GranolaBox

Last week I gave a lesson in my US History classes that I give every year, and my kids’ reactions always surprise me and them. I give them a quiz I made up a few years ago that gives a pretty crude picture of what political party they most closely identify with. This is usually the first step on what I hope is their lifetime journey toward political awareness. In other words, taking the first step that the large majority of Americans will never take toward waking the fuck up.

The kids are usually surprised because they tend to assume that they’ve inherited their political beliefs from their parents. I did. Up until I took a course from a stark-raving communist during my freshman year I was a little Republican. If only my fire had been lit sooner.

Most Americans base their political affiliations on what others tell them to believe. Still more “think for themselves” and base their information on what they hear in the mainstream media. A frightful majority probably base their voting choice solely on 30 second campaign ads.

If you know someone fumbling around in relative political ignorance, here are some links that can start them on the road out of political darkness. The first set is for political parties or “philosophical orientation.”

World’s Smallest Political Quiz
This quiz lives up to its name. They pegged me as a flaming liberal. Who knew?

Quiz Farm
This one had some pretty interesting questions. What I liked about it is the way it incorporated more extreme ideas. This one identified me as a Democrat, closely followed by Socialist. In other words, a socialist who doesn’t want to throw away his vote.

Political Compass
I think Danger Democrat had this on his blog a while ago, but I forgot where I saved it. Thanks to the DD. This one placed me firmly in the libertarian left, and I couldn’t be happier. It also shows who you’re down with…and I’m down with Gandhi.
This was the most sophisticated of the quizzes I took. It was also the best explained, at least from a historian’s perspective.

Count Me In from Gurl.com
This one is designed unabashedly for teenage girls, and it’s pretty funny. I adopted the persona with attributes of my more intelligent female students to take the quiz. If I was a chick, I’d be a democrat.

These are some of the presidential candidate quizzes I took. They’re interesting because they came up with so many different answers. Until I took them, I didn’t think I was as much a Kucinich guy as I apparently am. I love the guy, and his wife would make the hottest first lady ever.

Minnesota Public Radio
I thought this was the most comprehensive of the polls, and gave me the most surprising answer. This had me with John Edwards, followed by Kucinich, Clinton and Dodd. I supported Edwards in the last election after Howard Dean dropped out, but then he dropped out too before I could attend his first campaign meeting.

Here’s a shorter version of the same poll. It would be better to send to politically ignorant friends simply because it’s a little faster. They also laid out how well you match the candidates very well. The longer version did a more comprehensive one, but this was easier to read. This one had me with Kucinich, followed by Mike Gravel (who the hell is that?) Dodd, Clinton and Obama.

Select Smart
This one is comprehensive but long. It has a lot of questions, may not be accessible to the average short-attention-spanned politically unsavvy American. Again, my Kucinich love-fest remains, but Obama was second. Hmmmn.

This site has a tons of non-political quizzes that allow you to choose from things ranging from religion to favorite Beatles album.

All these sites are great for the politically uninitiated. If more Americans would take the 5 minutes or so to do these before they went to the polls the world might be a better place. Or, if it was I wouldn’t bitch about as much.

Technorati Tags: Kucinich, John Edwards, Howard Dean, Mike Gravel

Filed under: Politics on November 15th, 2007