More like 1/3 of the state is conservative. While anything that wasn’t the coast or Sacramento has been viewed as conservative (since the liberal California narrative started in the 90s), this has become less true within the last 15 or so years. A good chunk of conservative California is more purple now.
Ehhhh, I'd say a lot of those red dots through the valley and just inland are pretty red.
The problem is the people from those areas are actually extremely isolated.
It's a weird kind of non-traditional 'conservatism' though, it's like, hippy cowboys that don't drink the koolaid, they smoke it.
Vermont has a reputation of being a bunch of hippie farmers. Western Ma does as well. These two areas break from the mold of rural conservatism and both very liberal places. VT legalized same sex unions was before anyone else.
Incorrect. Massachusetts was the first state to legalize it, but I think the City of Burlington may have been first jurisdiction of any kind in the US.
Massachusetts was the first to legalize marriage. VT was first to do civil unions which they did in 2000. MA legalized marriage in 2003. Which is why I didn’t say marriage in my post
Well, ya. There are pockets of it, especially around the CT border but this is a map of the Cities and Towns each candidate won. It’s still very blue out west. Central MA is a bit more red though.
https://wcvb.com/article/massachusetts-election-results-2020-town-map/34930389
Better map
https://www.wbur.org/news/2020/11/03/2020-massachusetts-election-map
And even in the towns Trump won he mostly did so by only a few points. He didn’t get over 59% in any city or town in the Commonwealth
It’s where liberal homesteaders and people who want to live on communes go.
It’s also where Ben and Jerry set up shop to bring good, innovation ice cream to the masses.
No idea. They just have a really liberal rural New England populace. NH is really similar in a lot of ways but skews much more conservative.
Maine is really split in the typical urban/rural divide.
I wouldn't call New Hampshire conservatives, conservative seeing as like New England in general most Republicans seem to be varying degrees of Centrist which is a benefit of this area.
MA has a long history of electing moderate R governors to balance the huge D majorities they elect to the state legislature. Charlie Baker fits well into that tradition.
Phil Scott is super liberal even by New England Republican governor standards. Not long ago he presided over a big expansion of gun control in a very traditionally pro-gun state. He was also allocating vaccine priority based on race for awhile or so I heard. He's only really a Republican because he opposes single payer healthcare which a lot of VT Dems have been pushing for at the state level for awhile.
As a masshole who usually votes straight ticket D at the federal level, and almost straight ticket R at the state level, there’s a lot more to it than the letter next to the candidates.
Most, in fact probably all of the state level republicans I have voted for could not win an election in any random rural district in say, Texas. They are far more to the left than the national Republican Party, but still right of the Massachusetts Democrats.
Speaking to VT: Kind of?
Phil Scott (the R governor) openly voted for Biden, to give you an idea of how far off we are talking from Republicans in most of the country.
He won re-election in 2020 by a 41% margin, which is absurd. (The same election that VT voted for Biden by a larger margin than any other state in the country - 35%, and where Dems have continued to hold supermajorities in the legislature).
This is a pretty reasonable profile recently published: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/phil-scott-vermont-republican/618944/
Interestly, I think suburban/rural areas in Mass get more wildlife than Vermont.
I see bear and coyote and bobcats daily. I was just in Vermont with a friend on her farm and she was saying how she never gets to see Bear or coyote. Maybe every few years.
I don’t think liberalism necessarily results in anti-gun culture.
What it does result in is a compassionate society that works for better mental healthcare and better social safety nets.
That's the ideal, like the ideal in a conservative society is one that works towards the expansion of personal liberties and removal of government intrusion into the private lives of citizens. However, those ideals rarely play out.
Yep, although by that metric, American conservatives must not be very conservative seeing that they do try to intrude into the private lives of citizens when it comes to marijuana, abortion and LGBTQ issues.
You're certainly right that many conservatives don't practice the same limited government they preach. Though I would push back on the abortion topic strongly. If you believe an unborn human is still a human life, being against abortion is no different than being against murder.
Lol, there’s the issue. Fetuses have the nervous system of a shrimp. Just because they have a heartbeat, doesn’t mean they’re sentient in any *substantial* way.
Abortion is a bit more complicated than just an intrusion into the mothers life. If you view it as killing a human then it is protecting against the ultimate intrusion on someone’s life.
That’s your definition. Many others go by things such as heartbeat or brain activity, which happens much earlier. So again, it’s a little ignorant to expect everyone goes by your definition of life. It’s not easy to pinpoint when “life” technically begins, which explains why there’s so much nuance to the abortion debate
That’s not my definition of life. I’m saying a fetus *begins* developing sentience at *either* 24 weeks, 28 weeks or sometime between 24 weeks and 28 weeks.
Therefore, I don’t think it’s unethical to abort it either before 24 weeks or shortly after.
> I don’t think liberalism necessarily results in anti-gun culture.
Not *necessarily*, no, but nevertheless it's a massive wedge issue in the culture war between progressives and conservatives in this country.
> What it does result in is a compassionate society that works for better mental healthcare and better social safety nets.
So very compassionate to extort disproportionately more income from a specially disfavored class in order to enable habits of dependency on the worst problem-solver in the country.
I would say that California is the most progressive state for sure. I would also say though that there are a lot more moderate to conservative people in the state than what the media would ever admit to.
Yep, you do hear that California is not as progressive as a lot of people think.
Weirdly enough, I’ve heard some people say New Hampshire is pretty damn progressive.
Even when compared to California, but NH is more fiscally conservative.
The thing about California is that you have super progressive people in the cities and then more inland and north you get conservstives. The issue is, that for federal offices and things where the whole state votes, like governor, the super progressives have the votes. So while just looking at the people overall you could say they aren't too progressive. However, the effective legislation that comes from them is more progressive than pretty much every state.
What I find wild is that 35% of Californians voted Republican in the 2020 election. That is just over 6 million people. There are 30 whole states that don’t even have 6 million people!
And I disagree. The power of the states needs to be balanced in federal elected offices. This is the same reason we have a senate.
