>That said, polling/ethnography/etc. etc. were and are used as ways
>to subjugate populations as part of a nationalizing process. It's a
>double-edged sword. But this isn't really news to anyone who has a
>healthy understanding of the history of the social sciences and
>their ambivalent relation to the state, imperializing or
>nationlizing (which are two parts of the same process....).
Yup. And polling can also be used to narrow the range of discourse, to define opinions that are acceptable (i.e., appear as checkboxes on the survey form) and aren't (those that fall in between or outside the checkboxes). My beef is with those who see only one edge of the sword.
Doug