Well, I'd guess the most culturally diverse city (Los Angeles) is a likely answer.
Toronto is far more culturally diverse than LA, and that's the city that elected Rob Ford as mayor.
Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
51–60 of 92 posts
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. Washington, DC is absolutely not an ideologically diverse place, by basically any measure. 93% (!) of the city voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Additionally, most people there, Democrats included, are extremely dedicated to the status quo. I've live in cities all across America, including DC 2015-2018 -- I actually usually cite it as the least ideologically diverse place I've ever lived. I generally like Margi…
I work here and I agree. Everyone here thinks that the educated class should run the country. I had to move out to Anne Arundel to get away from it.
Was there a time when people thought the uneducated class should run the country? Were most of the founders part of the “educated class”?
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#53The question is complicated by the fact that a big part of the modern Republican ideology is a hatred of cities and an anti intellectualism. Which, by the way, is historically a very dangerous ideology and led to things like the Khmer Rouge's genocide.
You are aware that the Khmer Rouge was a leftist Marxist government, right?
Also, the “hatred” goes both ways.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all honesty, I'm sure the south wouldn't mind the social welfare state with all its trappings if it wasn't draped in progressive supremacist ideology. Surely there's an opportunity here, driving forward things like public healthcare (or public education) sans the diversity rhetoric.
Surely there's an opportunity here, driving forward things like public healthcare (or public education) sans the diversity rhetoric. What is "the diversity rhetoric"? Is it practically speaking possible to have a public healthcare system or a pubic education system without examining "diversity" in those services?
Of course, Scandanavian countries have both of those things without being diverse.
In some sense, high-quality public services have only been observed in non-diverse countries.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
I work here and I agree. Everyone here thinks that the educated class should run the country. I had to move out to Anne Arundel to get away from it.
Was there a time when people thought the uneducated class should run the country? Were most of the founders part of the “educated class”?
Pretty much all of the revolutions in until Russia in 1917 where almost 100% like this listen to Mike Duncans revolutions podcast series and its a very common theme.
I suspect some of the founders would have been OK with the franchise being limited to well off males.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all honesty, I'm sure the south wouldn't mind the social welfare state with all its trappings if it wasn't draped in progressive supremacist ideology. Surely there's an opportunity here, driving forward things like public healthcare (or public education) sans the diversity rhetoric.
Surely there's an opportunity here, driving forward things like public healthcare (or public education) sans the diversity rhetoric. What is "the diversity rhetoric"? Is it practically speaking possible to have a public healthcare system or a pubic education system without examining "diversity" in those services?
Most of the ways in which public education could be better would improve it for everyone.
But the NY Times (for example) is unable to discuss it without focusing on differences between groups of people. I think GP is saying that this gets people's backs up, and isn't necessary for making improvements.
The reason it angers people isn't entirely irrational. For example, if you know that your next public school principal is going to be judged not on the total quality, but solely on the black-white difference, then you know that he will be tempted to game the rating system and make things worse for one group.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#57I hypothesize NYC
Sorry, the groupthink here is palpable.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Look for places with competitive elections.
That could be more an indicator of a lack of political consensus or a fractured political power then of ideological diversity. As a concrete analogy, let's pretend there's a monarchy and the king, with identical twins, dies. There can be a highly competitive power struggle in between the two heirs but not over anything ideologically different. This happens in sports all the time. There's many highly competitive sport…
The "animal spirits" associated with a functional democratic process foster a culture where diversity of thought is at least possible.
I live in city recovering from an extreme -- a long era of domination by an all-powerful, mafia-like political machine. 40 years ago, even uttering an idea not in line with the machine would result in retaliation. Talk to someone identified as an enemy, and your street doesn't get plowed. Do anything more, and your relatives will be blackballed from employment.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#59The question is complicated by the fact that a big part of the modern Republican ideology is a hatred of cities and an anti intellectualism. Which, by the way, is historically a very dangerous ideology and led to things like the Khmer Rouge's genocide.
You are aware that the Khmer Rouge was a leftist Marxist government, right? Also, the “hatred” goes both ways.
I wasn't suggesting that the ideologies are identical, just that they share those elements.
And no, the hatred does not go both ways, but you might think so because another big part of modern Republican ideology is victimization and resentment. Which are also powerful dangerous forces historically.
Re: Which is the most ideologically diverse American city?
#60As a foreigner I must say Americans are rather blinded in their thinking about ideology from having a political system which doesn't allow for more than two parties.
Yes sure legally speaking there can be more parties, but due to the winner-takes all form of voting, there is no practical way for a third party to ever enter politics.
The existence of the republican and democratic party in the US for such an exceedingly long time has created a very ingrained sense of what politics and ideology is in the US.
People naturally have a much wider spectrum of ideologies than those represented by democrats and republicans. Yet there is no way to express that at the voting booth. Hence whatever people vote wouldn't really reflect the ideological divide.
Seen from my Norwegian perspective, if Norway was a city in the US, then Hillary Clinton would likely have gotten 90% of the vote. However that doesn't mean there is a lack of ideological diversity in Norway. There are 9 major parties in Norway and several much smaller ones, representing quite a diversity of opinion. The democratic party would have been quite an outlier politically in Norway, yet Donald Trump and republicans are even more extreme that people would naturally vote Hillary.
That a diverse set of people vote on some common lesser evil doesn't really make them all that similar.