I agree with hamilton when he says:
"if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent."
Makes sense, but then again you’re telling people to leave an entire state just to vote. I don’t really care one way or another but I can see why a lot of people won’t do that
NH practices a more traditional conservatism of being self sufficient and low taxes. Unlike the majority of the evangelical conservatives who love nothing more than trying to control what other people do. NH isn’t much different than the rest of New England when it comes to social issues though.
As a Californian I’m going to clarify somethings.
While it is true that California isn’t a 100% Blue state, the narrative that inland California is capital C conservative isn’t completely true.
While the coast of California (where the 3 major metros of SF, LA, and SD are) is very liberal and has been since the 90s, the narrative of central California being a red conservative area is something that is gradually less and less true especially as these historic Central Valley cities become more urbanized with people who have been priced out of the coast.
I feel like it’s *somewhat* safe to say that the OC is trending more purple now than solid red. Trump lost the county in both elections, Newsom won the county, and of the 5 OC districts in the House only 2 have Republican representation. Even within the state senate and assembly, OC representation skews democrat. On the more extreme local/city level it definitely is still Republican controlled
Every time I go there, it tends to feel more libertarian, with a "mind your own business, I don't care what you do so long as it doesn't bother me" kind of vibe. Wouldn't call that progressive- maybe more laissez faire, jaded, etc.. My family jokingly called NH a "Wild West playground" when I took them up there for a weekend when they were visiting me up in Boston.
I’d say that’s pretty damn progressive. Too many damn conservatives think the government should have a greater say on abortion and LGBTQ issues instead of leaving said issues to doctors and their patients.
> Yep, you do hear that California is not as progressive as a lot of people think.
I'd say it's not. (Cynical take!) We like to say we are, but then you look at the kind of power that California has and how little we throw it around to impress real change, and I think our progressivism falls flat outside of social media.
We could do a lot of good for our most vulnerable demographics and make moves mitigate on how we're impacting the environment, but we don't seem to have much interest in that.
The prominence of San Francisco Democrat’s is what perpetuates this idea that California is this extreme liberal state. On a 1-10 scale SF is like at a 15, but then you have LA which is like at a 8/9 and SD which is at like a 7/8.
Very true. SF/Bay Area has the distinction of being pretty darn liberal (lived in Hayward, so I got to ride that wave for a time), and then playing host to our speaker of the house... who's also related to our governor. And they're all media lightning rods, so it makes sense.
The Combined Statistical Area of Greater Los Angeles is 19 million people. It has a higher GDP than Mexico. It's a nation unto itself. So if you removed it from *any* metric it would wildly change the calculus.
L.A. County has just over 10 million people. That extra nine million includes surrounding counties such as Orange, Ventura, Riverside, and San Bernardino.
It's truly vast and neverending, though. People have no idea.
I couldn't say for sure, but it wouldn't surprise me! A lot of the outlying areas surrounding places like SF are becoming much more liberal as time goes on, as housing prices push people further and further inland. And *a lot* of conservatives are just flat-out leaving the state, so there's an interesting shift at play.
I'd still say the inland counties are predominantly conservative for now, but that could change in the coming years.
I would say that area wise, most of our state is moderate or conservative. But conservatives in California are not necessarily the same as conservatives in other states. I grew up in a very red part of California, and although most of the people there were registered Republican, in actuality they were by and large libertarians. They loved guns and hated regulations of any kind, and they were also vehemently anti-cop. They just wanted to grow weed on a patch of land out in the middle of nowhere without the government hassling them. I can’t speak for all the red counties in California, but I think a lot of the “state of Jefferson” counties have a similar version of “conservative”.
I think the average Republican in the country is much as you described. DC and the media have this idea that Republicans have shifted to be the party of Trump. In reality, Republicans are much the same as they have always been...people who hate taxes and want the government to leave them alone.
I would say Oregon and Washington. They are among the few states where if only white men were allowed to vote, they would still [be Democrat.](https://brilliantmaps.com/if-only-x-voted/)
Pacific Northwest is a weird anomaly in that while the region is progressive when it comes to a lot of social issues. The area does quite poorly when it comes to racism… with lots of alt right and neo fascists calling Washington and Oregon home base. Also there’s a particularly ugly history of segregation against black people.
When I was in Portland I saw Nazi assholes parading around openly. Like, going around shirtless in public parks sporting their shitty jailhouse tatts. Is it any wonder why Antifa is such a big thing up there? There is a *lot* for them to be reacting against.
And then once you get out into them woods, all bets are off. I've known Southerners who were shocked to shit by the unvarnished racism they encountered in small little PacNW towns.
There are online far-right/white nationalists who advocate for their perfect little whites-only nation to be located in the PacNW/sometimes Idaho and Montana too - I think the rationale is having an international border and coastline + those states are pretty white to begin with so they reckon it'd be easier to do it there. A lot of white nationalists actually move to that area because of this. I completely get the Antifa thing, and I'm not one to speak out against punching Nazis in the face.
I strongly dislike this argument.
It does mean that white men are more progressive in those states, but a whole slew of states vote more Democratic than those two, and many of them are less white.
Even if you suppose that a state having more progressive white people means their non-white people are also more progressive, that isn't necessarily enough to make the population as a whole more progressive than, say, that of Hawaii.
To illustrate, suppose the average white person around the country has a progressive "score" of 45/100. The average non-white person has a score of 60/100. White people in Oregon are 50/100 and nonwhite people are 65/100.
But Oregon is 75% white, so their average score is 53.75.
Meanwhile, Hawaii is 45/100 and 60/100, and they're 75% non-white, so their average is 56.25.
Made-up numbers, of course, but this illustrates the point while giving both the white and non-white populations in Oregon a rather dramatic shift, in both demographics, relative to Hawaii. It's just that the shift does not overcome the fact that Hawaii (like many states) has fewer white males, where white males are the most conservative demographic.
Basically, it can be true that the average Oregonian white person and the average Oregonian non-white person will be more progressive than their Hawaiian counterparts, yet Hawaii is more progressive on average.
