Young men’s and women’s opinions differ all over the developed world

The New Neo Posted on by

It’s not just in the US that young women lean more to the left than young men. It’s pretty much a worldwide phenomenon in developed countries, as well as a relatively new one:

The Economist analysed polling data from 20 rich countries, using the European Social Survey, America’s General Social Survey and the Korean Social Survey. Two decades ago there was little difference between men and women aged 18-29 on a self-reported scale of 1-10 from very liberal to very conservative. However, our analysis found that by 2020 the gap was 0.75. For context, this is roughly twice the size of the gap in opinion between people with and without a degree in the same year.

Put another way, in 2020 young men were only slightly more likely to describe themselves as liberal than conservative, with a gap of just two percentage points. Young women, however, were much more likely to lean to the left than the right, with a gap of a massive 27 percentage points.

In all the large countries we examined, young men were more conservative than young women. In Poland, the gap was 1.1 points on a scale of 1-10. It was a hefty 1.4 in America, 1 in France, 0.75 in Italy, 0.71 in Britain and 0.74 in South Korea. Men and women have always seen the world differently. What is striking, though, is that a gulf in political opinions has opened up, as younger women are becoming sharply more liberal while their male peers are not.

The phenomenon resides in the young – and if memory serves, I believe that in the US it is the young and unmarried, for the most part. Issues such as abortion are obviously a big part of this, at least in the US, but also perceived continuing injustices such as non-equal pay (which is a misunderstanding; the inequality has to do with women’s work patterns rather than discrimination, but widespread feminist propaganda says otherwise).

More:

One poll found that 72% of young American women who voted in House elections in 2022 backed the Democratic candidate; some 54% of young men did. In 2008 there was barely any gap. In Europe, where many elections offer a wide array of parties, young women are more likely to support the most left-wing ones, whereas young men are more likely to favour the right or even the radical right.

Remember that red wave that didn’t happen in 2022?

Also:

Although the men at the top are doing fine, many of the rest are struggling. In rich countries, 28% of boys but only 18% of girls fail to reach the minimum level of reading proficiency as defined by PISA, which tests high-school students. And women have overtaken men at university. In the EU, the share of men aged 25 to 34 with tertiary degrees rose from 21% to 35% between 2002 and 2020. For women it rose faster, from 25% to 46%. In America, the gap is about the same: ten percentage points more young women than men earn a bachelor’s degree.

So young women are more exposed than men to the leftist propaganda that dominates universities. My guess is that as a group they also tend to be more susceptible than men to propaganda that appeals to feelings, as leftist messages ordinarily do. And the disparity in education is probably contributing to a drop in marriage and childbirth rates, although there are certainly other factors as well:

In America, Daniel Cox, Kelsey Hammond and Kyle Gray of the Survey Centre on American Life find that Generation Z (typically defined as those born between the late 1990s and early 2000s) have their first romantic relationship years later than did Millennials (born between 1980 and the late 1990s) or Generation X (born in the decade or so to 1980), and are more likely to feel lonely. Also, Gen Z women, unlike older women, are dramatically more likely than their male peers to describe themselves as LGBT (31% to 16%). It remains to be seen whether this mismatch will last, and if so, how it will affect the formation of families in the future.

There’s much more at the link, none of it particularly encouraging.

On writing April Fools’ posts

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve been writing April Fools’ posts for nearly twenty years now. Some are better than others; I think my finest hour was in 2010. That one also went viral, and tons of people came to read it due to many links, not perceiving it was a prank. Many of the newcomers (and even some regular readers) took me seriously and berated me for what they saw as defending the indefensible and/or publishing misinformation (although that term wasn’t used back then). There was so much furor about that post that I had to issue a disclaimer and explanation.

The best April Fools’ posts are built on a foundation of truth, as was that one. This year’s post also was built on a true story but was less clever and elaborate than the 2010 one. Nevertheless it still fit the bill by fooling some of the people some of the time, despite the fact that towards the end I even acknowledged the date as April 1 and despite the fact that many commenters realized it was a spoof and said so.

The thing about April Fool’s and blog posts is that people aren’t necessarily expecting a joke and people don’t necessarily read all the comments, some of which would have let them in on it.

Each year, though, I think it gets a little more difficult to surpass the foolishness of most of the actual news and actual happenings. That’s another reason it’s hard to tell the difference between truth and fiction.

