Centrists - what pushed you from the far-left/far-right?

[SiKnSiN]

I can be far left, far right, moderate left/right, etc. depending on the issue. I have views which range all over the scale. Hell, I have some views hardly anyone shares.

 

[Jack V Savage]

It's just learning more. There are a lot of constraints on what can be achieved and a lot of tradeoffs in any policy position. If you're aware of that, it becomes a lot harder to support extreme views. Note that the uninformed are more likely to hold extreme views all over the spectrum and be less consistent and thus score as more "moderate" by some tests.

 

[Huked on foniks]

Bothsides use smoke screens while stealing and destroying the middle class.

Left- "racism still exists and it's white males" "men can be women" "praise allah down with christians"

Right-"they're coming for my guns" "a few people burned American flags"

Meanwhile jobs pay shit compared to the baby boomers generation, because bothsides have been taken over corporations who don't give 2 shits about gays guns or gods. Just money

I'm a gun loving Christian who's prolife. I love my flag I believe in gay rights (not that tranny crap) and proud union man.

This sounds like me. I'm still closer to the right but I've changed my views on unions, Gay marriage and the death penalty.

I used to be anti union until I worked at a job that treated employees like shit. They made us work 96 hours a week, no days or weekends off, and they started to take our holidays away from us. They paid decent and the company knew it so they started taking advantage of it by working us into the ground. We could've used a union badly at that job to negotiate our schedule because everyone there was fucking miserable. We had no life.

Although I still think homosexuality is fucking gross I figure as long as they don't bother me, all power to them. I won't stop them. Except the tranny shit I'm not down with that. That is so fucked up.

I used to be 100% death penalty, but they're are a lot of cases of innocent people getting put to death. So now I'm only for the death penalty in only certain cases like Timothy McVie or the 3 guys and I've hammer killers

 

[WiolentOne]

It's just learning more. There are a lot of constraints on what can be achieved and a lot of tradeoffs in any policy position. If you're aware of that, it becomes a lot harder to support extreme views. Note that the uninformed are more likely to hold extreme views all over the spectrum and be less consistent and thus score as more "moderate" by some tests.

You should note that extremists (e.g. greoric, workersunited, trotsky, national acrobat etc) are often the most consistent because their views are philosophically and ideologically grounded.

 

[Jack V Savage]

You should note that extremists (e.g. greoric, workersunited, trotsky, national acrobat etc) are often the most consistent because their views are philosophically and ideologically grounded.

There's something to that (flip side of my comment), but it doesn't apply to right-wing libertarianism, which is an incoherent view but has ready-made wrong answers to most questions because there are well-funded propagandists working on it. That's also an issue of scoring, to some extent. Consistent views are considered "extreme" even if they are consistently not extreme. But decent point anyway. I think hardcore Marxists will usually mellow out with experience.

 

[original doom]

The left is obsessed with islam. 70 % of the news revolves around ffuuccckkking muslims in Australia.

Even after a terror attack in israel there always seems to be this pro palestianian slant. Its not new.

 

[Pwent]

I could probably count the number of actual centrists that are regulars here on my fingers. The like system has the unintended effect of showing whether people actually like posts from both sides of the aisle or only with one side

Everyone just pretends so their arguments don't get painted in (well if you're a liberal/conservative then defend [insert unrelated thing]), to sound smart/"above" party politics or to avoid getting insulted

 

[lecter]

It's just learning more. There are a lot of constraints on what can be achieved and a lot of tradeoffs in any policy position. If you're aware of that, it becomes a lot harder to support extreme views. Note that the uninformed are more likely to hold extreme views all over the spectrum and be less consistent and thus score as more "moderate" by some tests.

that's so smart

 

[Trotsky]

There's a good chance that if this thread takes off it will be people arguing about whether or not certain posters are actually centrist.

The problem is that centrism is reductive, although much better than the more fallacious "moderate."

The "centrist" Democrats, i.e. Clinton, Booker, Schumer, etc., are differentiated from the farther left by policies that are often unappealing to voters on the center-right, which is why Sanders polled so well with independents and disenchanted Republicans. No independent voter was going to vote Clinton but not Sanders on the basis that the latter wasn't funding enough coups, expanding the surveillance state or prison industry, giving tax breaks to corporations, lobbying for free trade deals, selling enough arms to the Saudis, deregulating financial institutions, etc.

The idea of a fluid left-right spectrum has never been more ludicrous than it is now.