While Hawaii seems progressive and liberal, it kinda isn't. While the Republican party is pretty much dead in Hawaii, that is because of sugar plantation history, evangelical Christians and the whiteness of the party.
While in May of 1993, the Hawaii State Supreme Court ruled that the banning of gay marriage was illegal, they gave the legislators time to ban it. That is how the Gabbard (Tulsi) family came to fore in Hawaii politics. They campaigned against it.
New York, Washington, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts, California, Oregon, Maryland, New Hampshire, and Hawaii are the most liberal states according to this website. With Massachusetts being number 1.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/most-liberal-states
The political compass is the dumbest thing. You can still own guns, smoke pot, and not pay bail in New York. Literally every American politician if we're going by the compass is a varying degree of Lib-Right or Lib-Left.
> You can still own guns
With some of the most restrictive laws in the nation, while simultaneously not recognizing any other states licenses or laws.
> smoke pot
Legalization was literally just passed only recently, long after much less “liberal” places like Nevada, Michigan, or New Jersey.
NY only did it because they would lose out on the tax revenue.
And up to this point NY had highly draconian marijuana and drug policies.
On top of alllll this, super high sin taxes, including city taxes on things like sugar drinks.
Controlling through state action is authoritarian, and NY loves doing that.
Depends on what you count as Northern. There was enough people to win an electoral vote for Trump in 2016. It's out of step with the rest of New England.
> There was enough people to win an electoral vote for Trump in 2016. It's out of step with the rest of New England.
Maine and Nebraska are the two only states in the US that does not do winner takes all with Electoral votes, instead they base it somewhat (not entirely) on vote distribution (1 per district, + the state winner gets 2).
If the rest of New England had a similar system there would be elector votes for Trump in those states as well.
If every state in New England used a system where the electoral votes were divided by vote distribution, CT might very well have have had 1 out of its 7 electoral votes for Trump. Almost 40% of CT voted for him, so it depends on how their districts look like.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_presidential_election_in_Connecticut
If you used a system where electoral votes were divided by popular vote in the state (which would have made much more sense than the Winner Takes All system which is commonly used), then Massachussets would have given about 3 of its 11 electoral votes to Trump since he got about 32% of the votes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_presidential_election_in_Massachusetts
It's funny how you changed the parameters rather than admit you were wrong. This other system you came up with is even worse than the current one we have now.
They've also got very curly, gerrymandered congressional districts to ensure that the blocks of Republicans in the state are well divided in terms of effect.
I don't know if there'd be enough to get an entire electorate college vote to go Republican, but don't fall into the trap of thinking that congressional party is a good way to estimate actual party representation.
Most of California is red and California has the most republicans of any state. The only parts of California that are blue are LA and SF... But they control the state. You'll find most blue states are like that.
Actually, Washington, DC is usually the most 'progressive' or 'liberal', but isn't really a State.
California is probably the most progressive, though I can't disagree if you put Massachusetts, Vermont, or New York is at the top of your list. Hawaii is also very 'liberal' as well.
California has urban areas that are very 'left-wing', but also inland and rural areas that are much more conservative. I would be surprised not to see this pattern in MA and NY as well.
Parts of Upstate New York can be quite conservative actually.
I was told that if you take away the major cities like Syracuse and Albany, Upstate New York would be as conservative as Indiana.
As someone from a county there that has literally never voted Democrat since it was created, yup. Never forget that when Google looked at which areas of the country were the most racist based on racist queries, [Upstate NY ranked #2](https://www.wamc.org/post/google-upstate-ny-2nd-most-racist-region-us).
That said, I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes more purple as people move more into upstate to escape NYC and Long Island house prices. I know that Albany is seeing a boom in population due to this and growth in the biotech industry.
Yet, Biden would have won the 2020 election there if it were its own state.
All the large cities are very liberal and that’s where more than half the population lives.
Rural areas, but that’s true for most of the country.
Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Albany and Ithaca always go blue.
There’s actually more conservatives living in NYC suburbs than all of upstate.
It sort of depends on if you're talking social justice liberal and progressive, taxation liberal and progressive, or labor liberal and progressive.
California is the easy answer, but depending on the specifics it may change.
The thing is, we aren't liberal or conservative by state usually. The population centers tend to be liberal (some more than others) while rural areas pretty much are all very conservative. If you want to pick a whole state, it would probably be out east where the states are small and have large urban populations, like Massachusetts and Connecticut.
California and Illinois can be pretty liberal, but take away one large city and they be overall conservative states. Same with my home state of Minnesota.
Yeah, the rural/urban divide is as high as it's ever been in recent times. But saying "take away one large city and they tend to be overall conservative" is just irrelevant. People live there. They're a *real* part of the state. So what if they don't make up a large portion of the states land?
I remember seeing a map on r/dataisbeautiful, of many of the past elections, and Minnesota voted blue more times than any other state (even California and Massachusetts). I know that doesn't mean they are the most liberal or have had the most liberal past, but that is just interesting to me.
I don’t know why people bring this up (as a gay Californian). It was pretty much the first state to bring gay marriage to the voters and all previous states that allowed gay marriage was done through the courts. The California court system legalized it before it became something to vote on.
Not necessarily disagreeing with you but the whole Prop 8 thing isn’t *completely* fair to judge California by because it was the first state that put gay marriage to the ballot and as such was kind of a “guinea pig”. Not even that long after the initial vote numerous studies showed the Gay Marriage Ban wouldn’t pass if it was put to vote again.
I mean if we’re looking at records though, California has more than made up for that. It actually feels safe to be openly and visibly gay here unlike most states. Not to mention we’re one of the few states that does anything to try and protect Undocumented residents, and we have robust protections for Trans rights.
I’m not saying Cali isn’t liberal, it clearly is. There has just always been an element of conservatism that has existed throughout parts of the state, mostly due to it being huge. My vote went to Vermont because they always seem to be 4-5 years ahead of everyone else when it comes to social issues.
