WEDNESDAY, MAY 6, 2026
Harvard's fuzzy questions: These members of Gen Z today!
To what extent, do such youth condone "political violence?" A Harvard entity, the Harvard Youth Poll, decided to try to find out.
True to their nature, they conducted a survey—and the survey has attracted a fair amount of attention.
In our view, the strength of this survey's findings is perhaps a bit overrated. Before we tell you why, here's the organization's official report about that part of their sweeping survey:
Harvard Youth Poll
[...]
A strong majority of young Americans reject political violence—but some see it is acceptable under certain circumstances.
Across the measures we tested, most young people do not endorse political violence. But a substantial minority tell us that they are willing to justify it in certain, situational contexts—and those attitudes reflect emotional and economic strain far more than political identity.
Sixty-one percent (61%) fall into the “no violence” category of our index, while 29% show some acceptance (1–2 items) and 10% show high acceptance (3–5 items).
In total, 39% of young Americans say political violence is acceptable under at least one circumstance. The item-level data show where this openness comes from:
28% say political violence is acceptable when the government violates individual rights.
12% say it is acceptable when election outcomes are fraudulent.
11% say it is acceptable when someone promotes extremist beliefs.
11% say it is acceptable when someone else encourages violence.
10% say it is acceptable when peaceful protests fail to accomplish their goals.
Respondents were asked about five different types of circumstances. The numbers are there for you to review.
So says the official report. On last week's Real Time with Bill Maher, Gillian Tett was suitably upset by the youngsters' answers:
TETT (5/1/26): If you look at opinion polls, it's scary how much a proportion of Gen Z are now saying that they support some form of political violence to express, you know, their opposition. And that's got to change. I mean, that is simply not, as Bret [Stephens] says, the way to build a democracy.
Maybe—but also maybe not! In our view, here's the problem:
Some survey questions are quite straightforward. Everyone knows what's being asked, and everyone knows what's being said when a respondent answers. An example would be this:
Who are you going to vote for—Candidate Trump or Candidate Harris?
The question is completely straightforward. Respondents know what they're being asked. Pollsters know what's being said when the question gets answered.
That isn't the case with the set of questions which were asked about "political violence"—with this question, for instance:
The past year has seen an increase in political violence in America. Do you think political violence would be acceptable in America today when the government violates individual rights?
With a tiny bit of editing, that's the way the question was asked in the Harvard Youth Survey—and 28% of respondents answered in the affirmative!
For some observers, that percentage seems to be shockingly high. But what kind of "political violence" were those respondents endorsing? Also, what type of violation of individual rights did those respondents have in mind?
As posed, the question was strikingly fuzzy. There's no way to know what kind of "political violence" was being endorsed, in what type of circumstance.
For ourselves, we'd be reluctant to answer a survey question of that type. The question is so vague as to be virtually meaningless. If someone asked you that question in everyday chatter, you'd ask him to be more specific
A final point:
In reactions to this survey, observers like Tett have often taken the standard "shocked, shocked" approach. They almost seem appalled to think that any political violence would ever be acceptable to these kids today.
We're no fan of political violence, even in a democracy as imperfect as our own. But we can think of some famous Americans who may have been a bit less fastidious:
George Washington would be one such person. Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry might be two others.
The questions were extremely vague. The answers are hard to interpret.
Vague questions with meaningless results tells us that the people doing this are quacks. They received their doctorates and appointment from quacks. Huge swaths of academia are worthless. This is one of them.
ReplyDeleteNO. FUCKING. SHAME.
DeleteYou have no fucking shame, fascist imbecile.
I'll bet David never visited the survey itself to see what the actual questions were. Somerby doesn't report them here. How then can he know whether the questions are vague and the results meaningless?
DeleteSomerby also dislikes the concept of expertise. He thinks common sense is all you need to critique a study. His ignorant suggestion today is yet another way to undermine the concept of academic knowledge, giving fuel to know-nothings like David. When there is no such thing as knowledge, then any asshole can say and do whatever he wants without restriction. THAT is when the surveys will be meaningless -- when any fool can ask anything he wants and claim whatever he wants about the findings.
