I would have been one of the participants in the Boston Tea Party, of that I'm sure.

    The test that Abigail-II suggested came out more like I would have expected and plotted me as a Centrist. I'd love to think that I am a very balanced and fair person that oscillates around the center point of the chart depending on the individual situation and issue.

    Some examples: I on one hand feel the USA (or any other country for that matter) has a right to defend itself militarily even to the point of "projecting" power to defend itself or help its friends defend themselves. On the other hand I am sick of seeing my country run around playing policeman around the globe sticking their nose in where we aren't invited/wanted. Too many good boys/girls have lost their lives that way for no good reason IMHO.

    On one hand I believe that there are tooo many rules tying policeman's hands in terms of enforcing laws. On the other hand the trend towards making the act of invading privacy in the name of national security disturbs me greatly.

    People in dire financial straits should be given a "hand up" not a "hand out". Meaning if someone is down and out they should be given enough help to stand on their own but not so much help that several generations are being raised under one roof on the public dole.

    I know some of my views are not going to be popular with some folks here but they are after all my views and I will defend to the death anyone's right to disagree with me.

      I will defend to the death anyone's right to disagree with me

      I was digging you up to this sentence. I really doubt you would do this. As I really doubt any other sane human being would. :)

            I really doubt you would do this.

        Not taken to an exreme, yes I would. I'm a veteran and spent six years of my life doing whatever Uncle Sam sent me to do.

        I value the freedoms we have in this country very much and one of the freedoms I value the most is the freedom to believe whatever cockamamie way I want to. That is what I will defend.

        What you do with that freedom is a different matter. If your belief system infringes on my freedoms or my pursuit of happiness then we are going to be at odds.

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What-Me Worry? [OT]
by valdez (Monsignor) on May 22, 2004 at 07:46 UTC

    I turned out to be in the opposite quadrant of our current prime minister and I'm really proud of this! My political compass is Economic Left/Right: -6.75 and Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.97. If you like those kind of games, there is also President Match and you can even vote at The World Votes; however, my preference would go to Alfred E. Neuman (also here and here) :)

    Ciao, Valerio

Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by etcshadow (Priest) on May 22, 2004 at 03:30 UTC
    Well, I'll keep my own results to myself... but one thing I found very interesting is that, despite their claims that Kerry fell midway along the north-east diagonal (about two-thirds of the way to bush), when I "took the test for Kerry", I found bearing somewhat into the opposite quadrant.

    Also, there's the general problem with any such poll, that not all of the questions can be answered well on a spectrum of agree to disagree. To put it in other words, certain questions really require a mu option. (How odd... the link to jargon://mu doesn't work, but if you navigate that jargon file site, you can find mu on it.)

    So take it with a grain of salt, is all I'm saying.

    ------------ :Wq Not an editor command: Wq
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community
by simonm (Vicar) on May 21, 2004 at 23:16 UTC
    I'm solidly left libertarian, or in American electoral terms, a Kucinich/Nader voter. The test you linked to ranks me as "Economic Left/Right: -4.25 -- Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.49".
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by nimdokk (Vicar) on May 22, 2004 at 15:02 UTC
    I came out right about where I expected I would: Left-wing liberal
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by jonadab (Parson) on May 22, 2004 at 02:24 UTC

    I suspect it varies a great deal. I personally fall rather well on the conservative side of average. (I'd have voted for Quayle; GWB is fairly liberal. Flames to /dev/null; this is really not the forum for talking about this stuff.)


    ;$;=sub{$/};@;=map{my($a,$b)=($_,$;);$;=sub{$a.$b->()}} split//,".rekcah lreP rehtona tsuJ";$\=$;[-1]->();print
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by bl0rf (Pilgrim) on May 24, 2004 at 01:08 UTC
    Well, at least this thread is good for finding other monks' history. Personally, I was born in the USSR - so naturally I hate communism. I also hate Fascism because its just national communism ( national - zi ). I'm pro dictatorial ( the enlightened despot type ), and I aspire to become a dictator in the future, I am also funny, outgoing and program in Perl. :-)

      Sorry, you can't be Benevolent Dictator Of The World, that's my job.
        Well... you are a doctor...
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by petesmiley (Friar) on May 27, 2004 at 16:53 UTC
    Some of their questions seem either not so well planned or biased. It got my political leaning correct.

    "Mothers may have careers, but their first duty is to be homemakers."

    What are they asking? Maybe the question should be.... "Should your children be raised by it's parent or by daycare?".... What about fathers who stay home? This is a wierd and very conspicuous question.

    "Charity is better than social security as a means of helping the genuinely disadvantaged."

    When isn't it? Give me an instance of when charity is worse than some other method for doling out help. Did they mean.... "The only form of wellfare in a society should be charity?" I have two different answers to these questions.

    smiles

Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by kutsu (Priest) on May 22, 2004 at 16:22 UTC

    I didn't like that test (it needed a no opinion button for one thing), but I got economic left/right -1.38 and social libertarian/authoritarian -1.79...and since that's near the center that seems about right, or left ;)

    "Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum - I think that I think, therefore I think that I am." Ambrose Bierce

Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by fletcher_the_dog (Friar) on May 24, 2004 at 16:19 UTC
    Why do you make the assumption that we are mostly flaming liberals? Because we use a language were there is more than one way to do it? Because perl doesn't always follow CS conventions? I am just curious if this assumption is somehow based on the nature of perl itself or if has some other basis? As for myself I am not a flaming liberal, according to the test I am:
    Economic Left/Right: -3.25
    Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.03
      Just a theory regarding hackers in general that I have. I've generally gotten that impression from the people here, and at Slashdot.


      our @item = reverse (114, 101, 107, 99, 97, 104, 32, 108, 114, 101, 80, 32, 114, 101, 104, 116, 111, 110, 97, 32, 116, 115, 117, + 74); local $my = reverse ")meti@\ ,rhc (pam tnirp";eval $my;
Re: Political alignment of the Perl community [OT]
by fraktalisman (Hermit) on May 25, 2004 at 17:29 UTC
    "Abstract art that doesn't represent anything shouldn't be considered art at all." as a political statement?!
    As long as it's not forbidden to produce and display abstract art, who cares what it's called? Oh, BTW, according to that test mentioned above, I'm politically left (-6.12) and libertarian (-6.05).
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