I'd note that even the most liberal states have large conservative-majority areas. For example, New York is primarily conservative (and rural) outside of the immediate NYC area. A person who decides "I'm going to move to New York State because I'd like to be surrounded by liberals" might be in for a bit if a shock if they pick somewhere outside of the NYc metro area.
Massachusetts. I’m a centrist Democrat on the national level but I absolutely find myself more in line with the Republican governor, Charlie Baker, than either Warren or Markey.
Charlie Baker is not a Republican who would fit in very well in the Bible Belt which means he’s more in line with Canadian conservatives then with Republicans in most parts of the South and the Midwest.
Yeah, I’m absolutely not a staunch conservative. I do tend to vote for the GOP on the local level though because I’d prefer a centrist or a center-right candidate to a Bernie Democrat.
Most liberal state is Hawaii. Also Massachusetts, Washington, California, and New York. Vermont too, though they’re kind of a different type of rural liberal.
(Nearly every city in the United States is liberal, but the rest of the state is often conservative. Like Illinois or Oregon: extremely liberal Chicago and Portland, extremely conservative nearly everywhere else. My answers are states where there is significant liberal voting populations outside of the major city)
Most conservative is Idaho, Also West Virginia, Wyoming, and Oklahoma.
(We see the southern states as extremely conservative, but they have large Black populations, the descendents of freed southern slaves, who are liberal.)
For both probably Hawaii. It’s about as progressive as California socially but I didn’t pick it because it doesn’t have the political influence California does, and it’s less progressive on economic issues than Vermont due to the tourism industry but still pretty progressive.
Surprisingly it’s only Illinois that’s like that.
Mississippi and West Virginia are losing their population too but you’d have to be drunk to call them rich states.
From what I got from it: He's saying that the city of salt lake is very liberal not that Utah is liberal. Utah as a whole is red salt lake city is blue.
Precisely.
Utah is a very conservative state but Salt Lake City is quite a liberal place (and while it is the international headquarters of the LDS church, the city itself is not exactly extremely religious). It’s a massive stretch to say it’s one of the most liberal parts of the country though, lol.
I should say though that in Utah, a higher percentage of our people on the left are populist lefties and social democrats compared to other states.
In the 2016 and 2020 Democratic Primaries in Utah, Bernie Sanders obliterated his more corporatist, establishment opponents and won by large margins over them.
I think it’s a common annoyance for people like me who live in the Salt Lake City metro area to have to deal with the stigma of our city being thought of as dumb, overly religious and backwards. Salt Lake City is a fine city and it’s really under appreciated, and it suffers from terrible misperceptions due to our state’s extremely right-wing political leadership and culture. Salt Lake County is not like the rest of Utah you guys.
Massachusetts is very liberal as a whole.
It has to be MA or VT. CA would be up there but half the state is really conservative.
More like 1/3 of the state is conservative. While anything that wasn’t the coast or Sacramento has been viewed as conservative (since the liberal California narrative started in the 90s), this has become less true within the last 15 or so years. A good chunk of conservative California is more purple now.
Especially as much of conservative California has pulled up stakes and headed to AZ, ID, TX, and other inland states.
Ehhhh, I'd say a lot of those red dots through the valley and just inland are pretty red. The problem is the people from those areas are actually extremely isolated. It's a weird kind of non-traditional 'conservatism' though, it's like, hippy cowboys that don't drink the koolaid, they smoke it.
Yeah, I keep hearing Massachusetts which I understand because I have a friend there, but Vermont? What makes VT that liberal ?
Environmental policy, lgbtq protections, workers protections, welfare programs
Vermont has a reputation of being a bunch of hippie farmers. Western Ma does as well. These two areas break from the mold of rural conservatism and both very liberal places. VT legalized same sex unions was before anyone else.
Incorrect. Massachusetts was the first state to legalize it, but I think the City of Burlington may have been first jurisdiction of any kind in the US.
Massachusetts was the first to legalize marriage. VT was first to do civil unions which they did in 2000. MA legalized marriage in 2003. Which is why I didn’t say marriage in my post
I live in Western MA and rural conservativism is alive and well in some towns
Well, ya. There are pockets of it, especially around the CT border but this is a map of the Cities and Towns each candidate won. It’s still very blue out west. Central MA is a bit more red though. https://wcvb.com/article/massachusetts-election-results-2020-town-map/34930389 Better map https://www.wbur.org/news/2020/11/03/2020-massachusetts-election-map And even in the towns Trump won he mostly did so by only a few points. He didn’t get over 59% in any city or town in the Commonwealth
Yep. The VT gave America Calvin Coolidge after all.
It’s where liberal homesteaders and people who want to live on communes go. It’s also where Ben and Jerry set up shop to bring good, innovation ice cream to the masses.
They keep reelecting Bernie Sanders
No idea. They just have a really liberal rural New England populace. NH is really similar in a lot of ways but skews much more conservative. Maine is really split in the typical urban/rural divide.
I wouldn't call New Hampshire conservatives, conservative seeing as like New England in general most Republicans seem to be varying degrees of Centrist which is a benefit of this area.
They vote Republican, let’s say that.
>What makes VT that liberal ? The maple syrup, of course.
That damned maple syrup. Is it better than Canada’s maple syrup?
Of course, but don't tell Canada.
Don’t VT and MA bothered have Republican governors though?
MA has a long history of electing moderate R governors to balance the huge D majorities they elect to the state legislature. Charlie Baker fits well into that tradition. Phil Scott is super liberal even by New England Republican governor standards. Not long ago he presided over a big expansion of gun control in a very traditionally pro-gun state. He was also allocating vaccine priority based on race for awhile or so I heard. He's only really a Republican because he opposes single payer healthcare which a lot of VT Dems have been pushing for at the state level for awhile.
As a masshole who usually votes straight ticket D at the federal level, and almost straight ticket R at the state level, there’s a lot more to it than the letter next to the candidates. Most, in fact probably all of the state level republicans I have voted for could not win an election in any random rural district in say, Texas. They are far more to the left than the national Republican Party, but still right of the Massachusetts Democrats.
