Hollywood and academia have long been the bane of conservatives, accused of being overly liberal, and thus somehow biased in how people come through the ranks.
Of course, Hollywood and academia aren’t the only professions where most of the people are of one ideology, and they’re not always liberally leaning either.
Take sports and corporate management for example. Both of these professions tend to have a high ratio of people who are conservative. Yet you don’t hear of liberals complaining that this is somehow a problem like all professions must have equal ideological representation.
These facts lead me to ask the question: Why are some professions more liberal while others are more conservative?
I first looked at salary. Generally, the more money you make the more conservative you are. This doesn’t hold up in this comparison. Actors and sports starts both earn the most money, while management, at least lower and middle management, and those in academia tend to earn less. As a result, there is no correlation at all between salary and ideology in this example.
Next I looked at a person’s roots. Typically you think of those who come from more humble beginnings of being more liberal. However a significant portion of sports stars came from less-than-idealistic roots, yet they still remain conservative.
On the other hand, academia probably has the most people who were born into an advantageous environment, yet they tend to be liberal.
I then decided to look at something more abstract put potentially very important: empathy.
Empathy is, essentially, being able to understand how another person thinks. Having empathy enables one to answer the question, “Why?” Why does someone think and do things they way they do?
Many liberal attributes come from empathy. Tolerance virtually requires empathy, for example.
A lack of empathy often leads to assumptions that tend to create a “we’re right, they’re wrong; we’re good, they’re bad” feeling, which is all too prevalent in today’s conservative circles.
Getting back to the issue at hand, why are different professions liberal while others are conservative? If empathy matters, what about these particular professions leads to having empathy, or for not having empathy?
Let’s start with Hollywood. To be a good actor, you must be able to accurately portray many different types of roles. Someone could be an impotent, shy nerd in one movie, then a macho super-villain in the next.
To act these parts effectively, an actor needs some level of connection to the character. This connection becomes difficult without some level of empathy with the character. The more roles you play, the more empathy one acquires.
When one looks at conservative actors, many are typecast into mostly macho-type roles. John Wayne always tended to play in us-versus-them westerns. Clint Eastwood, when he was a more prominent conservative, was the same way. Arnold Schwarzenegger has always tended to pay the big macho hero/villain with big guns and big muscles.
Why are sports stars conservative? In sports, especially sports with a lot of physical contact such as football, empathy is not only unnecessary, but is actually seen as bad.
Do you want to have empathy for the player you just slammed into the ground, or for the opposing team? Not if you want to play at your best. Being selfish, either at a personal or team level is required to play sports effectively. You don’t want empathy to soften your next hit on the other team’s quarterback.
Academia tends to have empathy due to the very nature of academics. Being in academia usually means that you are constantly learning about new things. Learning about other people automatically increases the chance that a person will have empathy. This could explain why many academic departments, especially the social sciences, tend to be almost exclusively liberal.
Finally, what about corporate management? Again, empathy is usually seen as bad. Do you want empathy for someone whom you may have to fire later? Do you want empathy for those you buy from, those you sell to, or your competitors?
Not if you want to be a shrewd, “get maximum profit at all costs” type of business man.
To be a “maximum profit” guy, you don’t want to think about, “I wonder if Bob can get by after we let him go.”
There are always exceptions, of course, but I tend to believe that empathy is an important factor in creating someone’s ideology.
Next week, how empathy shapes public policy, and affects the relationship between the two parties.

Author