Political Compass of the Philippine Blogosphere

First of all, a personal project Ive been involved with is winding down which means I may have more time for this blogging thing. And I think Im starting to shake off the effects of an annual bout with anhedonia which means I may actually enjoy doing this blogging thing.

Over at Placeholder, cvj has posted an interesting snapshot of the Philippine blog community (from which I nicked the title of this post) based on the Political Compass website. It's a work in progress and cvj promises to keep updating it as more data points come in. The Political Compass quiz shows you where you are in 2 axes: the vertical axis maps where you are socio-politically, and the horizontal axis maps where you are socio-economically. Among his findings so far:

Another pattern that can be detected... is the farther one is to the left on the economic scale, the less authoritarian that person tends to be.

The post has prompted an observation from newspaper columnist and political satirist Manuel Buencamino of Uniffors:

I've always associated communism with totalitarianism hence authoritarian. So I don't understand how those of us who don't buy anarchy or self regulating economics end up being less authoritarian.

Isn't it ironic that those who subscribe to economic freedom prefer to have the socio-political aspects of life regulated while those who want economics regulated prefer socio-political freedom?

Could it be because there is a false dichotomy here, separating our stomach from our minds?

One can make the observation that authoritarians, whether communists, Fascists, neo-cons, or national socialists are all basically variants of a form of government wherein the State has a loomingly large role in the lives of the people. The Filipino blogging community I suppose is wary of an all-powerful State, and with good reason. However, in the Philippine setting, wherein a tiny minority control most of the nation's resources, the Filipino bloggers still recognize the role of the State in seeing to it that the powerless are protected from the depradations of the small but powerful oligarchy. The fact is that it doesnt, and on the contrary, the State allies itself with the oligarchy and this frustrates the bloggers no end. (See also Sparks's The Philippines' Low Intensity Democracy.)