The only thing I gatherings from these posts.
The right: We prefer a two party system.
The left: a vote for a third option weakens us in the battle against the right.
Centrists: I just want a third option that isn’t democrats or republicans…
Me coming into the comments section:
Well, if youre a “centrist” like me, then you used that designation to try to get out of talking about politics with ass holes on both sides. And also i hate getting “prejudged” -everyone does- because i might like or dislike a certain politician. I am a centrist, truly, but I dont need to prove that to any of you. And this is what I mean when I say “both sides are the same” I mean you assholes harras, insult, degrade, tease, berate, and nearly threaten about how your side is “the good side” and the “otherside” equals the destruction of America. Yeah, well, both sides do that annoying shit. You want to tell me “there’s no such thing as a centrist anymore” and that i am actually on the _________ side. Well f you, you dont get to tell me what side im on.
Maybe you just feel that since im not with you, that I must be against you? If that overly simple reasoning is where you are at, I dont think we should be friends anyway.
I dont want to be identified as red or blue, dem or repub. Honestly, im pretty conflict avoidant in general, and politics gets to be such nasty topic and can ruin family and friends. I see it happen more in the past few years than ever. Its really sad! And you know it too!
Can everyone please just put a sock in it for at least the rest of December? Can we all look for common ground and the things that we can share? Dont look at family through red or blue tinted glasses, but through the lens of love. Let’s put our pride aside for a while and produce good times and love this holiday season.
Done :).
i think the “current far left” supports authoritarianism, so not the opposite, just different flavor of the same side.
That’s because the political compass is two-dimensional, but everyone insists on thinking of it as a one-dimensional thing.
You’ve got left wing and then you’ve got right wing, and then in the vertical direction you’ve got authoritarianism and libertarianism. When people say far right and far left what they really mean is that the extreme edges horizontally and right at the top vertically. Think Castro, and not Gandhi. Both were left wing but are nowhere near each other in political phasespace
Even the 2 dimensional compass is a simplification, though orders of magnitude better than the binary “left or right” simplification, and also better than the 2 dimensional gradient as well.
Far [insert preferred political allegiance] simply means extremist, usually unwilling to compromise. Whether you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing depends on your personal political opinions, but generally speaking an inability to reach a compromise is not a desirable trait regardless of your political leanings.
As a saying goes, perfect is the enemy of good. We don’t want people refusing to embrace more libertarian policies simply because they don’t get everything that they want. Progress is achieved by steadily grinding away at the norm, not by having a big explosive change all at once. That’s what communists want.
Isn’t it just left & right ?
How about we stop pretending that the left doesn’t have its own share of emotionally damaged asshats and try to pick leadership that solves problems instead of pandering to one side or the other?
Who’s pretending ?
tankies are probably the worst presentation of the “left”
From a Canadian instance, really? This shit is so frustrating to see. The whole two party nonsense that this bullshit pushes is exactly why the usa is in the mess they are in now.
No, people don’t have to “pick a side” the ones who think in terms of teams are our enemy.
The problem is not there are two sides. The problem is that there is only one side with 2 parties with the rest left unrepresented.
The reason it is like that is that over many years the us system pushed the teamification of politics and enshrined only two parties in law. This was inevitable with only two parties, and should be a lesson to all other nations on the dangers of two party systems. The “us vs them” tricks of control are very easy when there is only two parties. It is poison to any democracy as no one is represented by ether “side” but everyone is sorted into a side and convinced the only way to fix anything is by having your side win (but of course there is no insensitive for ether party to actually fix anything, often the opposite).
The us has been trained (and sadly a lot of the world) that coalition rule is bad, even when its the only real way to have any sort of representation or guard rails in government. And you are right no one is represented now due to years and years of only two options that both know they are built into the systems of government so deep that their removal would require a new nation. After all this time there is no longer meaningful representation, but there is convenient scapegoats and excuses in pointing at the other side, so people in the us still think they live in a democratic system.
From my foreigner POV, it’s not even two sides. It seems like it’s MAGA vs everyone else.
Oh it looks that way on purpose, there are barely two parties and its used to control the people. When you see “everyone else” that is the trick, the other party that is not in power does nothing but gets to be seen the one that is “representing” that mass.
Advanced strawman. Opposing fascism isn’t far left. It’s just not-right.
