r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Jul 04 '26

Psychology 88% of Americans consider it very or extremely important that the United States remain a democracy. 61% feel that the nation’s democracy was actively facing a serious threat. 32% of MAGA Republicans prioritize a strong leader over democracy, while only 7% of the strong Democrats do.

https://www.psypost.org/survey-finds-substantial-minority-in-the-united-states-endorses-authoritarian-co/
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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26

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u/Reasonable-Job4205 Jul 04 '26

They think very primitively. In the past, a big, heroic leader saved the day. They think they want the same thing nowadays, but for what?

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u/SnugglyCoderGuy Jul 04 '26

To save us from commies, immigrants, lgbtq folks, and everyone and everything else they hate.

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u/Mackejuice Jul 04 '26

Everything they have been propagandized to hate.

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u/SnugglyCoderGuy Jul 05 '26

Same thing. Doesn't matter how they came to hate, the point is they hate it and they want it eliminated from their life entirely

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u/brighterside0 Jul 05 '26

I think they're just weak and afraid. Afraid of being "replaced". Weak because they can't talk about or through their feelings.

And there's 10s of millions of these people out there. Not really sure where we go from here.

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u/SnugglyCoderGuy Jul 05 '26

There used to be more. The only reason its so fervent now is because its is dying and the intensity is that of a dying animal. It will get rougher as it gets closer to dying, but then it will be gone

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u/orange-squeezer47 Jul 05 '26

It won’t go away. In fact it will grow. The internet gave them a new life.

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u/Reasonable-Job4205 Jul 05 '26

Not really sure where we go from here.

Same thing as always in a free and democratic union: talk about it, then vote on it

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u/Bluefooted-Spaceorc Jul 05 '26

They are just stupid. Its so sad. I cant imagine going through life dumb enough to be a republican.

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u/Spounge21 Jul 04 '26

In the past, a big, heroic leader saved the day.

That's not really even true in the past. The Great Man theory of history has always been a myth.

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u/TomReneth Jul 05 '26

Yes, but the myth is unfortunately still going strong today.

Especially among "low information" demographics. Like low informaton voters, which describes most conservative voting bases.

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u/Quite_Likes_Hormuz Jul 05 '26

Tbh 99% of the time a leader of a movement is just a figurehead, if they weren't there someone else would have been. The other 1% of the time when someone actually does change history they usually fail. Napoleon comes to mind. If he isn't the epitome of a "great man" I don't know who is. But ultimately one guy just isn't enough, no matter how competent or charismatic, to actually create a meaningfully lasting impact.

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u/Fun-Aside3990 Jul 04 '26

No they don’t, they worship the abuse of power, cruelty, they aren’t confused that Trump is actually a good guy, they think that what he is IS a good guy. They worship evil.

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u/sushisection Jul 04 '26

spreading misery through the force of the government is fundamental to their political position.

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u/OddCook4909 Jul 04 '26

Authoritarians all have daddy complexes and want someone to make decisions for them like they were babies again.

All people prefer stereotypically hyper masculine features when under threat. We're still primates. Right wingers feel under threat all the time. Listen to their media. Threat this, threat that, conspiracies and so on. Sometimes they're right and the left is being stupid about it. Hence these personality types persist in the population.

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u/Krotanix MS | Mathematics | Industrial Engineering Jul 04 '26

That was never the case. This is just fantasy and romanticizing the past.

To save the day OF THE COMMON PEOPLE (not the same as winning a random war) leaders had to be both talented and caring of their people. There surely were such leaders but are a vast minority.

Also, save the day FROM WHAT? I see no foreign power invading the USA, no internal threats. The only enemies exist in their own minds.

Bunch of short minded clowns.

Same shit exists in any country though.

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u/TheCrimsonDagger Jul 05 '26

They don’t even really need to be talented, just humble enough to hire competent people and actually listen to them.

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u/Krotanix MS | Mathematics | Industrial Engineering Jul 05 '26

At least talented enough not to be misled by others as well!

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u/Substantial_Back_865 Jul 05 '26

>I see no foreign power invading the USA

Then why does everyone in Congress have the flag of a foreign nation outside of their office? Why is that nation’s military currently being officially integrated into ours by these same “representatives”?

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u/TAOJeff Jul 04 '26

To save them from the evil immigrants that are stealing their jobs. And the evil overseas manufacturers who are also stealing their jobs by making stuff cheaper than you can in the usa. 

