this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2023
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I think it really depends on who you’re taking about when you say centrist.
“Gays have gone too far. Now they want to get married. I’m not against gays, but marriage is between a man and a woman” was/is a despicable “centrist” position.
“I’m not sure student loans forgiveness is the best long term solution to education costs. I think those trillions of dollars would be between spent on building schools, but it’s better than nothing” was/is common “centrist” position I don’t agree with but doesn’t bother me much.
It seems like there’s at least two definitions of centrist.
People who equate both parties policies at every turn are centrists in my mind.
In the mind of many others in the left, anyone slightly right of Sanders is a centrist. And I think that’s an entirely different definition.
The definitions are so opposed to each other that two people using the same word can be talking about something completely different.
they are in Europe.
also both centrist takes are stupid that you described.
The Overton window is a sliding scale.
And ya, both takes are hard to agree with, but one enables the trampling of civil rights, while the other simply has a separate view of how to use finite resources to solve a fiscal problem.
Anyone who equates those two takes os also quite “stupid.” Equating those two is a much worse take than the take about student loans forgiveness maybe not being the best way to address a national problem effecting hundreds of millions of citizens, that decades of neglect and misappropriation of tax funds created.
Also, Considering Biden is getting student loan forgiveness done, while sanders has not, the group that equates both parties, or moans at anyone left of sanders is doing the service of the centrist agenda, and in turn the right wing agenda.
Sanders is the chair of the committee in charge of student loans. He is also not the president.
Exactly. He’s not the president. And the person who is is getting the job done. Because sanders was not able to turn his candidacy into affect. And the Democratic Party “elites” put sanders in the role that he currently holds.
The two parties aren’t the same. Nuance about how to deal with the educational crisis of cost is not the enemy. Decades of neglecting education entirely is.
Btw: just so we are avoiding history revisionism. Student load forgiveness is being handled by the executive branch. Not the senate.
i think most of us are referring to the enlightened centrist that has no belief other than being 'in the middle' of the two prominent positions. people who don't want to rock the boat and are constantly looking for compromise no matter how abhorrent one position may be, like my uncle who wants me to get along with folks that literally want me as a queer person dead.
the real problem with being a 'moderate' or a 'centrist' is that it's a moving target depending on the prevailing political positions of the day. in reality, american democrats are the centrists, and pretty much everyone else is right wing.
This is something that I realized recently. There is no middle. Neutrality doesn't exist.
If you accept the way things work, you're complicit, if you don't accept them, you're not. End of the story.