this is why we were taught to look at how things work with a cool head, people. Anger only clouds your judgment and reasoning and is never a good thing to make a decision, under its influence. At the same time, don't be a hypocrite. If you have a set of beliefs, stick to them, unless they need correcting, then accept the correction gracefully.
people also don't realise that 'it's my opinion' doesn't qualify it as valid.
I've seen this from users on both sides here on FP tbh. Especially when it comes to arguing with the more infamous users, people seem to have an anyurism when the other is technically right about something.
(I am not a centrist)
Now throw this into the mix
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/05/23/opinion/international-world/centrists-democracy.html
I think we might be fucked
Personally a little efficiency might actually do some good, considering how half the governments in the world work, getting into deadlocks and trying to pull partisan bullshit with laws or bills designed for everybody's benefit.
I'm tired of this "enlightened centrism" meme
It's gotten to the point where if you're not vociferously partisan, you're el ebin ELNIGHTED CENTRISM xD
It's possible for the Democrats to do bad shit sometimes and pointing that out doesn't make you an "enlightened centrist"
(not responding to specifically what you said tempcon)
Absolutely. What 'makes the grade' of it for me is when you try to equivocate minor administrative quirks or errors with the full blown fascism of the present administration and sell it as 'both sides are equally corrupt and bad, therefore have and endorse nihilism and apathy'.
I'm an Independent, not a centrist, and I hope that it shows in my posting. The Democrats are at times very corrupt and disingenuous in how they market themselves versus how they administrate. In this year, they are not at all even slightly comparable with the neck-breaking whiplash and descent into naked fascism through unironically embraced memes such as 'nationalism is the only cure for communism and the left is communist'. We may point to this administration's hand in ensuring maximal suffering of immigrants as they are now apparently taking immigration policy advisement from Vlad the Impaler and may in turn receive 'but the Obama admin was just as bad, look at these scattered isolated incidents which are now asserted to be the same as administrative policy in an environment where such tragedies occur daily which shall now be directly equivocated as 'the same'.
An 'enlightened centrist' does anything and everything to make 'all crimes matter the same' because it allows them, therefore, to 'dismiss all crimes' when its inconvenient for them as 'an inescapable natural consequence of the system'.
I feel like centrism has become abused the same way people used 'Classical Liberal'.
It actually means what it says on the tin, but instead people who have very little political knowledge and just want to display apathy to both parties abuses the poor word to say thngs like, "There's always an answer in the middle" or "Both parties are just as bad."
Actual centrists would probably be with most democrats right now wanting to throw Republicans into the fire for what they're doing with Donald Trump. They may not agree with Democrats but I think most sane people want to get rid of Trump and his festering stooges ASAP.
Water wet
This article is pretty good and I feel it'll fall on deaf ears.
Just look at some people on this site, a few names jump to mind of "extremists" on either side of the aisle who fail to see any negative or critical aspect of their ideology and just regurgitate it on que.
Just a few months ago people were calling me a centrist as a attack.
You misunderstand the "enlightened centrist" meme. It has nothing to do with criticizing Democrats. It's when you believe the solution is always somewhere in the middle, otherwise known as the golden mean fallacy. It's mainly used as a way to downplay the alt-right and radicalize naive people.
And a few months before that people were arguing we could find a central commonality between being and Nazi and not being a Nazi. Everything is fucked right now.
Pretty rude to completely misinterpret my post and then say I'm the one misunderstanding the concept.
I know what it's supposed to mean. I was clearly expressing my distaste for what it's been warped into.
My bad
This is kinda weird. I'd be really surprised if the centrism meme has gotten big enough that it is represented in a large study. I'd be more inclined to believe that people are afraid of calling themselves far-right.
Also I don't want to shit on the author because it seems like he works in research and is writing a separate paper on this, but it IS an opinion article and the analysis is from him and not the data he's citing.
Politics 101: If you only hold an opinion because "it's my opinion" and with no other basises, you don't have any footing for that opinion and should reevaluate it.
Always keep that in your head.
Something else people might find interesting
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.3102/0002831216679817
Basically, it finds those with the most political knowledge are
the most guided by directional motivation, or seeking facts to justify already held ideas
no better at identifying misinformation than others
dramatically more likely to disagree with unaligned posts. The correlation is actually stronger than the link between political knowledge and agreeing with an ideologically aligned post.
Another sad bit is it also found media literacy, which doesn't lessen directional motivation but greatly raises accuracy motivation, is correlated with correctly identifying misinformation but also more, not less, susceptibility to emotional arguments.
I think the point of that link was to show that the center may have more of those people who only care about the trains running on time.
I would also be careful with condemning centrists, since besides that sort of people there's quite a few lower class types among them. Contrary to what you might expect, blacks for example are by and large moderate liberals. The hard right is only 10% more white than the hard left according to the hidden tribes study.