Trump pays the bond in the NY fraud case

The New Neo Posted on by

Now that the amount of the bond Trump was required to post in the NY fraud case was reduced from utterly impossible to merely extremely difficult (and I believe unprecedented for an individual; correct me if I’m wrong on that), he’s paid it:

On Tuesday, former President Donald Trump obtained a bond to cover the $175 million bond in his New York fraud case. The Knight Specialty Insurance Company will hold the bond. The company is owned by California’s “King of Subprime Auto Loans” Don Hankey. While Hankey is a Trump supporter and donor, he said Tuesday in an interview with the Daily Mail that he has not met Trump personally.

This is kind of interesting, as well. According to Hankey:

‘[Trump] first gave us a list of bonds and we approved the bonds as collateral along with some cash. When the collateral was finally posted it appears to be all cash. We have a screen shot of it and it was all cash.’

Asked why Trump didn’t simply pay the award himself, he said the transaction allows Trump to collect interest if the $175 million is invested in a money market or other allowable investment vehicle while being held in a trust account pending appeal.

What’s the interest on $175 million? Not bad.

An appeal to a higher court should be happening in the not-too-distant future. If Trump manages to delay or evade all the lawfare charges against him, this could enhance his popularity with voters still further – a sort of Road Runner thing.

Israel ends military operation in al Shifa hospital

The New Neo Posted on by

The 2-week long battle of al Shifa hospital is ended – for now. It really has been a successful operation:

I think it bears repeating: zero civilians killed. That is simply extraordinary. But of course, the MSM would much rather highlight the extremely unfortunate Israeli airstrike that unintentionally killed seven foreign aid workers. The fact that such errors and/or collateral damage are absolutely inevitable in urban warfare doesn’t matter; Israel is not allowed any errors.

More about the al Shira findings [emphasis mine]:

Following the IDF withdrawal, scenes of widespread devastation were revealed at the hospital, where many of the gunmen trapped had refused to surrender and engaged in fierce battles with Israeli troops. (…)

The army on Sunday released footage it said showed a cache of weapons seized by the Nahal Brigade’s reconnaissance unit in Shifa Hospital’s maternity ward.

“No hospital in the world looks like this. This is what a house of terrorists looks like,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a Sunday news conference.

The weapons, including mortars, explosive devices, sniper rifles, assault rifles, handguns, and other military equipment, were found hidden inside patient pillows and beds, and in the drop ceilings and walls of the building, according to the IDF.

Hamas hopes that civilians will be killed. It wants civilians to be killed, the better to stir up hatred of Israel and Jews, and the better to spread the blood libel and charges of genocide and war crimes. The enemy – Israel – is engaged in trying not to oblige Hamas and tries to spare civilians, at great cost to its own forces.

It is an astounding and Orwellian reversal of the usual aims of war, and that isn’t just because this is urban warfare. It is because for Hamas it is a propaganda war, and propaganda is their field of expertise. The propaganda war is the only one they feel they have to win. In terms of actual Palestinian deaths, Hamas figures the more the better.

First they came for Joe Lieberman: Caroline Glick on how and why the Democrats turned on Israel (plus, Glick interviews Patricia Heaton, actress who started a pro-Israel activist movement)

The New Neo Posted on by

As usual, Caroline Glick is well worth listening to:

I am highly impressed by Patricia Heaton. A brave woman and a very articulate advocate for Israel who has spearheaded a pro-Israel movement pitched to non-Jews, both Christian and others:

And while we’re at it, here’s a bonus. It contains information about the new Palestinian Authority prime minister (appointed, not elected, because the PA doesn’t do elections anymore), and the knavery-plus-foolery of the Biden administration. I’ve cued up the most relevant portion:

The state of the unions

The New Neo Posted on by

Most people are of the opinion that the Democrats would dearly love to replace Joe Biden as a candidate for 2024. But there are various stumbling blocks and it might not be possible. One of those stumbling blocks is: what to do about Kamala?

Harris isn’t a stronger candidate than Biden and therefore can’t take his place; in fact, she’s probably an even weaker one than he is. Plus, if she’s kicked off the ticket, quite a few people are going to be angry. That may be especially true of women voters and black voters, two of the Democrats’ core constituencies.

One of the things the Democrats need is an excuse to get rid of Kamala. So far it’s been difficult to find one. But there are rumors and rumblings that one might be emerging from an unlikely source.