One could say that the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto during WWII was political violence. Even if you don't go that far afield, we must not accept blindly the government's definition of political violence. Government is always happy to classify most acts of dissent as political violence. Don't need to go far. Look at DHS's justification for killing people, e.g. Alex Pretti and Goode and others. DHS claimed that they were engaged in political violence.
ReplyDeleteOn the one hand there's political violence, i.e. attempted assassinations, that were perpetrated by individuals with no coherent objective or justification. These individual actors have been mostly confused, angry, disillusioned. On the other hand, the government jumps on these one-off actions to claim that Antifa is a terrorist organization; that protests against ICE are terrorist actions; that Comey was calling for Trump assassination with his Instagram post.
So, that survey is apropos of nothing and sort of ridiculous.
Consider the idea that the survey is not measuring anything about specific types of violence but the willingness to consider violence however the resonder defines it. What would that mean about attitudes toward political process? Is it useful to know whether young people are still fine with working within the system or think other means are needed?
DeleteSomerby doesn't quote this part:
Delete"Traditional political identities (Democrat, Republican, Independent) do not explain political violence among young Americans, and ideological labels account for far less than underlying structural conditions. Advanced statistical testing confirms that partisanship and ideology are not significant predictors of support for political violence — a pattern consistent with academic research showing only weak correlations between these identities and openness to political violence. Instead, higher acceptance clusters among young people facing greater economic precarity, lower trust in institutions, higher social alienation, and stronger beliefs that others hold harmful intentions.
Attitudes toward political speech reflect a related tension. Some young Americans are willing to restrict speech they consider harmful or destabilizing, revealing similar patterns of perceived threat and vulnerability."
Notice that the comparison is between ideological perspective (Dem vs Repub) and that if you specified a particular type of violence it would introduce a difference in the experiences of the two groups that would vary the question itself and thus make the comparison between the two groups confounded by an alternative explanation. Political party would not be the only factor varying but the type of violence also would vary because Dems and Repubs have had different experiences over the past year.
By leaving the type of violence vague but holding the wording the same for all respondents, the difference in their responses can be attributed to their ideological perspective (Dem, Repub, Independent) not their political experiences over the past year.
Note that the study found no ideological differences on willingness to use violence. That is important because Dems are being accused of causing violence with their rhetoric that is leading to acts of violence in our society. If youth are not showing such differences based on ideology, it undercuts that explanation offered by Republicans for political purposes. That's why this finding is important to this Hitler debate.
Somerby is rejecting that idea and supporting the right wing thesis. He says that if the question were more specific, there might be differences related to violent rhetoric. But if these researchers, via their vague wording, allowed a chance for such a difference to appear and it did not, then it is hard to claim that Democrats are inspiring youth violence because Dem and Repub youth are the same in their attitudes toward violence.
If you change the wording to specify the type of violence, you bias the question to produce the kind of response the Republicans predict based on Dem rhetoric. Why would Somerby suggest doing that, if he understood how surveys work? I suggest he has no idea what he is talking about.
The purpose of the study was to see how youth feel about political violence (comparing ideological groups), not to prove that Democratic namecalling has inspired attempts on Trump's life.
DeleteThe survey, perhaps, should've narrowed the scope and defined what constitutes political violence. Absent that specificity, it becomes very fuzzy.
DeleteWhat do the respondents consider political violence? In my mind, it's not one-off attempts on Trump's life. In my view, organized uprisings with the goal of affecting or overthrowing the government, bypassing the normally available means, constitute political violence. J6 was an example. Thomas Crook taking a shot at Trump was not.
If the purpose of the study were to determine how youth feel about specific types of political violence, your suggestion about definition would make sense. But the purpose of the study is to compare attitudes of today's youth with those of the past. Political violence definitions change, which interferes with making that comparison across generations.
Delete“Do you like Green Eggs and Ham?”
DeleteWell, does that mean the eggs are green, but it’s served with regular ham? Or are both the eggs and ham green? In this case, the phrase itself is ambiguous. So it sometimes goes with the printed word. To answer the question properly, you might have to know the answer to those questions, since you may love green eggs, but not green ham. And of course, a logical response to such a question might be, “Why are either of these fucking things green?”