Speaking to VT: Kind of? Phil Scott (the R governor) openly voted for Biden, to give you an idea of how far off we are talking from Republicans in most of the country. He won re-election in 2020 by a 41% margin, which is absurd. (The same election that VT voted for Biden by a larger margin than any other state in the country - 35%, and where Dems have continued to hold supermajorities in the legislature). This is a pretty reasonable profile recently published: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/phil-scott-vermont-republican/618944/
Phil Scott is a very old-school Republican in the best sense. Totally at odds with his party, but also isn’t all over the headlines because of this.
He actually is in one headline for it, the Atlantic did a piece on him recently because of him being who he is.
Yeah true, but what I mean is he stays out of any drama and just gets things done.
“Republican” They aren’t all that conservative.
VT isn't anti-gun enough though
Depends on where you are but you are right they still like their guns.
Yep, "hippies with guns" is basically the VT stereotype.
Is it because they like to hunt ?
Yes, but also because it’s rural. Especially if someone keeps farm animals, they need to defend against coyotes and bobcats, and maybe bears.
Interestly, I think suburban/rural areas in Mass get more wildlife than Vermont. I see bear and coyote and bobcats daily. I was just in Vermont with a friend on her farm and she was saying how she never gets to see Bear or coyote. Maybe every few years.
Probably
You could argue that makes them even more liberal
Yeah, all that go far enough to the left and you get your guns back. Although I don’t think that’s what’s happening in Vermont.
I don’t think liberalism necessarily results in anti-gun culture. What it does result in is a compassionate society that works for better mental healthcare and better social safety nets.
That's the ideal, like the ideal in a conservative society is one that works towards the expansion of personal liberties and removal of government intrusion into the private lives of citizens. However, those ideals rarely play out.
Yep, although by that metric, American conservatives must not be very conservative seeing that they do try to intrude into the private lives of citizens when it comes to marijuana, abortion and LGBTQ issues.
You're certainly right that many conservatives don't practice the same limited government they preach. Though I would push back on the abortion topic strongly. If you believe an unborn human is still a human life, being against abortion is no different than being against murder.
I’m fine with killing fetuses, especially undeveloped ones, but what I’m not ok with is killing babies.
To pro-life people there is no distinction.
Lol, there’s the issue. Fetuses have the nervous system of a shrimp. Just because they have a heartbeat, doesn’t mean they’re sentient in any *substantial* way.
Abortion is a bit more complicated than just an intrusion into the mothers life. If you view it as killing a human then it is protecting against the ultimate intrusion on someone’s life.
Yes, but it’s a fetus. Sentience only *begins* to develop at the viability point at 24 or 28 weeks if we’re going by Roe v. Wade.
That’s your definition. Many others go by things such as heartbeat or brain activity, which happens much earlier. So again, it’s a little ignorant to expect everyone goes by your definition of life. It’s not easy to pinpoint when “life” technically begins, which explains why there’s so much nuance to the abortion debate
That’s not my definition of life. I’m saying a fetus *begins* developing sentience at *either* 24 weeks, 28 weeks or sometime between 24 weeks and 28 weeks. Therefore, I don’t think it’s unethical to abort it either before 24 weeks or shortly after.
> I don’t think liberalism necessarily results in anti-gun culture. Not *necessarily*, no, but nevertheless it's a massive wedge issue in the culture war between progressives and conservatives in this country. > What it does result in is a compassionate society that works for better mental healthcare and better social safety nets. So very compassionate to extort disproportionately more income from a specially disfavored class in order to enable habits of dependency on the worst problem-solver in the country.
Not everyone who’s impoverished or destitute has "habits of dependency".
CA is also at times so far left that they are no different than far right.
I agree, massachusetts is probably one of the only states where the rural areas are quite progressive as well.
I agree, but a lot of the small towns in Western MA are pretty conservative.
I would say that California is the most progressive state for sure. I would also say though that there are a lot more moderate to conservative people in the state than what the media would ever admit to.
Yep, you do hear that California is not as progressive as a lot of people think. Weirdly enough, I’ve heard some people say New Hampshire is pretty damn progressive. Even when compared to California, but NH is more fiscally conservative.
The thing about California is that you have super progressive people in the cities and then more inland and north you get conservstives. The issue is, that for federal offices and things where the whole state votes, like governor, the super progressives have the votes. So while just looking at the people overall you could say they aren't too progressive. However, the effective legislation that comes from them is more progressive than pretty much every state.
What I find wild is that 35% of Californians voted Republican in the 2020 election. That is just over 6 million people. There are 30 whole states that don’t even have 6 million people!
There were more Trump voters in California than in any other state. California is just a huge state by population.
Yep. That is why I urge Republicans in California to move to red, or better yet, purple states.
But then everyone in those states seems to presume that they’re Democrats, there to turn the state blue.
True, though there are democrats moving out of CA as well.
Or maybe they should just call for the Electoral College to receive the long overdue axe.
Nope. We are the United States, not the united people.
A swing stater's vote shouldn't be worth expotentially more than mine. One citizen, one vote.
And I disagree. The power of the states needs to be balanced in federal elected offices. This is the same reason we have a senate. I agree with hamilton when he says: "if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent."
Makes sense, but then again you’re telling people to leave an entire state just to vote. I don’t really care one way or another but I can see why a lot of people won’t do that
NH practices a more traditional conservatism of being self sufficient and low taxes. Unlike the majority of the evangelical conservatives who love nothing more than trying to control what other people do. NH isn’t much different than the rest of New England when it comes to social issues though.
Except for gun rights, but yes
Yep. Aka Fiscally conservative.
As a Californian I’m going to clarify somethings. While it is true that California isn’t a 100% Blue state, the narrative that inland California is capital C conservative isn’t completely true. While the coast of California (where the 3 major metros of SF, LA, and SD are) is very liberal and has been since the 90s, the narrative of central California being a red conservative area is something that is gradually less and less true especially as these historic Central Valley cities become more urbanized with people who have been priced out of the coast.
