It’s fascinating how some of these questions are phrased.
Should Australia spend more or less on its military?
I have no idea what Australia spends on its military. I don’t know whether it’s too much or insufficient. I wouldn’t feel qualified to answer this question, so I abstained.
But abstaining from this question appears to have affected my compass result. There are a few I abstained from and I think that by doing so, it has put me a lot closer to center than is probably accurate.
I used to think of myself as fairly central. Only “central” has seemed to move over the past 20 years and while I don’t think I’ve changed all that much, I’m considered more left these days than I used to be.
Zagorath@aussie.zone 4 weeks ago
If you ever needed evidence that Labor has abandoned its traditional position of being the party of the Union Movement:
Screenshot showing party answers to the question “How much power should trade unions have in the workplace?” LNP and ONP say “Somewhat less”. Labor says “About the same as now”. Greens say “Much more”
Also wow, absolutely fuck Labor for this one:
Screenshot showing party answer to the statement “Boats carrying asylum seekers should be turned back.” LNP, ALP, and ONP all say “Strongly agree”. Greens say “Strongly disagree”.
These are positions as self-reported by the parties.
Here’s my result:
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Not sure why it puts me more economically conservative than the Greens but more socially left. I answered a stronger position than the Greens every time my position was different from theirs on an economic issue, including saying “much more” to wealthier people’s taxes and “much less” funding for private schools and private healthcare.
I also found myself more moderate than the Greens on some social issues, like I said “somewhat agree” on “Political parties should commit to running at least as many women candidates as they do men”, where the Greens say “strongly agree”. My take is that anywhere from a 40–60% balance is reasonable, but that also it’s important to take into account other factors like racial background, sexuality, and occupation. It’s also important to consider where they’re running. It doesn’t matter if two thirds of your candidates are women, if the men are in all of the safest seats. Labor, at the last election, if they had taken that strategy, would have had 101 women candidates and 50 men, but would have ended up with 50 men in Parliament and only 27 women…
zero_gravitas@aussie.zone 4 weeks ago
Not sure why it puts me more economically conservative than the Greens but more socially left.
I think you’re mixing up the axes! You are economically to the ‘Left’ (on the left-right axis) of the Greens, but slightly more socially conservative (up-down axis).
Zagorath@aussie.zone 4 weeks ago
You’re reading it as an upside down version of the normal Political Compass, which would make sense (though not sure why you’d flip it rather than just using the Political Compass as it is).
But if you read the axes as they’re actually labelled by the ABC, the x-axis is labelled “social” and the y-axis is “economic”.
PointyReality@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
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A nice little thing to play with.