The political compass

[AdeptusHereticus]

Sargon just uploaded a video in which he takes this test about the poitical compass
https://www.politicalcompass.org/

I didn't watch the video yet, so I won't talk about it's content. The topic here is about the test itself. It uses the same compass everyone here agree with ... But the test itself looks painfuly useless to me. The wording is either too vague, or too tied to the -left-right paradigm rethoric. Some questions I woudn't have answered if the test wasn't forcing me too, and it was pretty difficult to choose the right answer to tick.

In the end, my score is 6.13/-6.26 and I don't recognize my own decisions in it. You might also notice something else that looks quite strange in the way the result is presented, but I'll let you discover what it is, and i'll see if I'm the ony one bothered by it. Maybe I misunderstood some parts of the tests and why the results are what they are ...

I would be very interested in seeing your own results and read your thoughts about the tests, if you have the time ... (3 minutes tops)

Edit : I just realized that I could use a link to show you my results so here it is
https://www.politicalcompass.org/yourpoliticalcompass?ec=6.13&soc=-6.26

[AnCap Dave]

Yeah, this particular political compass test is pretty lousy. Some of the questions don't exactly have a bearing on your actual political views yet they take them to mean one particular thing or another, mainly questions involving things like art and what not.

[CarcharOdin]

I've yet to come across a political spectrum test online that isn't either shitty or outdated.

[Ibrahim90]

My biggest gripe with the test is that there's no neutral option. I mean, some things I really don't give a shit about one way or another, even if they are politically relevant.

also, some of these things are non sequiturs: my (or anyone else') attitude on the morality of sex out of marriage (or gay marriage, or anything of that sort) doesn't have to have any bearing on what I think government should do about it. or take this one:

"from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is a fundamentally good idea.

I tend to agree, but who said government needs to handle it?

I could go on, but needless to say, the compass currently sucks...

[AdeptusHereticus]

Yes Ibrahim, that's exactly what 'im talking about. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who thinks that there's no good way to answer this test for people like us. The peoplle who designed this test don't seem very knowledgeable about what is libertarianism.

I couldn't even answer the first question !
"If economic globalisation is inevitable, it should primarily serve humanity rather than the interests of trans-national corporations."
How is that relevant ? Does that means that the test will process the answer as either something more or less socialist or something more or less corporatist ?

Or take this one :
"Military action that defies international law is sometimes justified."
Well, does that mean any international law, or merely the current ones ? Already the answer would differ ...

"There is now a worrying fusion of information and entertainment."
Why should I care ?

"People are ultimately divided more by class than by nationality."
Can't they be divided by other things ? Why those parameters should be the more relevant ones ?

"It's a sad reflection on our society that something as basic as drinking water is now a bottled, branded consumer product."
Is it counted as a corporatist tendency if I answer disagree, or strongly disagree ?

Now the thing that looks like it would explain it all is that, taken from the introduction :
"Our essential point is that Left and Right, although far from obsolete, are essentially a measure of economics. As political establishments adopt either enthusiastically or reluctantly the prevailing economic orthodoxy — the neo-liberal strain of capitalism — the Left-Right division between mainstream parties becomes increasingly blurred. Instead, party differences tend to be more about identity issues. In the narrowing debate, our social scale is more crucial than ever."

Does that means that they view the current left and right as non authoritarian by default ? That's what gets me. On both left and right, one of the premisses is that the country requires government intervention at some level. I know of one left ideology which doesn't advocate for government intervention anywhere : In France, they are called Les libertaires. Basically they see collectivism as the ultimate plan for society but argue that the government has no business whatsoever telling people to do it. They very much are the exception that confirms the rule.

So my contention here is that if the authors of the test don't see the current left and right as authoritarian to some degree, it could bias their wording and choice of propositions for the test, which will result in inaccurate results.

My last point in this post woud be that it might not be that important for libertarians anyway, since there are very few propositions in this test which can be answered in a libertarian way, which would suggest that they either don't understand it, or didn't see the problem of accuracy caused by the overshadowing of libertarian philosophy by the others. In other terms, this test is for the people from the left and the right.

[MrBogosity]

I've yet to come across a political spectrum test online that isn't either shitty or outdated.