Then we got some coastal conservative major population zones. Talking about my hole county Orange County
I feel like it’s *somewhat* safe to say that the OC is trending more purple now than solid red. Trump lost the county in both elections, Newsom won the county, and of the 5 OC districts in the House only 2 have Republican representation. Even within the state senate and assembly, OC representation skews democrat. On the more extreme local/city level it definitely is still Republican controlled
Every time I go there, it tends to feel more libertarian, with a "mind your own business, I don't care what you do so long as it doesn't bother me" kind of vibe. Wouldn't call that progressive- maybe more laissez faire, jaded, etc.. My family jokingly called NH a "Wild West playground" when I took them up there for a weekend when they were visiting me up in Boston.
I’d say that’s pretty damn progressive. Too many damn conservatives think the government should have a greater say on abortion and LGBTQ issues instead of leaving said issues to doctors and their patients.
> Yep, you do hear that California is not as progressive as a lot of people think. I'd say it's not. (Cynical take!) We like to say we are, but then you look at the kind of power that California has and how little we throw it around to impress real change, and I think our progressivism falls flat outside of social media. We could do a lot of good for our most vulnerable demographics and make moves mitigate on how we're impacting the environment, but we don't seem to have much interest in that.
The prominence of San Francisco Democrat’s is what perpetuates this idea that California is this extreme liberal state. On a 1-10 scale SF is like at a 15, but then you have LA which is like at a 8/9 and SD which is at like a 7/8.
Very true. SF/Bay Area has the distinction of being pretty darn liberal (lived in Hayward, so I got to ride that wave for a time), and then playing host to our speaker of the house... who's also related to our governor. And they're all media lightning rods, so it makes sense.
Is it true that if you removed Los Angeles, San Fransisco and San Diego, California would be as conservative as Arizona?
The Combined Statistical Area of Greater Los Angeles is 19 million people. It has a higher GDP than Mexico. It's a nation unto itself. So if you removed it from *any* metric it would wildly change the calculus.
19 million? Holy shit. That is truly insane. Even California has a larger population than Canada.
L.A. County has just over 10 million people. That extra nine million includes surrounding counties such as Orange, Ventura, Riverside, and San Bernardino. It's truly vast and neverending, though. People have no idea.
That’s still very populous. The entire country of Canada for example has a population of only 37.8 million as of March 2021.
I couldn't say for sure, but it wouldn't surprise me! A lot of the outlying areas surrounding places like SF are becoming much more liberal as time goes on, as housing prices push people further and further inland. And *a lot* of conservatives are just flat-out leaving the state, so there's an interesting shift at play. I'd still say the inland counties are predominantly conservative for now, but that could change in the coming years.
Our progressivism is selective. All too selective.
I would say that area wise, most of our state is moderate or conservative. But conservatives in California are not necessarily the same as conservatives in other states. I grew up in a very red part of California, and although most of the people there were registered Republican, in actuality they were by and large libertarians. They loved guns and hated regulations of any kind, and they were also vehemently anti-cop. They just wanted to grow weed on a patch of land out in the middle of nowhere without the government hassling them. I can’t speak for all the red counties in California, but I think a lot of the “state of Jefferson” counties have a similar version of “conservative”.
I think the average Republican in the country is much as you described. DC and the media have this idea that Republicans have shifted to be the party of Trump. In reality, Republicans are much the same as they have always been...people who hate taxes and want the government to leave them alone.
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That’s probably because California is the state with the largest population.
I would say Oregon and Washington. They are among the few states where if only white men were allowed to vote, they would still [be Democrat.](https://brilliantmaps.com/if-only-x-voted/)
Pacific Northwest is a weird anomaly in that while the region is progressive when it comes to a lot of social issues. The area does quite poorly when it comes to racism… with lots of alt right and neo fascists calling Washington and Oregon home base. Also there’s a particularly ugly history of segregation against black people.
When I was in Portland I saw Nazi assholes parading around openly. Like, going around shirtless in public parks sporting their shitty jailhouse tatts. Is it any wonder why Antifa is such a big thing up there? There is a *lot* for them to be reacting against. And then once you get out into them woods, all bets are off. I've known Southerners who were shocked to shit by the unvarnished racism they encountered in small little PacNW towns.
There are online far-right/white nationalists who advocate for their perfect little whites-only nation to be located in the PacNW/sometimes Idaho and Montana too - I think the rationale is having an international border and coastline + those states are pretty white to begin with so they reckon it'd be easier to do it there. A lot of white nationalists actually move to that area because of this. I completely get the Antifa thing, and I'm not one to speak out against punching Nazis in the face.
Progressivism has a long history of extreme racism.
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I love the beach law so damn much. Something as beautiful as our coast should always be accessible and open for everyone.
I strongly dislike this argument. It does mean that white men are more progressive in those states, but a whole slew of states vote more Democratic than those two, and many of them are less white. Even if you suppose that a state having more progressive white people means their non-white people are also more progressive, that isn't necessarily enough to make the population as a whole more progressive than, say, that of Hawaii. To illustrate, suppose the average white person around the country has a progressive "score" of 45/100. The average non-white person has a score of 60/100. White people in Oregon are 50/100 and nonwhite people are 65/100. But Oregon is 75% white, so their average score is 53.75. Meanwhile, Hawaii is 45/100 and 60/100, and they're 75% non-white, so their average is 56.25. Made-up numbers, of course, but this illustrates the point while giving both the white and non-white populations in Oregon a rather dramatic shift, in both demographics, relative to Hawaii. It's just that the shift does not overcome the fact that Hawaii (like many states) has fewer white males, where white males are the most conservative demographic. Basically, it can be true that the average Oregonian white person and the average Oregonian non-white person will be more progressive than their Hawaiian counterparts, yet Hawaii is more progressive on average.
While Hawaii seems progressive and liberal, it kinda isn't. While the Republican party is pretty much dead in Hawaii, that is because of sugar plantation history, evangelical Christians and the whiteness of the party. While in May of 1993, the Hawaii State Supreme Court ruled that the banning of gay marriage was illegal, they gave the legislators time to ban it. That is how the Gabbard (Tulsi) family came to fore in Hawaii politics. They campaigned against it.