I know I’m being facile here, but, the questions of any survey are extremely specific – at least, they were in the questions asked about “acceptable” (whatever that means) political violence in this survey. Acceptable to whom, we might ask.
One missing, for example, might be: “Peaceful persons and citizens are being kidnapped, deported and even murdered by anonymous political operatives, who have been given full immunity by the Federal Government. Do you think that justifies an acceptable violent political response?”
Our government, if it were functioning properly, would make that type of question unnecessary, but it’s not even asked (no one consulted me). But when a government openly oppresses it’s own citizens, in multiple unconstitutional ways, then I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised that violence as an answer becomes more tenable to some.
But 56% responded NOTA, so that’s good.
Leroy
Go look at the actual question by clicking the link. See if you think it is vague or ambiguous.
DeletePlease keep in mind that questions specific to our times need to be compared against 50 previous years.
DeleteThe book Green Eggs and Ham has a picture on its cover clearly showing that both the Ham and the Eggs are green. It is good to be literate but also good when childrens' books have pictures, given that children are so easily confused by things that adults already know.
DeleteThe question asked by the survey is:
ReplyDelete"Under what circumstances, if any, do you think political violence would be acceptable in America today?"
The results are announced without this sentence that Somerby has added ("with a little bit of editing" he says):
"The past year has seen an increase in political violence in America."
Somerby complains that the question does not specify the kind of political violence being suggested. Somerby's added sentence seems to limit the context to what has occurred in the past year. It would thus exclude 1/6 rioting but include Charlie Kirk's murder and the attempted assassination of Trump. It would exclude Rittenhouse but include ICE shootings of protesters.
There is a reason why a survey would exclude framing like the sentence Somerby has added. Context and framing effects are well-studied by Kahneman & Tversky and others who study the methodology of survey research and its impact on results.
Somerby knows nothing about those methodological concerns and has no training in how to design and conduct surveys. He pretends that no one has ever considered the kinds of flaws he tends to invent when objecting to results of one kind of another. Conducting studies is highly technical. When context is omitted to prevent biasing results, the responder provides their own context. Measuring that by comparing with previous survey results may be part of the research.
The way Somerby suggests his modification prevents his own readers from knowing what exactly was asked of the respondents. That is a way of putting his own thumb on the scales, manipulating his readers. Implementing his change would modify what was being measured by the questions.
It may be that increased willingness to endorse political violence (regardless of type) measures the degree of frustration with the political process held by these young people. If you limit it to shooting (Kirk, Trump) by adding a time limit, you cook the books by forcing respondents to think about murder instead of civil disobedience or blocking traffic. The researchers are not interested in how willing these youth are to kill but whether they are more fed up now than they were last time the survey was presented.
The interpretations of the responses are talking about how much more pessimistic today's youth are about job prospects and whether they lean left or right politically, compared to previous surveys. Those comparisons are not possible if you change the wording of the questions substantially, as Somerby urges be done.
"If someone asked you that question in everyday chatter, you'd ask him to be more specific..."
ReplyDeleteNo, I wouldn't. The question of whether political violence of any kind is ever warranted is a different one than asking if I would murder Hitler if I had the chance.
An autistic person who thinks in black and white terms and always requires concrete examples before answering a question might refuse to answer. Most of us are capable of thinking in abstract terms, generalizing, abstracting principles from groups of specific cases, considering hypotheticals outside of contexts, and agreeing with vague statements or specific ones, as required. That is flexible thinking. When people cannot be flexible, they are often classified as having a disorder of some kind. Children cannot think flexibly until middle school. Those with more education are better at it, than those who are undereducated or illiterate.
Pragmatics of language dictate that a person would give whatever type of response to the question that the situation dictated. For example, if asked "would you agree with the jury decision about a court case" your answer would be specific to that situation. If some stranger came up and asked "do you believe in political violence" I might suspect they are ICE agents or FBI and give the safest answer possible, which is likely "Sorry, I don't understand that question, can you restate it in Spanish?"
DeleteThe survey states that it is the 51st edition. If you change the questions you lose the ability to compare with previous years. The survey is about how today's youth differ from previous years.
