Politics for a Tuesday

[pauraque_bk]

The best evidence suggests that LJ is much more liberal than the general population. My own election poll, primarily answered by fandom people, went even more overwhelmingly for Kerry. (I also asked only US citizens to participate; if I'd opened it up to everyone, I'm sure we'd've seen even more Kerry votes.)

Based on these polls, LJ fandom resembles a strongly Democratic-voting city, like Philadelphia or Washington, DC. That gels with my subjective experience of what the political views of online fans are like -- we're a big bunch of liberals. It feels much like my real life, and I live in Berkeley.

There are conservatives in fandom, of course, and they seem to be well aware they're in the minority, as the success of therightfangirl should attest.

So, my question of the day is: Why is online fandom so liberal? When this comes up, I usually hear variations on two different answers:


1. The internet as a whole is liberal.
We've already seen that LJ is liberal, and it seems to make sense that the internet would be, because so many internet users are sub/urban (or at least were in 1998). Then again, many users are also financially successful, which could indicate greater conservatism.

And there are online services that more accurately reflect the politics of the general population than LJ. AOL polls, for example, usually seem close(r) to national polls. I'm also reminded of that online newspaper poll on gay marriage some months back that we all encouraged each other to go vote in. It was a pretty even split. (But are conservatives better at organizing? Well, that's another topic.)

If there are any fandom oldbies listening, what were politics like before fandom got online?


2. It's the slash, baby.
Can this possibly be a major factor? Do conservatives really go looking for fanfic online, notice slash, and take their business elsewhere? Surely there are enough het and gen fandom outlets to make this a non-issue, except for the most savagely anti-gay individuals. (Ooh, has anyone polled the politics at the Sugar Quill?)

Or maybe it's the other way around. Are liberals attracted to fandom in greater numbers because of the gay-friendly atmosphere?


Responses from conservatives would be especially welcome.

Comments

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

i think, youth, education, and yes, the slash :-) though i do wonder now and would really like to see a poll as to whether het folks tend to be statistically more conservative. that'd be very, very interesting!!!

[mincot.livejournal.com]

Although I can assure you that many liberals like genfic in and of itself--I think we're majority liberal and centrist over at the Hat and other places.

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

oh, i never meant to question that..overall, fannish folks tend to be more liberal on average, i'd assume...i just wondered if percentage wise the number of conservatives among non-slashers was higher than that among slashers (y'know, the entire how can you read/write two guys/girls having sex yet support the marriage amendment)

[mlle-petal.livejournal.com]

well i'm pretty active in the het side of the fandom, and i've found that even there the folks are overwhelmingly liberal. i'd say it really is a cross-fandom phenomenon. how intriguing :) it is worth mentioning that most het fanners tend to be fairly supportive of (or at least not squicked by) slash, so maybe there's still a connection of sorts...