The wall of lies and whataboutism goes below.
the strawman further polarizes me away from your perspective. if i didn’t know better I would say you’re trying to make things worse.
Opposing fascism isn’t far left. That’s just being a decent person.
This meme is made by a leftist, and that community does have an issue with the same “if you don’t explicitly agree with everything we say, you are other and therefore evil” attitude that the MAGA crowd has.
Thank God a brave centrist was willing to come here to criticize the left and defend the right to protect us from evil socialist extremism.
Please, oh holy enlightened central one, tell us the errors of our thinking. Is it our sins of universal healthcare, anti-genocide, and equal rights for all?
Please, oh please, do sermon us on the benefits of the right like unregulated capitalism, environmental destruction, and thought policing
Your sarcasm mutes your point terribly and this is the exact shit that has resulted in the ‘left memes’ being a sniveling crying loser.
I don’t know the guy you replied to from a loaf of bread but how did he support the right? He said both left and right and doing the same shit and you come out with these 3 rambling paragraphs, assuming things wildly.
I’m really not sure how to dumb it down more to make it make sense to you, given that the sarcasm and hyperbole dumbed it down quite a bit intentionally for effect. I guess read slower?
Perhaps, you should take your own advice. Good luck to you.
Is a shitty attitude a defining point of being a leftist? Because that’s the only thing I’m criticizing here. Everything else is just you making up things to be mad about.
So when you get rightfully criticized, your response is to cry that all of your criticisms are made up and that everyone besides you is wrong and has a bad attitude
If everyone you meet is an asshole, maybe you’re the asshole instead. But having that epiphany would involve you dropping that iconic “better than you” smugness that centrists love so much and giving a fuck about other people instead
What part of your comment was “legit criticism”? All you did was assume I’m a centrist and go off with a bunch of sarcasm based on that.
If you were trying to say that the the way some leftists attack everyone for everything is justified or necessary in some way, you should have tried making that point without adding in assumptions and sarcasm.
We’re assuming you’re a centrist because you’re very clearly trying to hold the exact position that the OP meme is mocking. My sarcasm is on point here because such a position is foolish and worthy of ridicule, and the hyperbole does an excellent job of pointing out the blatant falsehood of the entire political spectrum being equal.
I have no obligation to entertain right-wing viewpoints, give them a platform, or respect anyone who thinks they are worth consideration. In fact, I have an obligation to the do the exact opposite in defense of the victims of those viewpoints coming to fruition.
My advice would be to get off the fence and grow a thicker skin. No one likes centrists, especially whiny ones who think they’re above reproach or consequence.
You truly are proving the point I was making. Go back and look at the first comment I made that started this whole thread.
What if I rephrase to leave out mentioning MAGA, and simply say “the way some leftists choose to communicate is counterproductive”. What part of that statement says anything about actual leftist policy?
The knee-jerk reactions of people in this thread is exactly what I am taking issue with. Based on a single sentence, criticizing not leftist ideals, but criticizing the choice of how some people communicate, now you assume you know my position on all topics, based on your idea of what a “centrist” is (a term the is quickly becoming as useless as the term “woke”).
and equal rights for all?
Some one did not read the Canadian Constitution or the bill of rights.
Tell us, oh, wise one, about the ‘equal rights’ in Gladue?
Whoops, I forgot that I singularly control the equality settings for every nation on the planet, including Canada. Let me just pop over to the control panel.
That was very not cool to forget that bro
I’m so sorry bro, I should’ve paid better attention to the training material when I became The Leftist™️
No one said you ‘control it’ But you are the one who seems to think we have it.
maybe do your homework before spouting lies and bullshit??
I never claimed Gladue, Canada has utopian equality, actually. I couldn’t even point it out on a map. As another user pointed out, leftism ADVOCATES and works towards those ideals, which very clearly was what I was saying in context. If you had a functional frontal lobe, this might be an easier conversation for you. Maybe iron out the dent in your brain before trying to tackle big conversations, lil fella
Where did they say it’s what we have, because to me it reads that those are what we’re fighting for.
This includes indigenous peoples.
indigenous peoples in Canada already have more rights than actual Canadians.
What the hell are you on about?
Anything’s possible when you make shit up kiddo
How about the right to clean water?
You can have clean water when you stop tearing apart the water treatment plants for the resale value of the previous water treatment plant.
or , here’s an idea, enter the 21st centruy and collect taxes to pay for it yourself, like the rest of the country’s municipalities?Or, maybe the chiefs can forgo new trucks every year and actually build infrastructure for their people?