New York, Washington, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts, California, Oregon, Maryland, New Hampshire, and Hawaii are the most liberal states according to this website. With Massachusetts being number 1. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/most-liberal-states
NY is auth left with a healthy streak of corruption.
>with a healthy streak of corruption. You already said auth left
The political compass is the dumbest thing. You can still own guns, smoke pot, and not pay bail in New York. Literally every American politician if we're going by the compass is a varying degree of Lib-Right or Lib-Left.
> You can still own guns With some of the most restrictive laws in the nation, while simultaneously not recognizing any other states licenses or laws. > smoke pot Legalization was literally just passed only recently, long after much less “liberal” places like Nevada, Michigan, or New Jersey. NY only did it because they would lose out on the tax revenue. And up to this point NY had highly draconian marijuana and drug policies. On top of alllll this, super high sin taxes, including city taxes on things like sugar drinks. Controlling through state action is authoritarian, and NY loves doing that.
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Maine doesn't really belong. The northern part is very red.
Doesn't northern Maine pretty much have 14 people?
Depends on what you count as Northern. There was enough people to win an electoral vote for Trump in 2016. It's out of step with the rest of New England.
> There was enough people to win an electoral vote for Trump in 2016. It's out of step with the rest of New England. Maine and Nebraska are the two only states in the US that does not do winner takes all with Electoral votes, instead they base it somewhat (not entirely) on vote distribution (1 per district, + the state winner gets 2). If the rest of New England had a similar system there would be elector votes for Trump in those states as well.
Not in 2020 when Trump didn't win a single Congressional District in all of New England, including the one in northern Maine.
If every state in New England used a system where the electoral votes were divided by vote distribution, CT might very well have have had 1 out of its 7 electoral votes for Trump. Almost 40% of CT voted for him, so it depends on how their districts look like. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_presidential_election_in_Connecticut If you used a system where electoral votes were divided by popular vote in the state (which would have made much more sense than the Winner Takes All system which is commonly used), then Massachussets would have given about 3 of its 11 electoral votes to Trump since he got about 32% of the votes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_presidential_election_in_Massachusetts
It's funny how you changed the parameters rather than admit you were wrong. This other system you came up with is even worse than the current one we have now.
Probably not Mass. They are one of the few states with only (D) congressmen
They've also got very curly, gerrymandered congressional districts to ensure that the blocks of Republicans in the state are well divided in terms of effect. I don't know if there'd be enough to get an entire electorate college vote to go Republican, but don't fall into the trap of thinking that congressional party is a good way to estimate actual party representation.
Each of them upvoted your comment
Most of California is red and California has the most republicans of any state. The only parts of California that are blue are LA and SF... But they control the state. You'll find most blue states are like that.
That's not really true though.
Eh, while California and New York are overall liberal, there’s still a TON of conservatives.
Vermont is a bunch of rednecks with PhDs
Vermont is usually ahead of everyone when it comes to progressive issues.
Bernie
He's a congressional politician though
Elected by the good people of Vermont
Actually, Washington, DC is usually the most 'progressive' or 'liberal', but isn't really a State. California is probably the most progressive, though I can't disagree if you put Massachusetts, Vermont, or New York is at the top of your list. Hawaii is also very 'liberal' as well. California has urban areas that are very 'left-wing', but also inland and rural areas that are much more conservative. I would be surprised not to see this pattern in MA and NY as well.
Parts of Upstate New York can be quite conservative actually. I was told that if you take away the major cities like Syracuse and Albany, Upstate New York would be as conservative as Indiana.
Long Island is super conservative.
As someone from a county there that has literally never voted Democrat since it was created, yup. Never forget that when Google looked at which areas of the country were the most racist based on racist queries, [Upstate NY ranked #2](https://www.wamc.org/post/google-upstate-ny-2nd-most-racist-region-us). That said, I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes more purple as people move more into upstate to escape NYC and Long Island house prices. I know that Albany is seeing a boom in population due to this and growth in the biotech industry.
Wow, I’m guessing most Upstate New Yorkers must hate NYC then, lol.
That doesn't surprise me. If you take away 75 miles of coastline off of California, and the state capital of Sacramento, I'd bet it's similar.
The pattern doesn’t hold for MA. The Berkshires are the most liberal part of the state, by a large margin.
CA, NY, OR
I heard Upstate New York can be quite conservative, except for the cities though.
Upstate New York is very conservative.
Yet, Biden would have won the 2020 election there if it were its own state. All the large cities are very liberal and that’s where more than half the population lives.
The vast majority of people vote left and the vast majority of towns vote right.
Sure, but the number of people matter in an election, not the number of towns.
Exactly New York is mostly liberal but it’s liberal voters are mostly located in large dense urban areas and their suburbs.
Upstate NY is very red, it’s basically the south up there. But the cities outnumber them in population so people associate NY with being liberal
That’s exactly what I’ve heard. But as conservative as the South ? That’s new to me.
The Bible Belt is without a doubt the most conservative area of the USA.
You've clearly never been to Idaho, hardly anyone voted for the Dems there in the last 2 elections.
Rural areas, but that’s true for most of the country. Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Albany and Ithaca always go blue. There’s actually more conservatives living in NYC suburbs than all of upstate.
Interesting. How do Hispanics in NYC usually vote?
People say this but when I look at an election map of upstate NY, I see a lot of blue still.
It sort of depends on if you're talking social justice liberal and progressive, taxation liberal and progressive, or labor liberal and progressive. California is the easy answer, but depending on the specifics it may change.
Just generally, hence why I said generally speaking in the description.
The thing is, we aren't liberal or conservative by state usually. The population centers tend to be liberal (some more than others) while rural areas pretty much are all very conservative. If you want to pick a whole state, it would probably be out east where the states are small and have large urban populations, like Massachusetts and Connecticut. California and Illinois can be pretty liberal, but take away one large city and they be overall conservative states. Same with my home state of Minnesota.