ReplyDeleteThe vagueness of the question that Somerby points out, remains.
DeleteIf you put a question on a survey about whether someone likes dogs, then you have to list each type of dog or the question is too vague?
DeleteSteve M. discusses the recent call for Democrats to use plain language to talk to voters. I disagree with that complain and agree with what is said today at No More Mister Nice Blog:
ReplyDelete"I know, I know -- this isn't just a right-wing critique of Democrats. Many Democrats agree that their party's leaders sound too cerebral and professorial. But "Democrats are out-of-touch elitists" is a core right-wing argument, and Obama is echoing it here.
I don't really believe that professorial talk is what's holding back Democrats. Many liberal and left slogans -- "No Kings," "Tax the Rich" -- are very plain English. And Republicans don't always talk like regular folks.
I'll remind you that many of the young men whom Democrats would like to win over were introduced to right-wing thinking by a literal college professor, Jordan Peterson. These same young men embrace Stoicism (admittedly in a dumbed-down form) and follow influencers who regularly invoke the ancient Greeks and Romans. In the manosphere, young men invoke pseudo-scientific concepts like "hypergamy" to explain their struggles with dating.
Older Republicans praise pseudo-intellectual right-wing pundits such as Thomas Sowell and Hugh Hewitt, not to mention Newt Gingrich and Dinesh D'Souza, who delighted Republican voters for years with their academic-sounding denunciations of Obama's alleged "Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior." GOP voters appreciate efforts to turn institutions of higher learning such as Florida's New College into conservative beachheads.
They hate mainstream scientists, but love scientists who embrace vaccine and climate denialism. They distrust lawyers in general, but they revere the memory of Antonin Scalia, and they cheer on the Federalist Society lawyers who control much of the federal bench. They appreciate the work of right-wing think tankers like Chris Rufo. And they sometimes use fancy language: remember, we talk about trans rights, while their term for the trans rights movement is the very academic-sounding "gender ideology."
I don't think right-wingers care how highfalutin your language is, as long as they agree with you. If you tell them things they want to hear, you can use any language you want. If you tell them things they don't want to hear, they'll reject you even if you use nothing but one-syllable words."
https://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2026/05/the-magic-bullet-for-democrats-isnt.html
DeleteYastreblansky says about gerrymandering:
ReplyDelete"One of the strongest arguments for electing large Democratic majorities to Congress this November is exactly that: paradoxically, Democrats must gerrymander now, as ruthlessly as they can, to be in a position to end the gerrymander forever."
https://yastreblyansky.substack.com/p/gerrymandering-for-democracy
You might think about the possibility that it could be very difficult to outlaw gerrymandering later. You'd be asking some representatives to vote to have their own districts redrawn in ways that might cause them to lose their jobs.
DeleteIf Democrats have a majority, gerrymandering will be outlawed, based on past efforts to do so.
DeleteI don't share your certainty about this. I think it will be hard for representatives to vote themselves out of their jobs. But, hopefully, we'll see.
DeleteDemocrats have values beyond their own self interest.
DeleteWell every Democrat in congress currently supports a federal law against partisan gerrymandering. Not a single republican. The fucking corrupt Supreme Court 6 have now turned partisan gerrymandering into a virtue. So don’t get your panties in a wad DG, it ain’t happening
DeleteIt's easy to be against gerrymandering when there's no chance that an anti-gerrymandering law will pass Congress. Let's see if a sufficient number of Dems are so high-minded when it looks like they may actually have the numbers necessary to get a bill passed and signed by a President.
DeleteI’m sorry, DG, I didn’t realize you are a recent immigrant. Let me introduce you to the Confederacy of States. Let me know if you have any questions. Lol
DeleteKing Orange Chickenshit literally went to the Supreme Court and had his lawyer argue that as president he could have a political opponent assassinated and walk away with immunity. And guess what, Grand Wizard John Roberts said , yup.
ReplyDeleteSo what the fuck is TDH on about?
The headline for NBC's story about this is "Acting Attorney General Says Indictment Against James Comey Goes Beyond Seashell Photo."
