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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill who wrote (116585)	5/27/2005 11:18:07 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793835

Bill, it seems to me that you miss the point of asking these questions. The point is to identify the perspective of the subject on various questions having to do with economic and social control vs. liberty. The objective is not to encourage any particular POV, including yours. The questions are designed to provoke a reaction. Controlling inflation is more important than controlling unemployment. Good question, yet it should have been inverted, "Controlling unemployment is more important than controlling inflation." Of course it could have been asked the other way. In which case all the "strongly agree" answers would have been "strongly disagree" and the converse. Six of one, half dozen. In either case, the question differentiates between the left and the right, which is the objective. Here's one that goes the other way: "Land shouldn't be a commodity to be bought and sold." If you agree with one, you are likely to disagree with the other. Everybody gets to agree with some and disagree with others. In longer, more rigorous questionnaires they ask each question both ways, but in an internet quickie, they don't bother. Nothing to get exercised about, I don't think. If economic globalisation is inevitable, it should primarily serve humanity rather than the interests of transnational corporations. A false dichotomy. Well, yeah. They do that on purpose. The other day, Tim was fussing at the "hard" questions on a values hierarchy instrument I had posted where you have to choose between "national security" and "love" or between "cleanliness" and "salvation." They use false dichotomies to draw out what you care most strongly about. The questions are supposed to be hard. Here's a question that is practically the flip side of the previous one about business serving humanity: "The only social responsibility of a company should be to deliver a profit to its shareholders." You do not mention that you find that one biased, that is should be inverted. Because corporations cannot be trusted to voluntarily protect the environment, they require regulation. Poor (slanted) construction. What the respondent agrees or disagrees with is whether regulation is required. But the faulty premise of the question is that corporations can't be trusted. Not really. What they are really asking is how much corporations can be trusted to voluntarily protect the environment. They just do it by the back door so you can't see it coming. An answer to the direct question of whether regulation is required isn't as revealing. I find myself in an odd position of defending intentionally confusing questions given how much energy I put into analytical differentiation on this thread but they do do that on purpose and I imagine that they get more accurate results that way.