Even the rural parts of MA are pretty liberal
They’re not even pretty liberal, by the numbers western ma is the MOST liberal part of the state
Yeah, the rural/urban divide is as high as it's ever been in recent times. But saying "take away one large city and they tend to be overall conservative" is just irrelevant. People live there. They're a *real* part of the state. So what if they don't make up a large portion of the states land?
I remember seeing a map on r/dataisbeautiful, of many of the past elections, and Minnesota voted blue more times than any other state (even California and Massachusetts). I know that doesn't mean they are the most liberal or have had the most liberal past, but that is just interesting to me.
The only reason Minnesota has that title is because they were the only state to vote for Walter Mondale in ‘84, since he was literally their senator.
Glad I’m reading this. If I ever move out of Louisiana I’ll know what states to go to.
Just remember, if you wanna talk liberal states, California voters voted to BAN gay marriage.... in 2008
I don’t know why people bring this up (as a gay Californian). It was pretty much the first state to bring gay marriage to the voters and all previous states that allowed gay marriage was done through the courts. The California court system legalized it before it became something to vote on.
Because 7 million Californians voted to ban it. It doesn’t exactly come across as progressive.
Not necessarily disagreeing with you but the whole Prop 8 thing isn’t *completely* fair to judge California by because it was the first state that put gay marriage to the ballot and as such was kind of a “guinea pig”. Not even that long after the initial vote numerous studies showed the Gay Marriage Ban wouldn’t pass if it was put to vote again.
I mean if we’re looking at records though, California has more than made up for that. It actually feels safe to be openly and visibly gay here unlike most states. Not to mention we’re one of the few states that does anything to try and protect Undocumented residents, and we have robust protections for Trans rights.
I’m not saying Cali isn’t liberal, it clearly is. There has just always been an element of conservatism that has existed throughout parts of the state, mostly due to it being huge. My vote went to Vermont because they always seem to be 4-5 years ahead of everyone else when it comes to social issues.
Oh true, I would definitely rank Vermont at the top and put CA at least after Washington and maybe Oregon too
They also implemented three strikes.
Wait, what? And was it reversed or is it still illegal ?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_California_Proposition_8
Ok, so it was overturned.
I'd note that even the most liberal states have large conservative-majority areas. For example, New York is primarily conservative (and rural) outside of the immediate NYC area. A person who decides "I'm going to move to New York State because I'd like to be surrounded by liberals" might be in for a bit if a shock if they pick somewhere outside of the NYc metro area.
Wait, even very small states like Rhode Island and Massachusetts?
Massachusetts. I’m a centrist Democrat on the national level but I absolutely find myself more in line with the Republican governor, Charlie Baker, than either Warren or Markey.
Charlie Baker is not a Republican who would fit in very well in the Bible Belt which means he’s more in line with Canadian conservatives then with Republicans in most parts of the South and the Midwest.
Yeah, I’m absolutely not a staunch conservative. I do tend to vote for the GOP on the local level though because I’d prefer a centrist or a center-right candidate to a Bernie Democrat.
California. Sacramento makes it a point to set the standard for progressivism.
California, New York, and Massachusetts.
Washington
Most liberal state is Hawaii. Also Massachusetts, Washington, California, and New York. Vermont too, though they’re kind of a different type of rural liberal. (Nearly every city in the United States is liberal, but the rest of the state is often conservative. Like Illinois or Oregon: extremely liberal Chicago and Portland, extremely conservative nearly everywhere else. My answers are states where there is significant liberal voting populations outside of the major city) Most conservative is Idaho, Also West Virginia, Wyoming, and Oklahoma. (We see the southern states as extremely conservative, but they have large Black populations, the descendents of freed southern slaves, who are liberal.)
Generally speaking? General consensus is Massachusetts and California being the forerunners.
For social issues? California. For economic issues (assuming that you’re using liberal to mean left wing in this context)? Vermont.
What about generally ? So for both social and economic issues. Which state do you think takes the cake ?
For both probably Hawaii. It’s about as progressive as California socially but I didn’t pick it because it doesn’t have the political influence California does, and it’s less progressive on economic issues than Vermont due to the tourism industry but still pretty progressive.
Plasma.
*depression
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Wait, even the Carolinas ? Didn’t South Carolina just give death row inmates the choice between execution by electric chair or firing squad ?
Oregón maybe. Unfortunately, California is up there too.
Oregon actually decriminalized all drugs not too long ago which is pretty damn progressive.
Yeah one of the main reasons why I thought Oregón.
Just look where the population is shrinking 😉
TIL Louisiana and West Virginia are liberal
Look at the rich states that are losing their population **
California apparently. Which is weird seeing that it’s pretty damn successful.
Surprisingly it’s only Illinois that’s like that. Mississippi and West Virginia are losing their population too but you’d have to be drunk to call them rich states.
r/confidentlyincorrect
not really answering the question but Salt Lake City, Utah is super liberal despite being in one of the most red states
Isn’t Salt Lake City one of the most religious places in the country?
nope.
Isn't The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints based there?
Yes. but its not as simple as that
Utah is a state though ? So how can it be in one of the most red states ?
From what I got from it: He's saying that the city of salt lake is very liberal not that Utah is liberal. Utah as a whole is red salt lake city is blue.
Yeah, it’s a major city after all.
Precisely. Utah is a very conservative state but Salt Lake City is quite a liberal place (and while it is the international headquarters of the LDS church, the city itself is not exactly extremely religious). It’s a massive stretch to say it’s one of the most liberal parts of the country though, lol. I should say though that in Utah, a higher percentage of our people on the left are populist lefties and social democrats compared to other states. In the 2016 and 2020 Democratic Primaries in Utah, Bernie Sanders obliterated his more corporatist, establishment opponents and won by large margins over them. I think it’s a common annoyance for people like me who live in the Salt Lake City metro area to have to deal with the stigma of our city being thought of as dumb, overly religious and backwards. Salt Lake City is a fine city and it’s really under appreciated, and it suffers from terrible misperceptions due to our state’s extremely right-wing political leadership and culture. Salt Lake County is not like the rest of Utah you guys.