What Makes People Vote Democrat?

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For me, it often has more to do with revulsion at what the Republicans are doing than any particular confidence in the Democratic Party, but I actually did think Barack Obama might have the charisma to accomplish a formidable agenda, which factored into my voting for him, although I was let down to see him squandering his mandate and political capital. As an atheist and pro–sexual-freedom individual, Republicans' religious and social conservatism in particular repel me, but I've always enjoyed cultureal diversity too, so conservatives' talk about "illegals" and the loss of American culture strike me as moronic and xenophobic. Since I've known a few people on disability and have volunteered and worked with people in poverty, and I've personally had some rough life experiences for a suburban middle-class kid, I also tend to be more supportive of social welfare and other charitable action.

My father always votes Democrat because he supports "the working man" (e.g., he likes the song "Working-Class Hero"), and he worked for most of his career for the U.S. Postal Service (public-sector employees' economic interests tend to align with the Democrats). As a letter carrier, he was active in the Post Office's equivalent of a labor union; they can picket but not strike by federal law if I am not mistaken. He was also something of a latter-day hippie in his musical taste and style as a teenager/young adult.

Some people I know who vote Democrat do so because they passionately believe in protecting the environment. They feel outraged if they see a neighbor leave a light on, for example. I definitely enjoy the outdoors and wouldn't want it covered in tar or ash, but I'm definitely not so anal about it that I get worked up like that. Others vote Democrat because they strongly believe in reproductive/abortion rights and feminism. Still others are strong supporters of gay rights.

By the time all of the supposedly disadvantaged minorities have bloc-voted Dem, there really aren't many regular Joes left.

Those are the main reasons I vote Democrat.

They're too stupid to vote third party.

Back in the 50s, people who voted for Democrats were assumed by Christians to be Catholics.

I actually did vote for several third party candidates in the last election.

I'm talking the partisans who simply see D or R (which is a lot of people).

Most of the democrats in my family do it because they were/are part of a union. I know plenty of women that vote democrat because pretty much just because of the abortion issue which they see as a woman's rights issue. I don't really understand that since all pretty much agree that it is morally wrong and believe it's a human life with a right to live yet still support it because it's not "realistic" otherwise. It's such a minor issue either way in my opinion in the grand scheme of things so I don't understand why it's such an important issue to women.

From my experience, most of the democrats I've known weren't very ideological or were for the most part single issue voters. The candidates personality def plays a big part too, they LOVED Obama but didn't care to much for Kerry or Gore(although everybody loves Gore now in hindsight apparently)

I always just vote Straight-R

I don't know any better.

Emotions make people vote Democrat.

The same could be said for Religious Conservatives who vote Republican.

Indeed.

That's probably one of the dumbest non-answers I've ever seen. You haven't specified which emotions and over what issues these sentiments affect voting perferences. Ever since Hume it's been understood that emotions make people do almost everything that they do and certain patients with parts of the brain taken out show that without emotional centres people don't decide anything.

Yeah it is a dumb answer. "Emotions" are vague and has that douchey "OMG I'm so logical" vibe to it. What type of emotions does the democrat ideology appeal to?

I couldn't tell you what exactly makes people vote Democrat cuz there's so many reasons. Envy, jealousy, victim mentality, a genuine feeling of helplessness, misguided perceptions of how the rich came to be, misguided perceptions of what keeps the poor down, a more collective outlook of human nature, skepticism of intrinsic altruism, etc. Some are motivated by childish emotions which are in turn come from a childish mentality, others have to do with the way one genuinely perceives human nature.

I perceive human beings as needing autonomy, but at the same time no man is an island and we are social beings so I lean towards the right from the centre.

And yeah, logic is a means to an end, the end being emotions. It's a strategy on how to achieve the emotion effectively. Being rational doesn't mean being unemotional. Irrationality is taking the shortest route to the desired emotion, not being motivated by emotion itself.

Last edited by AceOfSpades on 16 Dec 2010, 4:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The patient I was refering to, by the way, was named "Elliot".

A lot of the emotions you described are what drives some people to vote Republican, too.