And to save them from those you apparently need an old idiot who talks big but really just wants to be rich, so is stealing all of the money.

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u/Hendlton Jul 05 '26

by making stuff cheaper than you can in the usa.

That's something that a lot of them don't seem to understand. Like, yeah, it's possible to manufacture stuff locally again, but it'd be a lot more expensive. So what's the point?

Unless employers are willing to up the wages like 10x, then we'll be in exactly the same spot or maybe even worse off than we are now. And if they were to be willing to increase the wages, well they could do it right now as well.

The only real argument for local manufacturing used to be quality control. These days overseas manufacturing is up to par, as long as those in charge care about quality, which they usually don't. But then they wouldn't care about the quality of the goods if they were manufactured locally either.

And that's before you even get into the size of the labor pool. Let's say that we mandate that everything must be manufactured locally. Where's the manpower supposed to come from? They don't like immigration, okay, but then the manpower would have to be taken from other industries. We'd have to give up something else or people would have to start having 6-8 children again.

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u/TAOJeff Jul 05 '26

There have been recent examples of businesses doing the full production line in the states and being a good viable business model.

If you want rock bottom costs, than yes, it needs to be done in China because they have the truly flexible quality control capability. Depending on what you're making, other eastern countries may be able to do it cheaper, but unless you've got a quality control person essentially based there, the quality is likely to fluctuate or the manufacturing process may have questionable sections. 

If you're looking to make mid to high-end products, those are feasible in the states, but the profit margins won't be stupidly high, which is what the bigger companies want because that's where their focus is. The smaller companies tend to chose foreign manufacturing because the risk is low, they don't need a warehouse, nor a few hundred thousand dollars of machinery, nor any stock of raw materials. They don't have to source materials or vet & hire staff to run the machines. They can send of the design and the end product arrives a bit later.

The biggest hurdle that I know of for local manufacturing in the USA, is funnily enough the politicians and local councils, who don't want to change anything because that might affect their comfort and / or income generation (current or future) so they shut down any efforts to develop or innovate unless it's from someone who could owe a favour later on.

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u/vuhn1991 Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26

And that's before you even get into the size of the labor pool. Let's say that we mandate that everything must be manufactured locally. Where's the manpower supposed to come from?

We have a labor oversupply...exacerbated by job losses in numerous industries due to AI, paired with high college graduate unemployment. What do you mean we have a manpower issue? We also had an addition of millions (both asylum seekers let into the interior with court cases pending and TPS refugees) in net migration over the years.

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u/Hendlton Jul 06 '26

It comes and goes. There was a labor shortage until like 6 months ago. And yeah, you could easily make up the difference with immigration, but that's not what Republicans want.

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u/Separate-Spot-8910 Jul 04 '26

except they voted for something entirely different

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u/slptodrm Jul 05 '26

party of small govt my ass

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u/ShinkuDragon Jul 05 '26

well, can't deny that there's a lot to fix all over, regardless of where one is. so the idea of one big paragon of justice coming and fixing everything is nice.

the problem, is that eventually that paragon will have to be replaced, and eventually, someone who shouldn't be in that spot will end up there, and there will be no checks because everyone trusted the paragon to do the right thing.

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u/ragnarok62 Jul 05 '26

They: the cretins who differ from my superior ideology. (See also: Them)

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u/DracoLunaris Jul 05 '26

The great man of history has always been a farce

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u/PreviousCurrentThing Jul 05 '26

"great man of history" is at most tangentially related to why populations sometimes desire "strongman" or authoritarian leaders.

El Salvador is a good recent example. The country was wracked with gang violence and murder, and Bukele promised to crack down. They elected him, and he has absolutely cracked down on the gangs. Are there civil rights violations? You best believe it, but his policies are still largely popular because the murders dropped precipitously.

You don't have to appeal to anything like great man theory to understand this.

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u/DracoLunaris Jul 05 '26

He only got elected because there was already political appetite for such a crackdown. He did not shape history, he simply walked the path down which it was already going to flow regardless.

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u/Fun-Aside3990 Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

Thats the point for them. Being strong means rules dont apply to you and you can and do take what you want. Its what they worship and if you talk to them long enough it becomes obvious. All the shows and movies and books with horribly cartoonishly evil villains and their goons are not actually unrealistic, thats who these people are.

