Do you have R adult siblings who seemed to exhibit R traits as children?

[Maine Mary]

Case in point... One of my 3 sisters has always been very judgemental and sometimes downright mean to those she considered somehow "beneath" her. For example, she HATED overweight people even though half my family is that way. Somehow she ignored that fact though-(hypocrasy) I remember even when we were preteens she used to like to say things like "Looks like it's ging to rain. All the "tubs" are out"
Or about an overweight stranger she'd say things like, "I'd like to grab that bag of chips right out of her pig-fat hands".

She had no patience for those who dressed sloppily and has been very materialistic as long as I can remember. She horded her holiday candy for months and since she was older always took any little thing of value I ever had aquired (from Christmas ,birthdays ect). We weren't very well off financially so hand-me-downs were a clothing staple. However she would only pass down the crap clothes to me even if she had already outgrown the decent ones.

Even though I could give a million more examples I guess the best way to explain my point is that she had as a child, (and still has) a sort of dog-eat dog mentality which she seems to justify by finding fault in others. I don't know... it's sort of an attitude I equate w/R's more then Dems. We may not be perfect either but I rarely see THAT type of personality among Dems.

Sadly my sister hasn't changed much over the years and if anything has aquired even more of a mean streak toward a broader spectrum of people. Welfare people, the working poor, people who exhibit bad parenting skills (in her opinion :eyes:) ect. And of course she is a regisitered R.

My other 2 sisters were never that way as kids and though one is somewhat apolitical, the other is a definate D.

What do you think? Is there such a thing as a R or D personality that some people are actually BORN with?

[Dookus]

1. Yup

three siblings, and we all turned out exactly the way our childhood behavior and attitudes would indicate.

The only Republican in the group is my oldest brother, who was always the snitch moralist.

[Djinn]

4. nature & nurture I think

there's 4 kids in my family and we all have different takes on things and some of us are a bit more judgemental and/or sympathetic than others, but we're all lefties, I think it's a bit of both.

[Bill of Rights]

2. Very interesting post

My sister converted to Catholicism, which means that she is now fanatical. She is younger than me by 4 years and was a dear. She is now a Republican because of killing babies. She is not dog-eat-dog. After she found out that I am gay, it took her 7 months to deal with it. She later told me that it was very hard for her.

[southerngirlwriter]

3. My sister is a Republican.

As a child, she was reactionary and stupid and would believe anything anyone told her. If she cared enough about politics to do the FR thing, she would be one of the ones over there in tears over the fake Anton Lavey/John Kerry picture. Would buy it hook, line, and sinker.

Luckily, she doesn't care enough to be active in the party. She shows up and votes Republican but doesn't really follow politics until a week before the various elections.

As a child, I was a voracious reader who had trouble making up my mind about some things because I am overempathic and can so easily put myself into the shoes of every person in a debate, and it took until I was a teenager for my liberal principles to really coalesce, and they did so with much thought and reading and thinking and writing to back them up.

Your theory sounds right to me. :-)

[Missy Vixen]

5. My younger sister, the Republican

>What do you think? Is there such a thing as a R or D personality that some people are actually BORN with?<

I could write on this one all day. We come from a blue-collar family of hardcore D's and union activists.

My younger sister was catered to from the moment she drew her first breath. She's considered the "beauty of the family", and has manipulated and controlled everyone around her till she got whatever it was she wanted. My sister also never bothered with formal education -- after all, why bother educating oneself when Daddy (or some other guy,) will make sure she doesn't have to wear herself out with the mundane things in life?

I don't think she's read anything weightier than Danielle Steel in her entire life, and to be blunt, I wonder if she actually reads at all.

Cut to now. When one is plain (like me,) one has to constantly improve oneself. I have my own opinions and can back them up with facts. My sister is now parroting the right-wing crap her "boyfriend" spouts. She called several months ago simpering about "how high" taxes are, and "how awful" it is to pay them. I snapped in return that she doesn't pay for anything; how can she bitch about taxes at all? I then asked her to recite three tenets of the Republican Party platform, if she was so knowledgeable about it.

I realize this makes me unneccessarily cruel, but if there was anyone in the world who could grow up in a Dem atmosphere and decide she's a R, it's my younger sister.

Julie

[Semi_subversive]

6. My sister seems to lean that way

but I'm pounding away. She's born again from way back, but it's half the fun showing her that * is a born again fraud.

