Sunday, June 26, 2016

Academics accusing Trump of authoritarianism

A lot of people try to compare Donald Trump to Hitler.

The comparison does not make much sense, but I want to look at one aspect -- the claim that Trump is authoritarian like Hitler. It appears to me that Hillary Clinton is much more authoritarian, as she is the one who wants to ban guns, to start wars, and to support questionable executive action such as the one that the Supreme Court just declared illegal.

The accusation usually comes from Jews who are extremely authoritarian themselves. There is actually decades of social science research on this, where authoritarian is defined to be right-wing authoritarian (the bad Hitler kind), and left-wing authoritarian (the good kind, according to the professors). This research was initiated by a Jewish group purporting to identify people who might support another Hitler.

Peter E. Gordon writes:
my poll asked a set of four simple survey questions that political scientists have employed since 1992 to measure inclination toward authoritarianism. These questions pertain to child-rearing: whether it is more important for the voter to have a child who is respectful or independent; obedient or self-reliant; well-behaved or considerate; and well-mannered or curious. Respondents who pick the first option in each of these questions are strongly authoritarian. Based on these questions, Trump was the only candidate — Republican or Democrat — whose support among authoritarians was statistically significant.
So they consider you authoritarian if you want your kids to be respectful, obedient, well-behaved, and well-mannered?!

Hillary Clinton wrote a whole book on how your kid should be in govt day centers. That is an example of left-wing authoritarianism. Those right-wing authoritarians just want well-behaved kids.

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