So, the amygdala doesn't just impact fear response, it also does anger, anxiety, and stress. An overactive amygdala negatively impacts your ability to think clearly.

Fun fact: Conservativism can be linked to Lead and/or Mercury exposure

I'm autistic and have an oversized amygdala but that doesn't stop me from being leftist. I just feel compassion for everyone human. Still struggling with the compassion for animals that I eat.

The better educated you are, the more left leaning you tend to be:
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2016/04/26/a-wider-ideological-gap-between-more-and-less-educated-adults/

Conservatives tend to be dismissive of science and empirical evidence:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/07/160713172717.htm

Higher verbal IQ correlates with liberal attitudes:
https://www.psypost.org/verbal-iq-predicts-political-participation-and-liberal-attitudes-twice-as-strongly-as-performance-iq/

Whatever this dumb shit is, is a reaction to that. As usual, they project their own shortcomings on their enemies.

In any case, what it comes down to is basic empathy and morality. If you care for others, you tend to vote left. If you care for only yourself and your self-interests, you vote right. There is no debating that, it's stated right there in the fucking ideology.

POV:

You just aggravated someone with an 'undersized' amygdala.

No wonder Republicans are so phobic of everything. They got overinflated amygdalas. Amygdalas so big they look like this:

Conservatives are more afraid of everything, and respond in anger. How the fuck is that "better"?

Ah, the typical nazi idea of correlating random body measurements with complex behavioral and emotional patterns.

I'M AFRAID OF EVERYTHING LIKE A REAL MAN!

Went to a Mediterranean restaurant for dinner with my wife. We celebrated her birthday, and so decided to check the dessert menu. We generally don't get dessert, just never really lie thing, but this menu has a dessert called amygdalopita, which piques my interest. Why would they name it after part of the brain?

And so upon further research, we discovered that the Greek word αμύγδαλο (amýgdalo) means almond. And this really got my wheels turning, because it brought back memory of EMT classes, way back in like 2003, where they talked about the amygdala being named such due tonit being almond shaped.

So I like a dessert that not only tasted great, but also helped me make connections, maybe fire off some neurons I hadn't in a while.

For the curious ones, from Psychology Today:

"A larger amygdala is primarily associated with increased anxiety, heightened emotional reactivity, and stress-related disorders, often acting as a hyper-active "threat detector" Symptoms frequently include persistent fearfulness, depression, irritability, and hypervigilance, as the brain over-processes neutral stimuli as threats."

Whoever made the original meme is an absolute moron.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201311/the-size-and-connectivity-the-amygdala-predicts-anxiety

Conservatives don't know anything about the person they voted for. They don't know anything about how their government functions. They don't know anything about their Constitution.

I promise they don't know what an amygdala is or what it does.

conservatives have a hyerptrophied amygdala due to always constantly feeling fear.

OMG they are so detached from reality that they are bragging about being terrified?

"Be afraid." We have people posting "Be afraid." with 0% irony.
What?

Tiny amygdala

Big dick

Hat3rs will h8

Sanders 2028

I've seen some interesting discussion of this linked to the idea of survive/thrive strategies. Is the world a dangerous place that calls for avoiding risks and protecting what you have, or is it full of opportunities and calls for exploring and being open to novelty? Neither inclination is fundamentally wrong. But I'm not sure how to reconcile that with modern "rightists" who want to burn down the system and aren't conservative in the lowercase-C sense.

"I'm afraid more often and that's why I'm a terrible person!"

Since we're sharing fun facts, conservatism and authoritarianism is unsurprisingly correlated with high levels of obedience in things like the Milgrim shock experiment replications. Something akin to 90% compared to the original 60% (which was already quite high since they only had white men at the time).

They're also more likely to choose selfish options in things like the prisoners dilemma, too!

(Edit, if you wanna read more there's an open source textbook I use: https://opentextbc.ca/socialpsychology/ )

"I'm more scared than you!" Is a weird flex.

Stay close to the tree line. Learn to identify plants with poisonous oils. Stockpile the leaves that are like paper. If you must run a fire, use clean burning fuels, to avoid disclosing location. Dig a deep hole and build a privacy wall out of poisonous vines.

Edit that was for something else lol

The average American reads at an elementary school level, and many are functionally illiterate. Here is a case in point.

Ironic that right-wingers seem to be particularly enamoured of the “It’s afraid” meme then (doubly ironic that it’s from an anti-fascist parody).

Let's just say I get scared real easy.

Kazakhstan has superior amygdala. All other countries have inferior amygdala

Having enlarged and/or over active amygdalas would go a long way to explaining a lot of traits expressed by conservatives. That includes their fear of going to going to the grocery store without a gun on their hip.

I'm a leftist and I have an anxiety disorder! Checkmate, conservatives

I credit an intense compassion for animals and resulting veganism to my autism.

Just wanted to put that in this thread without making it a direct response to anyone. Sometimes it can be incredibly alienating and disconcerting to encounter people online who say they can't be vegan because they're autistic. It's a very diverse spectrum with a multitude of manifestations, and I'd like to go on record as proof that it swings toward positive outcomes and not only negative ones.

That would actually make a lot of sense.
And it's wild to brag about it.

I am guilty of thinking about the same thing when it comes to "Conservatives". I catch myself wondering if they are actually human or if they are all mentally retarded due to lead poisoning.

Around 40,000 to 50,000 years ago we had other species of humans running around with us, like Neanderthals and over a dozen other species if you go back further. These would have seemed like aliens to our ancestors. What if Conservatives are a slightly different version of human.

The lead poisoning thing actually makes sense for the Baby Boomer generationand Generation X. We used leaded gasoline during their lifetimes. These people could all be mentally deficient ... and we are letting them run the world when they should be in a mental hospital somewhere.**

That's actually interesting, and I'd love to see the studies behind that (and then see if I can find out how my own brain is structured).

Hi, I'm a coward bc I'm not a leftist isn't the flex you think it is.