Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development
A University study has found that Conservatives think Stephan Colbert dislikes liberals.
The study investigated biased message processing of political satire in
The Colbert Report and the effect of political ideology on perceptions
of Colbert.
Results showed that political ideology influences biased processing of
ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data
from an experiment with 332 subjects, researchers found that
individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions
of Colbert's politics.
Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in
Colbert's funniness. However, conservatives thought that Colbert only
pretended to be joking and genuinely meant what he said. Liberals were
more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when
offering political statements.
Conservatives also believed that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally,
analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert's political opinions
verified a relationship between political ideology and individual-level
opinion.
Colbert is clearly not a conservative. At a White House Corespondents
Dinner Colbert, who the part of the Faux conservative talk show host,
he spoke about truthiness as he assaulted Bush under the guise of mock praise. He
lampooned Bush over everything from his low approval ratings to his
handling of Iraq to his vaunted stubbornness and even got in a few shots
at the Washington press corps as well.
The Bush episode indicated that conservatives really didn't get what
Colbert was saying. Otherwise they would have never let Colbert roast
the president.
Keith Olbermann of MSNBC Cable News had seen Colbert's skits when the
show was first starting. He advised Colbert that the satire might be too
subtle for conservatives.
Heather LaMarre, one of the authors of the study was on the Keith
Olbermann show disusing the study. She explained that Archie Bunker, who
was designed to be a ridiculous character, was viewed as charming and
old fashioned by conservatives. Olbermann responded with something like
"There you go. People see what they want to see."
A bigger question is why is there perceptual or cognitive disconnects exist between conservatives and liberals?
According to Wikipedia, Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral development
can explain some of the cognitive issues; He has three levels with that
each have two stages: pre-convectional, conventional and post
conventional:
- Level 1 (Pre-Conventional)
- 1. Obedience and punishment orientation
- (How can I avoid punishment?)
- 2. Self-interest orientation
- (What's in it for me?)
- Level 2 (Conventional/Conservative)
- 3. Interpersonal accord and conformity
- (Social norms)
- (The good boy/good girl attitude)
- 4. Authority and social-order maintaining orientation
- (Law and order morality)
- Level 3 (Post-Conventional/Liberal)
- 5. Social contract orientation/liberal of the Post Conventional level.
- 6. Universal ethical principles (Principled conscience)
Charles Hampden-Turner of the UK also
wrote a book on Kohlberg''s theory and used the term conservative for
conventional and liberal for stage 5 of the post-conventional level.
Kohlberg indicated that people that functioned at the higher levels
could understand the lower level thinking, but the lower levels had a
far harder time understanding reasoning in the moral level above them.
Conservatives have two levels. The Stage 3s follow social norms have the
'good boy' or 'good girl' attitude. Rush Limbaugh has often stated that
his Dittoheads are the good guys. Most of the Ditto heads are in fact,
the lower level Stage 3 conservatives.
This is why the post-conventional progressives and conventional conservatives have so much trouble communicating with each other.
The higher level Stage 4s have a bigger picture view of conservative
thought such as columnists Chris Buckley, Michale Smerconish, Paul
Novak, James Dean, Charles Krauthammer, and Peggy Noonan.
Although
authoritarian thought has always been a feature of conservatism, James
Dean of Watergate infame has stated that the old moderate Goldwater
conservatism had morphed into simple authoritarianism.
This started when Newt Gingrich became the Speaker of the House in
1994. Newt did not want Republicans to associate with Democrats and also
abolished the committee system in the House which had been based on
seniority. Instead he made people who were loyal to him committee
chairs. This started the spiral of the GOP into ideology and purity.
Most liberals and progressives are post-conventional. In Stage 5
(social contract driven), individuals are viewed as holding different
opinions and values.
Similarly, laws are regarded as social contracts
rather than rigid dictums. Those which do not promote the general
welfare should be changed when necessary to meet "the greatest good for
the greatest number of people".
This is achieved through majority
decision, and inevitable compromise. Thus democratic government is
ostensibly based on stage five reasoning.” This sounds a lot like
Barack Obama, doesn't it?
Stage 6's are rare birds and these people are usually great reformers like Jesus, Mohamed, Martin Luther and Gandhi.
The Stage 4 conservatives believe in law and order, but will happily
look the other way when international law is involved. The Bush
'enhanced interrogation techniques' are a good example of this.
Stage 5 liberals respect both US and international law. They also know
that laws are constantly being changed and do not have a high regard for
the belief that law is etched in concrete. A dynamic democracy must
evolve to succeed. Men make the laws and men can change the laws.
Another way of looking at this is that the conventional people are "in-the-box" types. Post -conventional people are the "out-of-the box"
types that are are more free thinking, open-minded and tolerant. It is
not hard to figure which groups would oppose social change like gay
marriage and what group would support it.
It is also easy to comprehend why most religions are seeped in
convention and orthodoxy and many follow codes of conduct developed in
the Bronze Age.
You
now know why Archie Bunker was considered a ridiculous character by
liberals, yet was viewed as charming and old fashioned by conservatives.
You also know why some conservatives don't like Rightardia. They don't understand the satire or post-conventional thought at all.
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