Wrap your head around this set of polling results reported by Heather Hulbert over at the Democracy Arsenal:
1. Women are more scared than men. Women are significantly more worried about the likelihood of a terrorist attack on the US, and personally concerned about the safety of their loved ones.
2. Yet, women are less supportive of pre-emptive approaches and military action.
3. And they are more supportive of diplomacy and "soft power" than men, despite being more afraid.
This leads me to a meditation about change: what’s it telling us if more than half of more than half of the voting population is heading for the future with hope and fear together? If they want their fears heard and responded to as part of moving forward with hope?
I suspect there’s a third factor at work. Apparently fear is not the main value correlating with support for hard-line militarism. Although, after skimming the American Security Project Survey I don’t see any easy way to figure out what that factor is. Oh well, possibly an area for follow up research.
Recent Comments