 

[Trotsky]

I could probably count the number of actual centrists that are regulars here on my fingers. The like system has the unintended effect of showing whether people actually like posts from both sides of the aisle or only with one side

Everyone just pretends so their arguments don't get painted in (well if you're a liberal/conservative then defend [insert unrelated thing]), to sound smart/"above" party politics or to avoid getting insulted

panamaican, lead, polish headlock, madmick all come to mind as right centrists. And frankly almost all of the "left" here is center left.

 

[boomertx]

What pushed me?

Facts and finding unbiased articles on a subject. Realizing many articles don't contain the truth and whole truth. Only a set of 'facts' designed to support an agenda. Pretty hard to sift through the yammering on the left and right but you can find it. Especially once you realize who is behind the curtain, so to speak.

I also tend to look at opposing viewpoints and decide on the merits of that viewpoint and make an informed decision. I'm all for the right to bear arms but see no reason why extensive background checks can't be run. The latest abortion laws in Texas? Pathetic (I grew up in a staunchly anti-abortion family). All that law has done is increase abortions in New Mexico and Louisiana.

Not a big fan of the death penalty but am okay with it under the right circumstances. Prefer life w/out parole and a miserable f'in existence in prison. Supermax is fine.

Environmental laws? No problem. I like protected lands and keeping them off limits to development. Don't like GMO's? Grow your own shit and put the GMO stuff in it's own aisle with the Gluten free groceries.

 

[Gunny]

I know that there are probably people who have always been some sort of political moderate in here, but I'm curious if there are people in here who came from the far-left or far-right, and what pushed you away from your positions?

I was a socialist for most of my twenties, but over the years I was pushed away by the impractical, all-or-nothing approach to politics that many activists have. If you ask a socialist about their position on how to control rising rents, the answer is along the lines of abolishing housing as a commodity. If you ask them about unemployment insurance (or EITC/NIT), it's a suggestion to abolish the wage system, as poverty reduction is a means to pacify the working class. These things sound great when you're on a date at a coffee shop, sure, but you'd look like a total wonk bringing up any of these things to an economist or policy advisor.

All in all a lot of socialist prescriptions ended up being too idealistic for me to support, and seemed like a bunch of stuff that was observably out of sync with the preferences of most working-class people. I still consider myself a Marxist in a sense, but this has more to do with axioms about studying history/conflict than supporting a specific policy or being a card-carrying communist. I also don't think horseshoe theory is a very useful way for understanding the political spectrum, so I don't fancy myself a "radical centrist" or anything like that. I've basically embraced liberalism as the next-best alternative to doing nothing wrt public policy.

So, what brought you to the center? Or am I the only self-indentifying centrist here?

The failures of free trade and crony capitalism drove me toward the center

 

[BruceLeeOnTRT]

I'd say I fully abandoned the left the moment they embraced Islam and began playing PR for Muslims after terrorist attacks.

 

[Trotsky]

The failures of free trade and crony capitalism drove me toward the center

Both of those are bona fide centrist policy points, though. Centrist Democrats and Republicans are the strictest adherents to those things, as evidenced by the past 20 years of policy and the fact that momentum is being shifted towards social democracy and anti-imperialism in the Democratic Party (Sanders) and anti-bureaucratic protectionist nationalism in the GOP (Trump).

 

[Chris Kyle is a liar]

Centrists are just losers who make up their minds and yearn to be accepted by everyone. Fuck them.

 

[WiolentOne]

There's something to that (flip side of my comment), but it doesn't apply to right-wing libertarianism, which is an incoherent view but has ready-made wrong answers to most questions because there are well-funded propagandists working on it. That's also an issue of scoring, to some extent. Consistent views are considered "extreme" even if they are consistently not extreme. But decent point anyway. I think hardcore Marxists will usually mellow out with experience.

Jack, you're wrong. You can disagree with how ancaps define liberty and freedom, how applicable their ideology is, or their solutions to proposed problems - but their views are undoubtedly consistent with individualism.

 

[skold]

Trump is not really a conservative but is a centrist.


But I know some people would say he's conservative but he's not.

He is just an idiot

 

[forum poster]

I can't stand people on The FAR CENTER. If you're "centrist" on every issue you are just a fence riding wimp, or you simply don't care, or you somehow think you're above the fray.

Although I would generally consider myself a centrist in many countries as I'd fall between both the major parties on a lot of issues. In the UK for instance.
Universal healthcare would have me to the left of the Democrats in the US.

 

[Overtures]

far right: stupidity
far left: idealism

 

[SummerStriker]

I think the democrats have gone far off the wall leftist the last 4 years.

Trump is not really a conservative but is a centrist.


But I know some people would say he's conservative but he's not.

At best he's a soulless pragmatist with no ideology other than a belief that technology will keep improving. I love technocracy.