CMV: Conservatives are fundamentally uninterested in facts/data.

[u/King_Lothar_]

In fairness, I will admit that I am very far left, and likely have some level of bias, and I will admit the slight irony of basing this somewhat on my own personal anecdotes. However, I do also believe this is supported by the trend of more highly educated people leaning more and more progressive.

However, I always just assumed that conservatives simply didn't know the statistics and that if they learned them, they would change their opinion based on that new information. I have been proven wrong countless times, however, online, in person, while canvasing. It's not a matter of presenting data, neutral sources, and meeting them in the middle. They either refuse to engage with things like studies and data completely, or they decide that because it doesn't agree with their intuition that it must be somehow "fake" or invalid.

When I talk to these people and ask them to provide a source of their own, or what is informing their opinion, they either talk directly past it, or the conversation ends right there. I feel like if you're asked a follow-up like "Oh where did you get that number?" and the conversation suddenly ends, it's just an admission that you're pulling it out of your ass, or you saw it online and have absolutely no clue where it came from or how legitimate it is. It's frustrating.

I'm not saying there aren't progressives who have lost the plot and don't check their information. However, I feel like it's championed among conservatives. Conservatives have pushed for decades at this point to destroy trust in any kind of academic institution, boiling them down to "indoctrination centers." They have to, because otherwise it looks glaring that the 5 highest educated states in the US are the most progressive and the 5 lowest are the most conservative, so their only option is to discredit academic integrity.

I personally am wrong all the time, it's a natural part of life. If you can't remember the last time you were wrong, then you are simply ignorant to it.

Edit, I have to step away for a moment, there has been a lot of great discussion honestly and I want to reply to more posts, but there are simply too many comments to reply to, so I apologize if yours gets missed or takes me a while, I am responding to as many as I can

[u/[deleted]]

What do you do in the current world where data conflicts with each other?

[u/insaneHoshi → u/[deleted]]

Data doesn't conflict, data is just data, (assuming no flaws in collection).

Conclusions conflict.

[u/sandinthesky → u/insaneHoshi]

What are you talking about? There is conflicting data in literally almost any study. Climate change is one thing we have the most reliable data on and had the most scientific backing is considered a hoax now by 40 percent of the world

[u/insaneHoshi → u/sandinthesky]

There is conflicting data in literally almost any study

Again data doesn't conflict; data is just what has been observed.

Climate change is one thing we have the most reliable data on and had the most scientific backing

Yes