You and the Political Compass

[Patriqvium]

First of all, I do not know if this has been posted here before - I assume that it has not been at least for a while, since the forum search was unable to find anything related to it.

Anyway, my history & politics group made the Political Compass test (http://www.politicalcompass.org) in school last week to see how it (the group) would be aligned politically. While making the test, I got the idea of repeating the same experiment here on Apolyton Off-Topic - and here's the result. To participate, just go to the web site and take the test, then return here and enter your result to the poll above.

The test itself is pretty clever - as you may see, it replaces the classical left-right classification with a two-axis "left-right, authoritarian-libertarian" compass. I splitted it into nine categories instead of the original four to make the results easier to analyze.

To see your category, compare your score to these numbers:

Authoritarian Left (smaller than -4, bigger than 4)
Intermediate Left (smaller than -4, between -4 and 4)
Libertarian Left (smaller than -4, smaller than -4)
Authoritarian Centre (between -4 and 4, bigger than 4)
Intermediate Centre (between -4 and 4, between -4 and 4)
Libertarian Centre (between -4 and 4, smaller than -4)
Authoritarian Right (bigger than 4, bigger than 4)
Intermediate Right (bigger than 4, between -4 and 4)
Libertarian Right (bigger than 4, smaller than -4)

Finally, to make the poll more "valid", please follow the following two guidelines:

- Answer the questions of the test honestly and according to your true opinions and/or deeds.

- When answering the poll here, choose the alternative that the official test gave you - not the one you at least though you belonged to.

[chequita guevara]

The libertarian compass is a joke. It is deliberately skewed to make thir point of view look the most free. I could just as easily create a compass that made communism the most free point on the compass.

[Eli]

I got both numbers only a bit smaller than -4.

[loinburger]

Politics schmolitics.

[chequita guevara]

Eli's a socialist!

Eli's a socialist!



I got -7, -6.5 (Duh)

[DinoDoc]

4.13 Economic Right, -1.95 Libertarian

[Zopperoni]

Economic Right: 2.38
Authoritarian: 0.46

[SlowwHand]

Libertarian Centre. I am so unsurprised.
Almost identical placement to Gandhi, but a bit more centered.

[*End Is Forever*]

Economic Left/Right: 2.63, Authoritarian/Libertarian: -3.59

Not much surprise there, then.

[Monk]

I got libertarian left. Is that a term that's widely used, or..? Usually "libertarian" would be asscoiated with right-wingers.

[Mercator]

L/R: -5.88
A/L: -5.23

Hasta la victoria siempre!

[Tingkai]

I got -6.25 and -7.79. All that tells me is that the people who created this survey would label me as being Libertarian Left. I would not accept that label because I can't see how they scored the questions.

Consider the question "I'd always support my country, whether it was right or wrong." If you strongly agree with this question, does this make you an authoritarian. If yes, then why? Or what about the question "Our nation has many unique virtues." IF I agree with that, does it make me an authoritarian or a liberatarian.

What I find funny is the use of the term Libertarian for people I would describe as being liberal or socialist.

Overall, a ridiculous survey.

The concept that this politcal compass would cover the political spectrum is also absurd. Where do you place conservative values that seek to maintain what exists and that are against change?

To me it seems like a simple tool for liberatarian propoganda.

[Stefu]

This has been posted and posted and posted and posted and posted here, and always, clear majority is shown to be Libertarian Left. I think it goes without question that this is very, very skewed poll to the direction of Libertarian Left, and questions show it, too. I think we here at Apolyton should create a better test. Any ideas by... anyone?

[Ecthy]

Libertarian left... that doesn#t make me or Eli a socialist... it means we are Social Democrats in the European sense and evil communist child eaters in the American sense

[Eli]

I eat only Christian children.