ReplyDeleteThe fucking acting AG has indicted the former director of the FBI. Tell me again who the fuck is in favor of political violence.
It’s true. They will also present as evidence a dog turd they found at the beach, as further evidence that the sea shells were a commentary about Trump.
DeleteFBI raids office of VA Dem who led redistricting push in VA - a black woman
ReplyDeleteBecause fuck us, what are you going to do about it
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Modular Exhibits
Glancing through a biography of Mussolini, I came across this:
ReplyDelete"He (Mussolini) even thought it 'inadmissible' that he should fail to be given the Nobel Peace prize for his contribution to the Locarno settlement, and his ambassador in Oslo had a difficult time when this could not be arranged."
- Mussolini, by Denis Mack Smith, p. 152.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/saudi-arabia-denied-us-access-to-airspace-pressured-trump-to-pause-project-freedom/ar-AA22zb1O
ReplyDeleteTrump the Chump.
DeleteTalk about not reading the room: Trump sitting down with schoolchildren explaining how his war saved them from nuclear death in 2 weeks. Got them confused with a MAGA audience.
DeleteThe shame of it was all those people standing behind the crazy motherfucker watching this twisted demented megalomaniac literally abuse these children right in front of their craven eyes and doing not a fucking thing to stop it.
DeleteGo fuck yourself, dickhead. With a fucking rusty chainsaw.
I don't see Trump being one of the stupidest mother fuckers of all-time, ever having a negative effect on David's love of Trump's bigotry.
DeleteI wish I was wrong, but I live in reality, not the NY Times Op-Ed pages.
9:31, You're not wrong.
DeleteWhy not Somerby?
ReplyDelete"Ashley St. Clair, a 27-year-old former brand ambassador for Charlie Kirk's Turning Point USA, has turned into one of the fiercest critics of the movement she helped build.
St. Clair, who amassed more than a million followers on X, published an anti-transgender children's book, appeared on Fox News and took selfies at Mar-a-Lago, now alleges that many of President Donald Trump's top online cheerleaders are "mercenaries of the attention economy" coordinating with administration officials for paid promotional deals, reported the Washington Post.
"There is no free thinking here," she said in a recent TikTok video. "They are waiting to get marching orders and a direct deposit."
In near-daily TikTok monologues to over 77,000 followers, St. Clair claims to expose secrets of her former allies and the "hidden machinery" that created social media stars, alleging that top MAGA personalities portrayed as grassroots activists received coordinated talking points from administration officials and congressional Republicans through group chats with names like "Fight, Fight, Fight."
St. Clair revealed in February 2025 that she had secretly had a child with Elon Musk, the owner of X, and after their relationship ended and custody disputes emerged, she withdrew from public life for several months, describing it as a period of doubt and self-reflection when she realized she "didn't understand what [she] was talking about."
She emerged in January expressing "immense guilt" over spreading anti-transgender views and contributing to a movement built on "fear and false patriotism," where she said "everything is staged, everything is for a dollar, everything is about making money."
St. Clair has shared screenshots of direct messages offering her thousands of dollars per post to boost conservative candidates, and documented campaigns from influencer-marketing platforms instructing creators to coordinate messaging around political issues.
She provided evidence of Trump campaign official James Blair requesting her help amplifying posts attacking the Biden administration, with communications suggesting coordination between political operatives and social media personalities.
“Can E help gas this fire?” Blair wrote her in October 2024, likely referring to Musk, who later responded and promoted at least two of his posts attacking Democrats before the presidential election.
Critics, including fellow influencer Rogan O'Handley, have dismissed her as a disgruntled attention-seeker, but Renée DiResta, a Georgetown University researcher who studies political influencers, said St. Clair is "saying out loud what people who track the space have observed on the outside to be highly likely," confirming suspicions about the lucrative nature of right-wing influencer networks.
St. Clair said she is speaking out despite risks to her career because she fears the "viral-outrage infrastructure" will outlive Trump's presidency, fostering continued secretive cooperation between political operatives and influencers that could damage American politics."
Next she'll accuse Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Kavanaugh of being funded by Right-wing oligarchs, as if everyone in the world didn't already know that.
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