User:Quadell/biases

In age, I'm around 40 (to within an order of magnitude). Too young to be too cynical, and too old to be too naive. It still feels like 1994 was about ten years ago, and it probably always will.

In location, I'm delighted to be an American (USian). Born and raised in Louisville, I'm quite settled into my new home of Cincinnati. I've very rarely left the U.S., and I have to remind myself that people aren't merely trying to sound cool when they use non-American varieties of English.

In religion, I'm a post-atheist Buddhist and Christian. I'm constantly fascinated by both Judaism and Islam. I found Buddhism through the wisdom of the Dhammapada during a series of personal crises, and I rediscovered Christianity through scholarship. Given that Jesus spoke almost exclusively in parables, I think it's more in the spirit of Christianity to read the Bible figuratively, rather than literally.

In politics, I'm a post-libertarian, pragmatist Democrat. I have strong beliefs, and a few of them probably aren't fair. I think vaccines are a public good, and should always be free. I think American companies are disloyal if they don't give their employees paid time off to vote and serve on juries. I think the lack of paid parental leave in the U.S. is deeply embarrassing. I think the data is clear that owning a gun makes you more likely to be injured by a firearm, so buying a gun for protection is almost always a dumb choice—but I still oppose 99% of gun control measures as ineffective and counterproductive. I think women should be able to choose whether or not to have an abortion without legal interference, and that insurance (including Medicaid) should cover these procedures. I think the primary reason that the U.S. is far less socialist than nearly every other first-world country is that white Americans consciously or unconsciously resist allowing public funds to be used to help people of different races. I think when people dislike big government, what they really mean is that they dislike working together with others. I think everyone I know and love disagrees with me on at least one of these points.

I present these biases to you, my fellow Wikipedians, to give you power: a heightened ability to detect bias in my edits, which I hope can be fully eliminated. Thanks for reading.