I've been staying away from the political threads because I didn't trust myself to be polite, but this is a topic near and dear to my heart.
I was raised in an EXTREMELY conservative family. My parents are fundamentalist Christians and the church I was raised in was a borderline cult (they advocated cutting ties with all family members who refused to join the church, homeschooling children to protect them from the evils of public/private schools, basically withdrawing completely from the community along with enforcing strict rules about conduct, clothing, etc. Members who didn't follow these guidelines were labled "backslid Christians" and ostracized until they complied or were excommunicated.)
Obviously, domestic social issues like abortion, gay rights, etc were the main issues driving my parents to vote. They also believe that America has some sort of God-given supremacy and are very pro-war, not just this war - any war.
They were very involved in local and national politics and we were involved from the time we were born. I remember being brought to protest outside abortion clinics and other various events. When I was seven, they sent me off to school every day wearing my 'Bush for President' button. We talked about politics incessantly, and they had no problem with scaring me into sharing their beliefs - at six or seven I watched graphic footage of a late-term abortion while they lectured about how democrats like killing babies and movies about "the gay agenda" where homosexuality was equated with pedophelia and my parents told me of all the horrible things that gays would want to do with me if they got a hold of me.
All of our family friends shared their beliefs and I was not exposed to any other views at all until high school.
In high school, I started reading newspapers, reading books written by politicians, and just simply talking to people who had other beliefs. At first I didn't want to hear any of it, convinced that I was right. But pretty quickly, I craved other viewpoints and started shifting my position on a lot of issues. It certainly wasn't dramatic - at 18, I registered republican and still considered myself very conservative. But at least I was open to other views.
My parents were adamantly opposed to me going to college (a woman's place in in the home; colleges are "dens of iniquity"; and besides, we all know the rapture is coming any day now, so why waste the time) but I begged and pleaded and cajoled until they finally signed the papers for me to attend a small, private, conservative, Christian college about an hour from home. The school's most active group was the College Republicans. There was no Young Democrats club. I got swept up in the College Republicans club my freshman year and spent more time in Columbus working with politicians or canvassing the state campaigning than I did on campus. After my sophomore year, I got an internship at the American Conservative Union and dropped out of school to stay on through the 2000 election. I not only voted for Bush, I worked on his campaign, organized events at the Republican National Committee, and attended an inaugural ball.
But the whole time this was going on, I was conflicted. Because while politically I was still working for conservative causes, personally my beliefs were shifting further and further to the left.
After inauguration, I left Washington and moved to North Carolina to finish my degree. And over the last four years, I've finally come to terms with the things *I* believe. I learned how to analyze topics and come up with my own response, rather than parroting what my parents told me as a child.
I certainly am not saying that someone who votes like their parents cannot think for themselves - on the contrary, I hope someday that I have children who think for themselves and then choose to vote like me. My case was an extreme one. And breaking away from my parents' grip was a long, hard process. Now I'm a registered Democrat who campaigned for Kerry, but I vote split ticket for whichever candidate I think is best.
And, I should probably note, that my family has basically discommunicated me. I hear from them a couple times per year and the conversation generally disintegrates into me begging to agree to disagree and them telling me I'm going to hell and working for evil. They think I've been brainwashed - I would argue that I *was* brainwashed and am finally thinking for myself.
So, no, I don't vote like my parents. And I don't think politics is genetic - but I think that the way a child is raised will have an impact on their political beliefs. They will either embrace them or rebel against them depending on a number of factors.
Annie (who is sorry this post wound up being so long, obviously she needed to vent...)