It’s hard to keep the sympathy when all I can see on the res is complete corruption.
if the tribes are “their own nation” then maybe start collecting taxes like every other nation on earth?
if you don’t explicitly agree with everything we say, you are other and therefore evil
“Vote Blue No Matter Who”
(Except Mamdani)
Mamdani is a pretty good example of the left doing things right; get the right guy nominated at the party level, then worry about the election. In a two party system, election day is too late to fix anything, it’s purely damage control at that point.
Mamdani is a pretty good example of the left doing things right
He ran at the right time, the stars aligned and gave him some truly wretched losers for opposition, and national media tripped over a dozen billionaire’s dicks trying to insert itself into municipal politics.
But I don’t think Mamdani would have been successful against a Guliani, a Bloomberg, or a DeBlasio. And if a Republican had won over a fractured Liberal/Left field, I suspect we’d be getting an earful about how Radical Islamists cost the Democratic Party the election.
There’s thousands of Mamdani’s in modern American politics. You can find them in every DSA chapter in America. He’s not simply the product of The Left Doing Things Right. He’s a product of the liberals and conservatives finally running out of gas, then tangling themselves in a knot trying to block an alternative.
Democrats Win: We didn’t need the left’s help with this!
Democrats Lose: It’s all the left’s fault, here’s endless articles why.
Leftists barely agree with each other, let alone anybody elsewhere on the political spectrum. You aren’t entirely wrong, though - there is a tendency to say that anything good is leftist and anything bad is right-wing, but right-wingers also do the same (see how anything they don’t like is either woke or communist, or both)
but right wingers are mostly homogeneous in thier beliefs, with the hefty help of the propaganda MSMs and financial backing. left doesnt have a propaganda machine promoting “left”, thats why there isnt any unified belief amongst all left leaning people.
And anything that doesn’t involve a fencepost tickling their prostate is a sin to centrists.
Their g-spot is pretty far to the right though.
Yes, a lot of self-proclaimed centrists are rather right-wing but like to picture themselevs as occupying the middle of the bell curve. See also their use of the term “common sense” when they want to feel like their view is the majority one despite that not being supported by statistics.
Yeah there is a massive range of disagreement under the umbrella term “leftists”. Marxist, Marxist-Leninist, Trotskyist, Maoist, Communization theory, Anarcho-communist, Eco-anarchist, Christian anarchist, etc. etc.
These are all largely arguments over organizing a working class majority in control of it’s own lands and capital. None in these groups objects to the central thesis of worker self-government.
By contrast, centrist/right groups favor narrow hierarchies of elite oligarchs, them bicker over exactly which one of their kingpins should get the big chair.
So, most people make generalizations based on personal biases? And its human nature tendency to have “in-groups” and “out-groups”? That simple though?
Yep, I think real centrists see them both as frothing at the mouth fucking idiots who treat the world and politics like a sports team.
It’s a fucking joke.
bOtH sIdEs
Hey look, someone trying to prove my point.
They’re right, you’re a moron and a coward
Based on what? The fact that I don’t fall over myself to agree with whatever the leftist opinion-du-jour is? Comments like yours are specifically why the leftist movement is doomed to failure. It’s a shame, since most the ideas are good, just too many self-righteous assholes are the vocal face of it.
Wordy and self-aggrandizing but basically yeah, you even admit the ideas are good and that the only reason you pretend otherwise is because you don’t like the people telling you them, get the fuck over yourself and start being correct about things
Can you even read? I said the left has an attitude problem, just like the right does. That says absolutely fuck-all about how I feel about the actual ideas behind leftism.
The fact that I don’t fall over myself to agree with whatever the leftist opinion-du-jour is?
Getting strong Know-Nothing vibes of this whole thread. No real ideological thesis or central position. Just a bunch of hollow “I’m a free thinker because I hate you” reactionary slop.
Reminds me of the old joke about the conservative being whatever the opposite of a liberal is, updated daily.
I’m very purposely trying to keep my opinions about policy points out of it, because that’s not what I was ever taking issue with, and it would only serve to completely derail the conversation.
All I’ve ever been taking issue with is the discourse itself. The US has a two party system, which is inherently going to encourage a very “us vs them” mentality. When people immediately jump to name calling, ridicule, and general verbal abuse at the first hint of disagreement, it’s only making things worse.