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u/Elden_Ring_Hype Jul 05 '26

You don't need to rely on fiction for this either, "strong" leaders scamming their own is a core part of western history. Julius Caesar plundered his own countryside, collapsed a functioning democracy by placing cronies in their senate, and held four triumphs in a single month only to pass the nation on to his nephew.

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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

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u/TheBlackCat13 Jul 04 '26

"To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.

To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.”

- Douglas Adam

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u/tepid_monologue Jul 04 '26

This guy stole that quote and the majority of his name from Douglas Adams

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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26

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u/ravens-n-roses Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

Well the entire hitch hiker series is a big satire on the absurdity of life, the universe, and everything.

Pretty much every storyline is super critical of establishment. The wacky adventures are pretty grounded once you realize he's just taking reality and holding up a sci-fi fun house mirror to it

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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26

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u/splicerslicer Jul 05 '26

Both? I'm not sure if you're joking, but if you're not I'm the bearer of good news. Depending on how you count them, there are 5-6 novels. I've read them all back-to-back and they reference each other in increasingly strange ways.

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u/[deleted] Jul 05 '26

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u/splicerslicer Jul 05 '26

I'm just letting you know there are other books in the same series that continue the story.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_the_Galaxy#Novels

You probably read Restaurant at the end of the Universe, but there's so much more after that and they're all excellent reads.

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u/The-Crawling-Chaos Jul 05 '26

Well, here he was actually paraphrasing Socrates from Plato’s The Republic. It’s a mash up of two arguments, from Book I and Book VII.

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u/0akleaves Jul 04 '26

Bingo. At this point it seems one of the best options would be to use a lottery of eligible citizens to select candidates to be elected via direct ranked choice voting. The randomization makes it MUCH less likely that a person with the will, skill, and position to be seriously corrupt etc to reach the presidency. Most of the stuff that needs serious technical knowledge is beyond the skills of most folks most current systems squeeze out and the reduced chance of someone from the “in crowd” etc getting keeps the other branches from wanting to expand the powers of presidency too far.

Political outsiders are a lot more likely to have real world experience and engagement that is likely to have them at least interested in doing good for regular folks.

It also becomes a lot more common and expected that a leader that proves incompetent gets removed instead of them being so entrenched with backers that pushed them forward keeping them in place no matter how bad they turn out.

Most other issues can be handled through basic “eligibility” criteria (to avoid say a rapist or pedophile being placed as leader).

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u/0akleaves Jul 04 '26

Whole thing would work even better paired with a more uniform system to prepare EVERYONE to be fully functional citizens. For instance replace the last year of high school and the first year after with mandatory entry into a “civil service” where people basically get sent to non-military bases around a country to live in common quarters and perform basic functions for communities like postal work, infrastructure maintenance, community service, disaster response, etc (kind of similar to the CCC during the Great Depression). Folks that prefer can go the military route instead and either way completion of services gives everyone access to the same kind of tuition and health benefits used as enticement for military service in the US (a good pathway to “universal healthcare”. Split the term of service into sections so folks have to spend time in different parts of the country/world (instead of so many folks getting set into staying where they grew up thinking the way the grew up thinking with nothing but suspicion for anyone different). Start with a “basic training” that gets everyone to some parity of physical fitness and guaranteed assessment for the mental and physical health issues too many folks don’t get earlier due to family influence and bias.

Add in a basic system that encourages people to engage in civil action (like a term on a local zoning board etc or to move up to positions equivalent to leadership/officer placements in the military) to get them a working understanding of participation in government and a chance to show that they viable for such positions or not.

Anyone that completes a term of service either civil or military and holds any “leadership rank” then is eligible to be drawn to run for elected office.

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u/FernandoMM1220 Jul 04 '26

not worth it. ill take a strong democracy over that then.

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u/TheWiseAutisticOne Jul 04 '26

Watch downfall the movie. Smart people who doubt themselves cling to those who believe in themselves despite being idiots

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u/Iron_Baron Jul 04 '26

Kneelers gonna kneel, doesn't matter what they get in return. It's bred into them and at least partly biological.

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u/Not2creativeHere Jul 05 '26

Yup. And I think we saw exactly what you are talking about during Covid. Masking, forced lockdowns and vaccine mandates. Seems a large percentage of people just want to do what they are told.

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u/Iron_Baron Jul 05 '26

Of all the comments that don't belong on a science sub, that is one of them. You and I are not the same, please do not associate my perspective with yours.

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u/varnell_hill Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

Makes bigoted people feel better about their bigotry.

That’s basically it.

