General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Should the United States have a standard Psychological Test [View all]Gravitycollapse
(8,155 posts)First off, measures of intelligence are historically rooted in biological racism and the results of large scale IQ tests reflect poorly on POCs. Second, IQ tests only measure a very narrow subset of what would be considered "intelligence." There would be little correlation, for instance, between a strict hierarchy of IQ scores and the ability to complete complex, real-world tasks. It certainly wouldn't contribute anything meaningful to debates on what constitutes true "leadership."
What your IQ test standard would effectively do is reconstitute political leadership along lines of race, class, and gender. Members of wealthy, white communities would be overrepresented in political office much in the same way they are now.
This isn't even diving into the more than likely situation that IQ results would be further politicized, associating specific voting patterns or public positions with greater "intelligence." Which sounds great if you're an ideologue and your party is in power. It won't be so great when you're the opposition.
Remember all the political rhetoric around Clinton supposedly being chronically ill and senile? Imagine if that kind of rhetoric became institutionalized. That's basically what you're advocating.