You sound like a Libertarian.
I view libertarianism similarly to how I view communism (the actual philosophies not the co-opted bullshit Libertarianism or the red scare version of communism); they are systems that seem like they could work if you somehow got everyone on the same page, but I don’t believe that they are robust enough to withstand the people who would exploit the system.
I feel like half the problem with politics right now is that everyone feels like they have to pick a label to call themselves. So they pick whichever is closest to what they believe at the time, then (consciously or unconsciously) mold themselves to conform with that chosen group. Suddenly, everyone who disagrees is personally attacking them, since they went and made their political affiliation part of their identity, rather than just a choice they make.
Opposing fascism is illegal, and centrists have a fetish for Law And Order. That shoves a lot of people leftward by default.
Too bad there isn’t a political party representing “The Left”
I wish Americans had leftist politicians half as cool as the right likes to pretend they are.
Centrists are actually with maga, they just don’t wear the hat. See Fetterman, Schumer, Jeffries, etc
I’ll summarize something I said before:
Democrats will hurt you for money, but Republicans will pay for the privilege. Both parties subservient to capital but there are still meaningful distinctions. Change must come from the bottom.
Counterargument: Centrists are actually a diverse group with many very different positions, that just have in common the fact they don’t agree with either of the currently dominant political factions.
Aggressive reposte: what you just did (political stereotyping, where you label everyone who disagrees with you as basically being the same cartoon villain) is, in my experience, an example the left-wing bigotry that drives centrists away from your political faction. Disagreeing with your doesn’t mean that I agree with the hateful morons on the right, it just means I also see and won’t tolerate your bigotry.
Counter-counterargument: Centrists are actually a diverse group with many very different positions, but they all end up supporting fascism by staying inactive. I don’t think you’re evil for not picking a side, I think you’re short-sighted for assuming “staying out of it” is possible and preferable to fighting for change. Winner-take-all, first-past-the-post elections will always result in a two-party system, if you want to change that without literally burning it all to the ground, you have to do it from within the system. You can still be a centrist, just try to take the context of the whole political structure into consideration when you vote. You can say you don’t tolerate bigotry, but your actions (or rather, lack of actions) make you a liar.
So hating a hateful ideology and people who hold that ideology is bigotry. Damn, you need to see a chiropractor, you just twisted yourself in knots for that poor argument.
No, the bigotry is lumping all centrists, who have a diversity of views, in with the hateful ideology, despite having zero information about what they actually believe.
I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice. - Martin Luther King Jr.
Most centrists I have interacted with have the same thought, I don’t care as long as I’m not affected by it. As long as the sense of order is maintained they will let babies starve, houses burn, and deforest our planet to maintain that stability. So you must excuse those of us on the left who have interacted with people more conservative to us for so long. We’re tired of the bullshit and we’re not going to let you live it down anymore. I have heard people talk about how centrists/moderates, whatever term you use to describe them, are the swing voters. From my personal experience in the USA with the moderate, the moderate fucking sucks.
If the moderate is who truly votes in presidents then they have failed us multiple times now with Trump. Thoroughly, absolutely. I don’t know how you can live a life seeing the horrors perpetuated for money and power to still think our system okay. If you’re not swayed by the plight of the fact we can feed everyone on the Earth, we just cannot satisfy the gluttony of the wealthy to do so. Of maintaining order while a group of people who had no choice in their birth are subjugated, beaten, rounded up and jailed just for existing, and lynched for existing. If you look at everything wrong in this world and aren’t galvanized away from moderation and right wing politics, then you’re lost.
Ok buddy. Enjoy slurping Trump.
Not an American
Okay but the Far Left is antisemitic because they don’t support Israeli
genocidefreedom and democracy. So they’re even worse than MAGA.I’m glad we’ve got someone capable of identifying and stating how others sit on a political plain.
Yeah, both are too loud and impeding the centrist ability to go back to Brunch lmao
Brunch: May or may not include stuffing their own pockets
Far left citizens may oppose fascism but their leaders aren’t doing a good job of it. America needs a better left wing party.
your right because there is none
People thinking the Dems are left. They’re left of the GQP, they’re not left of the spectrum, far from it. The neoliberal is as much not your friend as the fascist is.
Lmao.
