I am not even sure, by LBO standards, what left or right wing is. I tend to think of the spouse as pretty left-wing, but you may differ. Here are her views (which might explain why she is not on LBO): she doesn't find particularly tricky (in a practical sense) the basic notions of morality and fairness (support for or against various isms and rights follow: for feminism, against racism, etc). She believes strongly in animal welfare or rights, and is perhaps more militant (in terms of opinion) than me in her unwillingness to accept exceptionalism in speceisism.
She is not on any mailing list (well non-technical or non-family ones, that is) and she would probably explain it as below: a list could serve one of these purposes: (a) figuring out using collective wisdom what right/wrong, fact/fiction, etc are, and common goals based on that. This (I am putting words in her mouth) she believes is mostly implicitly agreed upon already (outside of the animal rights issue, which she doesn't expect to convince anyone outside of her community about), (b) planning actions, strategy, tactics to reach these goals or spread the facts, etc and (c) to be supportive of each other on a personal and a community level. Her experience of Internet interaction (mostly as an observer) has not led her to believe that either (b) or (c) work or happen, unless the goals are narrowly defined for a fairly homogeneous group and there is a strong undemocratic element to the process. Her cynicism (as I see it) regarding human natures (including her own) also gives her little hope that even (a) is possible i.e., we may implicitly agree on facts etc but not so explicitly, or when it is time to act.
What does she do... more housework than me ;-). Playing with the little guy. Less time on computers. Marching in the occasional rally. Arguing with her extended family about Kashmir or Pakistan or the BJP. She is a big science and engineering junkie -- so books, TV on the subject... or the occasional argument with me about anti-scientism (we had a great discussion the other day about a recent article in the NYT regarding a science conference that in my opinion was mostly religion bashing (which she thinks is mostly a good thing to do ;-))... stuff like that.
I quite understand her attitude. The more intriguing question is why do I post to mailing lists? I think the reason is that I am weaker than her... rather than accept my unwillingness to act I hope to (pretend to) be doing something worthwhile in the midst of pursuing my default activity (Internet anything). In this way, I can also pretend to have or be part of a community.
More than you wanted to know, I am sure ;-).
--ravi