[graywarrior]

7. My sister was a stoner freak til

she married a born-again. Now I can't say swear words in front of her. Jesus's ears hurt. Plus, she a repub.

[DrRock]

8. sibs

I am the second oldest of seven. My older brother has a PHD in Sociology, so I value his opinion very highly. When he talks about these issues, he always looks at them from a humanist perspective, and not a political perspective. We weren't raised religious at all, but my younger sibs were. They all gained very good values as a result, and have not let their religious beliefs skew their sense of right and wrong. My oldest younger sister is probably the most devout in her faith, but looks at it from a humanist perspective. She's pro-life and anti-war, so at least her values are consistent. I have one younger brother who's an artist, so he saw through the religious bullshit right away. The jury is still out on the youngest ones, but I think they'll turn out ok. At least that's what I'm working on...

[undergroundpanther]

9. Look into

Authoritarian personality disorders.
Every bully has something on this spectrum.

To me the only mental illness that exists is authoritarianism.Bullies.

It takes only one bully or authoritarian to make any milieu of people feel miserable..
Bullies and authoritarians self esteem seems to depend on their habit of belittling others.
At the heart of it is a presumption of entitlement and a deep self loathing.

[wickerwoman]

12. Sounds like my brother...

He's a centrist dem who I can see going Repub after his next promotion.

He was a straight C- student in school pissed off that his older sister was better at everything than him.

Now I can't even express an opinion about a fucking movie in front of him without him pulling out his condescending "You've been brainwashed by those East Coast ivory tower liberals and you're an elitist snob to boot" bullshit. I've caught him multiple times repeating opinions he gave his "feminazi" sister shit about five or six month earlier when he thinks I'm not listening but anything I say (and I mean anything) he pounces on and then tries to pass it off as a "joke".

I was thinking he'd been watching too much of The Man Show and hoping for a conversion, but at this point I wash my hands of him. He's a miserable bully, always has been and always will be.

[ClintonTyree]

10. We were all............

crammed full of religion and patriotism. I have a sister (55), I'm a year younger (54) and my brother was born 17 years after I was. We were children of Republican parents, God fearing, gun toting moralists who except for myself, gave up thinking for themselves years ago. The main difference in the way we turned out? Viet Nam.
My sister certainly wasn't going, but I was of prime draft age and after I lost my student deferment I received the "LETTER" from the Selective Service.
The mood abruptly changed around the house when my parents and sister came to the realization that I could be shipped off to some foreign land to shoot at people and be shot at with the intention of doing grievous bodily harm. All of the sudden my parents were ready to send me to Canada to avoid the draft.
That was back in the late 60's. I lucked out and failed my draft physical, but my mind had been changed forever. I would never again blindly trust or follow my government or religion again.
My family reverted back to their Republican ways, not having learned a thing.
17 years later my brother was born, and not wanting to make the same mistakes that had produced a free thinking, ever questioning soul as myself, made damn sure that they indoctrinated my brother with all the hate and vitriol that they could pollute his young mind with. He remains a staunch Republican to this day.
My sister........she's relinquished all thought capacity to the media cartel, she thinks what they want her to think. She's always been intellectually lazy.
I'm the only one in the family that seems to have the ability for free thought, although my mother seems to be coming around a little. She's been a lifelong Republican and absolutely HATES Bush. I like to think I can take credit for her 'conversion'. Since my VERY Republican Dad died, she's taken to thinking for herself (he always did all the thinking for both of them before).
I was always the Black Sheep, the godless liberal who challenged the system, but they loved me all the same. I loved them too, even if I didn't agree with their beliefs. Hey, we're a family and families stick together.
In closing, again the catalyst in the parting of ways was Viet Nam. My life was the only one in the family that would have been at risk in that travesty, so it profoundly changed me.

[clyrc]

11. Well, my brother was crazy as a child

and he's crazy now. He claims to be a Repub, but if the rest of my family turned Repub, he'd argue Democrat. He doesn't vote, though, so I really don't worry about his political leanings.

My sister is a lukewarm moderate Democrat, mainly I think because my parents are Democrats. I expect her to get more conservative as she gets older, though, which is the opposite of what I'm doing. She is neither mean nor stupid, but she has a rather narrow focus and she likes it that way.