You may recall that, back in early February of 2023 on the evening of Biden’s State of the Union speech to Congress and the nation, there was a startling encounter between Jill Biden and Kamala Harris’ husband, Douglas Emhoff. In case you missed it at the time, here it is, with contemporaneous commentary:

Very odd indeed, but people explained it away. Although the presidential and vice presidential couple don’t ordinarily travel on the same plane for security reasons, it’s not as though Jill Biden and Douglas Emhoff are strangers, either. Au contraire. For example, see this article from the summer before the 2020 election, when the campaign was ongoing:

“Dr. Jill Biden & Kamala Harris’ Husband Doug Already ‘Have a Real Bond'”: “I think that their bond is about that they can genuinely like each other and have that friendship and can do it together,” Harris told PEOPLE.

Maybe the only people who know what it’s like to be on the presidential campaign trail, other than the candidates themselves, are their spouses — which helps explain how Joe Biden’s wife and Kamala Harris’ husband “already were buddies” even before joining the Democratic ticket.

“They have a real bond and that’s also very special,” Harris told PEOPLE recently, in her first joint interview with Biden since being named his running mate.

In that conversation, via Zoom only days after the former vice president chose the California senator, the pair discussed the shared values that bond them and how they’ll work together in the Oval Office even when they may disagree.

The day after the Aug. 11 Zoom call where Biden offered her a history-making spot on the ticket, Harris and Emhoff drove up to Wilmington, Delaware.

“One of the first stops was to visit with the vice president and Jill at their home, and we just hung out [with] homemade chocolate-chip cookies and just caught up,” Harris said. (Family photos were pulled out, she says, adding: “Then Joe called my in-laws, Barb and Mike, and we surprised them.”)

Speaking with PEOPLE, Biden and Harris also talked about the quick ways in which the new foursome — Biden and wife Dr. Jill Biden, a community-college professor and the former second lady; and Harris and attorney Doug Emhoff, whom she married in 2014 after being set up by her best friend — had already clicked.

… Dr. Biden and Emhoff have also been trading supportive social media messages — the de rigueur show of easy camaraderie.

…Harris said. “They were on the trail together. So what ends up happening is that the candidate spouses, they take to the road on their own and go to various places that we can’t be. So Doug and Jill did the gay pride parade together in Las Vegas. They’ve done presentations together, and they sit next to each other at debates.”

There’s more in that vein at the link. One can only imagine that the bond may have gotten stronger since then, and another part of the bond is that – because Joe Biden had been Obama’s VP for eight years – Jill could appreciate what Emhoff fells like as the spouse of a veep.

But now rumors are circulating that there’s something more going on between the two, and that their respective spouses aren’t happy about it. I think these rumors are false, but my guess is that the goal is to use this as an excuse to dump Kamala from the ticket. Emhoff will be made the bad guy, of course, rather than Jill.

It’s not the greatest of solutions to this knotty problem. But it’s rather late in the game, and there aren’t many alternative approaches in sight. It’s already April 1, after all, and there are only seven more months till the 2024 election.

Airstrike in Syria kills Iranian officials;

The New Neo Posted on by

A precision attack in Damascus hit a building located between the Iranian and Canadian embassies. It apparently killed six senior Iranian military/terrorist leaders and is widely believed to have been launched by Israel:

I am always surprised to hear that such people are having actual physical meetings, although I suppose they feel safe in a place like Damascus. I also often wonder how Israel gets word of such get-togethers; I can think of several possibilities, though.

More:

Israel would apparently like to inform Iran that it will pay a price for its attacks on Israel, despite Iran’s using surrogates to execute those attacks.

The wife of slain NYPD Jonathan Diller officer gives a stirring eulogy at his funeral

The New Neo Posted on by

Jonathan Diller of the NYPD was shot by a career criminal with 21 arrests to his name:

Diller, who left behind a wife and infant son, was shot to death by a recidivist; that is, a repeat criminal.

But this was no ordinary recidivist. In the old days, that might have meant someone who had, at the very least, spent some time in prison. Under the new rules, though, Diller’s killer, whom I will not give the dignity of naming, had an endless history of previous arrests…21 in total at last word. Nor were these inconsequential arrests for things such as jaywalking or graffiti. Instead, the killer, who was arrested with a gun in his hand and shiv carefully stowed in his rectum, was arrested for violent crimes.