Footnote: If your opinion is only backed by sources which are not highly credible and attempt to be apartisan, your opinion is not likely to be factually backed.
Thing is, that's not the actual reason they hold an opinion the majority of the time. More often it's a long string of (possibly even coherent) explanations ending in a fallacy or untruth somewhere. Like a wrong statistic or an incorrect source.
Then you need to prove that their statistic or source is wrong, and in turn they'll just call you a liar and go full conspiracy theorist and say that you are in bed with whoever their enemy is.
And once that happens, they are beyond hope. Their logical system will be closed, and anyone who dares challenge it (but themselves) is either ignorant or the enemy. They can never be convinced of anything else, and will hold their beliefs until the day they die.
I don't think all criticism is created equal. Some people seem to criticize purely because they're too left wing, which imo isn't real criticism at all.
not all opposition is criticism
Centrists are just lazy pal. I am definitely far left and I obviously hate the entire right wing of the political spectrum, but I find myself hurt more often than not by the "left" and their more or less global inability to actually make any progress due what amounts to appeasement, essentially. You can easily disagree with the "democrats" and still hold actual political opinions, considering that they're hardly even on the left to begin with.
Centrism is literally just appeasement, or at least it is in the current political climate anyhow. You don't find a middle-ground with people who are locking children up in cages, or are doing their best to revoke rights from minority groups. Appeasement didn't work in the lead-up to WW2, and it won't work now.
Centrism isn't the position that compromising on situations is the best result. It's literally people that hold positions that don't solidly fit them in either the right or left spectrum. The old "Just kill half the jews" meme is a strawman.
Being with the left on
Taxes
Immigration
And against on
Gun Control
Healthcare reform
Doesn't mean they want the in between result. They'll probably still vote either D or R depending on how strongly they value those positions. Though I do know telling them to fuck off certainly doesn't help them lean towards your side.
The people you're complaining about are the politically apathetic, and likely don't even vote.
Centrism isn't literally "durrhurr cut things right down the middle and there's your answer!"
It's an acknowledgement that party lines are an absolutely garbage method of determining the validity of anything. The end.
please try and apply some critical thinking to your views here.
im on the “left” on many issues. I’m on the right on others. You would say my centrism is a copiut when in reality it’s anything but. A copout would be to just ignore the details and be partisan about any given subject.
Yep. This is why I stopped bothering talking to a former anarcho-communist acquaintance the moment he came out and said neuropathology was the modern day phrenology, and we can't actually prove how mental illness works under capitalism. (No joke: there is unfortunately a strain of Marxist thought that believes mental illness itself is a product of capitalism). He was sitting there spewing that bullshit with, as far as I know, zero mental problems that weren't self inflicted from his frequent, simultaneous consumption of alcohol and kratom, while I was on the other side of the computer knowing that the small pills I took every day were literally the reason I was able to be coherent and functional instead of a fucking mess.
A simple matter of my brain chemicals being naturally unbalanced and yet easily altered with medicine was being turned into yet another facet of batshit-insane far-left political drivel. There was no point in talking to him anymore, because he was clearly was too far up his own asshole.
If there are no centrist parties that perfectly fit your views on these matters, it means you are essentially forced to be a single-issue voter.
If you are progressive socially, but conservative economically, in the vast majority of countries, you have to pick which side matters to you more; and many pick economics. If you are to the left economically, but conservative socially(which is obviously very rare since left economics favour the many, not the few), you are going to have to decide if issues such as abortion, gay marriage, and so on matter more to you, than things such as government assistance for those that need it, and taxing the wealthy do.
That to me, is why "centrism" is absurd. If you want the Dems to change their stance on gun rights, and that is basically your sole "right wing" value, you should be trying to change them from within, rather than voting Republican because they have already established their support of gun rights. Unfortunately, many "centrists" voted for Trump(or Libertarians) because it was easier than trying to fight for change in the Democrats from within, because the main point of contention with "centrists" tends to be on gun rights, or "big government"; two things that are currently at the core of the Democrat platform.
If you are "centrist" and value your guns over the social and reproductive rights of millions, I don't even know what to tell you.
And part of the reason the right keeps growing is that the right doesn't give them shit for being centrists and having their own values. Instead, they pander to them. So while you're sitting high and mighty saying your concerns are stupid to the center, the right's telling them "Yeah I get you, we'll take a look at that". That's what happened in Pennsylvania and other midwestern states. And all the while you lose out on a potential voterbase because you want to be a dick instead of campaign and actually effect change. Because these voters just aren't good enough for you. It's not like these votes matter at all.
Have you tried building rapport with people instead of insulting them? Even if you don't think the matter is important, a little thing called empathy usually goes a long way in winning over voters. Because people tend to appreciate when others care about them. And they definitely take note if a certain group is antagonistic towards them.
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