The sad truth about political centrists

Close to the middle of the network
It seems we’re looking for a center
What if it turns out to be hollow?

Suzanne Vega

There is no ideological center. There is only the Overton window, and it is always in play. Anyone who identifies as a political centrist is a puppet of the Overton window.

In all extant political systems, moderation is for losers. Each party must appeal to the base, and the base is never moderate. The more moderate someone is, the less politically engaged he is. An actual moderate temperament is apolitical.

(Sortition might make moderation in lawmaking tenable, by making it less political. Nothing else will.)

It doesn’t pay to be the voice of moderation in an adversarial system. And that’s for the best. The system is a crab bucket, and we don’t want those things escaping.

So don’t try to make peace in politics. Conflict is the whole point. Only sortition will change that – maybe.

The problem with the political centrist is he has no center! He is looking for a center outside himself – in vain. He is an ideologue in denial. Centrism is his ideology. It is a vain attempt to fill his internal void. But what he’s looking for isn’t out there. It can’t be. By definition, a center has to be inside you to begin with.

This is why he can be suckered into extreme positions on specifics, by manipulating the Overton window. The Overton window is the only standard he has, and he only chases it because he can’t grasp its true nature. The Overton window is a line of battle. It is always shifting, always in play. It is a mirage.

And as the fake center that we call the Overton window is moved about by manipulative forces, so the centrist is pulled along. He is doomed to be owned by whatever ideology is an ascendance at the moment.

In mass persuasion, ideologues throw all sort of poo at the wall to see what will stick. The political centrist is that wall. His “reasonable and moderate” views are all the pieces of poo that stuck.

Political centrism is wordcel stupidity at its worst. The ones who think they are being reasonable are the enablers and the agents of destructive chaos. They are tools.

Reasonableness in politics is for damned fools.

tweeted a form of this 2023-12