In a sane society, the killer would have been in prison until he was dead or too old to commit crimes. But thanks to the demons unleashed on society by the BLM movement, the killer—a black man with a Hispanic name—was out on the streets and armed. For leftists, his race meant he was society’s victim, no matter the carnage he deliberately rained down upon those caught in his path.

Meanwhile, Trump attended ceremonies for Diller on the same day that a trio of Democrat presidential luminaries – Joe Biden, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama – held a fancy fundraiser in New York that raised twenty-six million dollars for Biden’s re-election:

The mood at Radio City Music Hall was electric as Obama praised Biden’s willingness to look for common ground and said, “That’s the kind of president I want.” Clinton said simply of the choices facing voters in 2024: “Stay with what works.”

Biden himself went straight at Donald Trump, saying his expected GOP rival’s ideas were “a little old and out of shape.”

Har de har har har.

And way way down towards the end of the article it mentions:

Trump was in the New York area on Thursday, attending the Long Island wake of a New York City police officer who was shot and killed during a traffic stop in Queens.

Here is the eulogy for Diller delivered by his young widow. It is an eloquent and heartrending tribute to a man who sounds as though he was a wonderful person to know and an even more wonderful person to have as a husband and father. Tragically, his one-year-old son will never know him, although he no doubt will hear about him.

It puts me in mind of other assassinations of police officers throughout my lifetime, in particular the cold-blooded killings of NYPD officers Gregory Foster and Rocco Laurie back in January of 1972. The article is long; here are some excerpts:

For someone who came of age during the height of youth culture, Greg [Foster] didn’t spend much time being young. When he turned 22, that November, he was married, with two kids, and he’d served a tour in Vietnam with the Marines. No matter how many intimidating labels stuck to him—black kid from the South Bronx, cop in the ghetto, battle-scarred jarhead—anyone who knew Greg would have described him as low-key and genial, earnest and modest, maybe a little softhearted, maybe a little square. You wouldn’t have looked at his babyish round face and sleepy eyes and guessed his resume. His wife could have told you that he was too shy to dance. She couldn’t press his uniform shirts to his satisfaction, so he ironed them himself. The squalor of the projects appalled him. He’d grown up poor, too, but his mother would never have let him run the streets dirty and half-dressed, the way kids did there.

To see [Greg Foster] with his partner, Rocco Laurie, was to be put in mind of other contrasts. Greg was short for a cop then, with a spreading waistline, and Rocco was 6’1, just over 200 pounds, a weightlifter and weekend athlete. With his strong, straight features and by-the-book attitude, Rocco must have seemed exotically all-American to people on Avenue B, someone from a picket-fenced village in the heartlands, like Clark Kent. As an Italian from Staten Island, with its old world customs and post-war affluence—a place with color TVs and unlocked doors—Rocco was from far away. He also didn’t spend much time being young. At 23, he was also married, also a Marine, also a combat veteran, also new at the 9th. Rocco and Greg were more alike than not, in temperament and perspective. Neither man’s wife was crazy about their career choices, but Greg had wanted to be a cop since before he knew when, and Rocco took the test after he decided that college wasn’t for him. Still, the now-familiar movie trope of black and white cop buddies hadn’t been seen much then, on screen or off, and the partners were eye-catching, even in a neighborhood where the street life was a carnival that never left town.

They were shot in the back while walking the beat one evening; the perps were members of something called the Black Liberation Army. But they weren’t just shot in the back:

Three Black males walked toward them. One of them wore a long black coat and another a green fatigue jacket and black Australian-style bush hat, according to an insert from “Days of Rage,” a 2015 book authored by Bryan Burrough.

After passing Laurie and Foster, the men turned and unloaded multiple rounds into their backs.

Laurie was shot a total of six times in the limbs, neck and groin. Foster was hit eight times, including three direct shots to his eyes. One of the killers — apparently caught up in the moment — danced over the bodies while firing shots into the air. Two of the perpetrators removed the officers’ guns, one of which would later be recovered after a shootout with police in St. Louis.

Foster left a young wife and two children. Laurie left a pregnant wife who later miscarried and has never remarried in all the long years since. She is still a beautiful woman. You can see her in this photo (I can’t embed and copy it, so you’ll have to follow the link), taken in 2022 at a 50th-anniversary remembrance when by my calculations she would have been in her early 70s.

RIP Jonathan Diller, Gregory Foster, Rocco Laurie, and all the other officers murdered in the line of duty.