Politics subreddits and their choice of words
Choosing ones words for speeches is a crucial part of politics. Let’s see what choices are made in different political subreddits.
About 453k randomly chosen comments to about 32k submissions from 2013-08 to 2014-07 on /r/conservative, /r/democrats, /r/liberal, /r/libertarian and /r/republican were collected and analysed for frequency of specific words and phrases.
Cannabis
/r/republican mentions weed the most, while the conservatives talk not so much about it. The democrats lie somewhere in the middle.
cannabis
Congress
The congress is mentioned most often by the republicans, followed by /r/democrats.
congress
Medicaid
Here too the republicans lead the category. They talk more about Medicaid than all others.
medicaid
Minimum wage
Minimum wage on the other hand seems to be a hot topic in /r/liberal, while the democrats mention it less than everybody else.
minimum wage
Obamacare
Obamacare is discussed by far the most in /r/rebublican.
obamacare
President/Obama
The republicans and the democrats mention president obama more than the three other subreddits.
president
Religion
The religious words, that was scanned for, are used most in /r/liberal.
religion
Science
The same goes for science topics.
science
Tax
Taxes are most debated by the republicans, while /r/democrats mentions them not so often.
tax
War
War and related words are mentioned the most in /r/liberal.
war
Cursing
They also use more swear words than the other subreddits, followed by the democrats. The republicans curse fewest of all.
cursing
Happiness
The liberals also express their happiness most openly, followed by the democrats.
happiness
Mutual mentions
Finally we look at how often the communities mention each other.
(Click here for the interactive version and an explanation for this diagram type.)
The democrats and the republicans are both mentioned quite often; the others by contrast rather seldom.
That’s it. If you want to you can download the raw data all these diagrams are based on.