Drake wrote:
Until Charlottesville, I hadn't seen this argument before. I saw it elsewhere first, and then a similar one here on Wrong Planet today. Basically, the assertion is that centrism is flawed because centrists position themselves purposely in the centre of the left / right political spectrum.
I think this idea is either a result of the paranoia those on the extremes of the political spectrum often harbor, or an attempt to bully centrists to pick a side.
Drake wrote:
I have always thought centrists are just there because their beliefs put them there, and if the centre moved, they wouldn't move with it.
While there may be some individuals who claim to be centrists merely because they are adverse to mainstream thought, most probably are there by virtue of the fact that their beliefs don't align with one side more than the other.
Drake wrote:
Anyway the argument goes that this incentivises extremists to to become more extreme, because this moves the centre, and the centrists will move with it, and thus move away from the side said extremists are opposing and towards them.
Does this type of Centrist actually exist? If you are one, I'd be interested to hear from you about why.
I don't think this is the case. The political spectrum is a spectrum, not three points that consist of left, center, and right. If a centrist were to move right or left, there are already people there. The person would just cease to be a centrist. If the right became more right, it's easy to envision the center of the spectrum shifting, placing the former centrist left of center. However a few things can be said about this. 1. The ideology of the person did not change. 2. The political spectrum is intangible and not properly represent by a spatial length, as people may envision it. If you were to mark the center of a spacial length and then lengthen one end, yes, the former center would then be left of center, but the same cannot be said of the political spectrum, because it's not actually spatial.
25 Aug 2017, 7:43 pm