The best one is still this: http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz/quiz.php?iframe=true&width=850&height=100%

[Travis Retriever]

The best one is still this: http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz/quiz.php?iframe=true&width=850&height=100%

And is by far the most popular.  It has been taken over 22 million times.

And yeah, I get:
Your PERSONAL issues Score is 100%

Your ECONOMICS issues Score is 100%

No surprise, given I'm a libertarian & Anarcho-Capitalist. X3

[MrBogosity]

And is by far the most popular.  It has been taken over 22 million times.

And yeah, I get:
Your PERSONAL issues Score is 100%

Your ECONOMICS issues Score is 100%

No surprise, given I'm a libertarian & Anarcho-Capitalist. X3

One of the flaws of that test, actually, is that it doesn't distinguish between minarchist libertarians and anarcho-capitalists. But then, that's not the point of it, either.

[AdeptusHereticus]

One of the flaws of that test, actually, is that it doesn't distinguish between minarchist libertarians and anarcho-capitalists. But then, that's not the point of it, either.

It severely lacks in other areas too : What is the mission of the military ? Can you sell drugs ? There are no laws about sex between two consenting adults but what about being employed to have sex ? And what about general rules about trade, employement, sex when it involve minors under the law ? General principles maybe ?Surely, it requires more to make a proper test ...

[MrBogosity]

It severely lacks in other areas too : What is the mission of the military ? Can you sell drugs ? There are no laws about sex between two consenting adults but what about being employed to have sex ? And what about general rules about trade, employement, sex when it involve minors under the law ? General principles maybe ?Surely, it requires more to make a proper test ...

The idea is to give a simple test so that people at fairs will be willing to stop and take it, to help libertarians do outreach. They used to have questions on things like drugs, but the questions they ended up with are the result of something like a decade of everything from minor tweaks to major changes, with the result being that these 10 questions are a good predictor of what people will likely answer to those other questions. It's astoundingly accurate for being so short!

[AdeptusHereticus]

Really ? Well, I've posted a comment on Sargon's video to ask him if he'd be willing to take that particular test because I'm curious to see his result now ... We'll see if I can be satisfied or not.

[Travis Retriever]

The idea is to give a simple test so that people at fairs will be willing to stop and take it, to help libertarians do outreach. They used to have questions on things like drugs, but the questions they ended up with are the result of something like a decade of everything from minor tweaks to major changes, with the result being that these 10 questions are a good predictor of what people will likely answer to those other questions. It's astoundingly accurate for being so short!

Well, closer to ~2 decades of tweaks & changes, if the age of it is any indicator (I thought it was first released in the mid 1990s).  Worlds apart from the Political Compass test.  And better than the one on OKCupid which has a lot of questions about your thoughts on philosophy that have little to with government, e.g. "Something like natural selection explains why so many people are homeless."  And if you say agree, you get points for economic freedom.  *facepalms*

That said, one criticism it has gotten that you've agreed with and tried to implement was that the libertarian answer always being "yes" might skew the results.  it's a shame the link to your mixed questions version of the quiz stopped working a while ago.  Oh well.  Still the best quiz on it I know, regardless.

[AdeptusHereticus]

Well, closer to ~2 decades of tweaks & changes, if the age of it is any indicator.  Worlds apart from the Political Compass test.  And better than the one on OKCupid which has a lot of questions about your thoughts on philosophy that have little to with government, e.g. "Something like natural selection explains why so many people are homeless."  And if you say agree, you get points for economic freedom.  *facepalms*

oO

[MrBogosity]

Well, closer to ~2 decades of tweaks & changes, if the age of it is any indicator (I thought it was first released in the mid 1990s).

Yes, but there haven't been any changes in quite awhile.

That said, one criticism it has gotten that you've agreed with and tried to implement was that the libertarian answer always being "yes" might skew the results.  it's a shame the link to your mixed questions version of the quiz stopped working a while ago.  Oh well.  Still the best quiz on it I know, regardless.

Yeah, I'll just need to program a back end of my own to get it going. Not that I have anywhere near the time for that...

But I think it worked. It pretty much proved that there wasn't any real bias there.