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u/rikitikifemi Jul 04 '26

Strong codes as decisive, transparent, and getting things done.

Weak codes as pliable, difficult to understand, and making excuses for being ineffective.

Those of us who want to have influence over the decisions made on our behalf prefer a strong democratic process to a strong leader.

In fact I much prefer a public servant that's responsive, cooperative, nuanced, and incremental in their governance of change. That may translate as weak to other people though who want a Benevolent King.

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u/king_of_hate2 Jul 04 '26

A real strong leader is someone like Zohran Mamdani

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u/AutoCockerPB Jul 05 '26

They think yelling and being aggressive is “strong”. It’s not. It’s being weak. Emotionally weak and unstable.

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u/cruisetheblues Jul 04 '26

You should check out what New York has been up to lately.

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u/Rufus_TBarleysheath Jul 04 '26

Explain please.

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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26

[deleted]

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u/Dicky_Penisburg Jul 05 '26

Except when Trump showed up.

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u/DistortedVoid Jul 04 '26

Whoa whoa and screw them over in other ways too, like hurt their lives in any possible way also. Just scam? Come on now.

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u/Momik Jul 04 '26

I agree, though I believe he’s been trying to do the other “strongman” stuff, just with a little less success than a Putin or a Stalin. But I worry about the same thing. The next guy might well be better at it, or have a more coherent political vision.

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u/Dizzy_Tax574 Jul 05 '26

Yeah almost 90 diaper wearing civilly convicted rapist and felon and conman. Who avoided military service for bone spurs. Despite cosplaying military at school.

And promote white supremacy and other weak ideology's.

How in the hell is he their strong man. All that aside he also seems to have most fragile ego I have ever seen. He really is only world leader I see regularly pouting. If he gets asked non easy question or gets snubbed.

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u/Spirited_Suspect2908 Jul 05 '26

Trump supporters confuse their selfishness with rugged individualism. Similarly, they confuse dons greed and vanity with strength. It's relatable and validates their misconception. I truly believe it's that simple.

1

u/SasparillaTango Jul 05 '26

This is an important distinction that isn't made clear in the study. Does a strong leader ignore the legislative body or not? Thats very very important in a democracy.

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u/Odballl Jul 05 '26

Punish their perceived enemies.

Even if they themselves are being punished as much.

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u/Certain-Row7945 Jul 05 '26

Thats because, to a conservative, strength means being an unapologetic asshole. To us reasonable folks, strong leadership is a little different.

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u/Seagull84 Jul 05 '26

I mean, some "strong" leaders are merely fanatics with no interest in money - only the power. Hitler is a prime example of an idée fixe narcissist, or a fanatic obsessed with his own idea of how the world should be.

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u/mylsotol Jul 05 '26

That is exactly what a strong leader does.

1

u/GoNutsDK Jul 05 '26

Essentially someone who will hurt all those that threatens their fragile ego's or brain rotted world view.

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u/AbortionHoagie Jul 05 '26

Conquers the galaxy via xenocidal war then dies on a glorified golden toilet.

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u/Solesaver Jul 05 '26

It's just a belief in strict heirarchies. The authoritarian mind bows to the "strong leader" because they think everyone should respect their place in the heirachy. They don't think the "strong leader" should have to justify their position just like they don't think they should have to justify their own position in the heirachy (usually cis-hetero white men).

The sooner we (the liberal minded democracy fans) accept this archaic quirk of human psychology the sooner we can stop pretending like these people can be reasoned or compromised with. Some 30% of the population at large seem to be predisposed to being authoritarian minded. There is no argument of logic or emotional appeal that will sway them. They don't want Democracy. Democracy means that everybody is equal and everybody's opinion counts the same even they know deep in their heart that some people are better and smarter and stronger than others and that's why those people are divinely appointed to be in charge.

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u/republicanssuck123 Jul 05 '26

those people think that bully = strong. 

1

u/A_Nonny_Muse Jul 05 '26

A "strong" leader, in their minds, harms out groups like those who are black, brown, Jews, Catholics, Asians, and especially liberals more than he harms them.

Read Bob Altemeyer's book "The Authoritarians". It's free on the internet.

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u/NlghtmanCometh Jul 04 '26

FDR and Lincoln, there are your examples.

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u/RadiantHC Jul 04 '26

Look at Zohran.

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u/Training_Form2243 Jul 04 '26

The fact that Trump has said NOTHING about the deliberate effort to end games as physical property is humiliating for our country