Smart Ones Avoid

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Ecthy
I study political science.

[GePap]

I studied political science.

HA!

[Cyclotron]

In general, I agree that - at least in my experience in college - the people that tend to gravitate to the college democrats / young republicans are generally not people I have much respect for, or would want in public office. They are only slightly above the level of people in student government; they're just smart enough to realize that they might "change the world" more adequately as a political hack than a school senate member.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by GePap
I studied political science.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by VetLegion
You need to join Spiffor's party of True Card Carrying Eurocomunists

QFT

[Flip McWho]

Originally posted by Spiffor
quote:
Originally posted by GePap
I studied political science.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Flip McWho

You f*cked it up.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Cyclotron
In general, I agree that - at least in my experience in college - the people that tend to gravitate to the college democrats / young republicans are generally not people I have much respect for, or would want in public office. They are only slightly above the level of people in student government; they're just smart enough to realize that they might "change the world" more adequately as a political hack than a school senate member.

I found it funny that no Pol Sci people got involved in politics in college, as far as I knew. To cynical by far...

Changing the world is always easier once you rule the world....

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by GePap
I found it funny that no Pol Sci people got involved in politics in college, as far as I knew. To cynical by far...

Changing the world is always easier once you rule the world....

Nobody I know in Politics wants to be part of it. All the successful politicians are fraternity-raised businessmen and lawyers who have the money and connections to run and succeed. Perhaps having a degree in Poly Sci should be mandatory for all officeholders at the national level.

[Ecthy]

Huh? in Berlin and Potsdam, the college politics are dominated by Pol Sci people. Only the a$$holy ones though, for normal folks applies what Cyclo says.

[Spiffor]

I am confronted with young activists fairly frequently. And their speech is indeed occasionally extremistic and devoid of arguments (the extremeness and intolerance varies from group to group). But it is pretty normal: young activists are, well, young.

They often lack political subtlety because they haven't spent years thinking about their actual ideas, because they haven't spent years gathering info showing that the world is not a simple place, they haven't spent years actually talking to people with different viewpoints.

Politics is a complex thing for young people, because politics are about the management of many people, who are also very different from each other. As such, politics is tpically the kind of matter that gets finer with time, and political experience.

This is incidentally why it would be a good thing to have people confronted with politics sooner than now. At least, they'll be politically dumb during their teenage years, instead of being politically dumb during their early adulthood (or later).

[Ecthy]

Spiff

Young people taking extreme points

My green alternative flatmate

[Cyclotron]

Spiffor is basically right on the money here - but I'm not sure about older people getting any better. Rather than having their opinions become finer or more subtle, it seems to me that they simply become more set in stone; the dumb or simply naive things they thought when younger become even more dogmatic, really only changing as they get more conservative with age.

I remember reading about one of the leaders of the nationwide Young Republicans, who said that she had been a liberal in high school, until she found out that a college she applied to had rejected her and probably did it in part because of affirmative action; apparently, that was enough to turn her into a hardcore republican. That kind of thing would almost never happen to a 40 year old.

[Ecthy]

u in the US now?

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Ecthy
u in the US now?

No, but I will be in 4 days.