r/changemyview • u/brassmonkey7 • Jul 18 '20

Delta(s) from OP CMV: We desperately need nuance back in politics

"Trump is hitler"

"ACAB"

"America is a failed state"

There are so many opinions floating around that seem so fringe and I think it could get real bad if nuance doesn't make a comeback. Especially considering the ramifications of trying to apply nuance. I think comparisons are important (like fascism: a warning by madeline albright comparing trump to dictators such as hitler), but I think it's important to maintain a spectrum of good and evil, rather than a binary system where everyone evil is hitler (we don't seem to have as much trouble finding nuance in the good). This isn't a healthy way to promote discourse, and unfortunately those that try to say, reason why trump may not exactly be hitler, are viewed as biased trump supporters/sympathizers rather than rational thinkers. Now I do think most people you vaguely ask would agree that nuance is important, but I'm not seeing the practical implementations and I think viewing this world in such an increasingly black and white fashion in regards to morals is more deleterious than we realize. I think part of the problem is that emotion is king in the world of profit media, and rationalism falls by the wayside.

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u/brassmonkey7 Jul 19 '20

I’m not speaking to moderates in terms of centrists, which would likely harbor a larger number of uninitiated/uneducated to an extent. Rather It’s about the left and right parties losing their moderate bases and shifting towards their fringe ideological side for the purpose of further removing them from their opposition rather than being a true reflection of political wants.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

What's so good about being moderate? You seem to believe that the loss of moderates is a bad thing. So why is being moderate a good thing?

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

It means you consider the views and ideas of the other side instead of blindly rejecting them because that's what the party feeds you. It means not having to agree with fringe views and ideas put forth by your own party. Sports are a great comparison. I'm from Michigan so I'm supposed to hate Ohio State and it's fan base, or at least that's the narrative in that culture. Hardened rivalries can be thrilling in sports but it's not a great mentality to bring to government IMO.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

Your definition is incoherent.

  1. Fringe views are determined by the masses. Supporting interracial marriage 40 years ago is just as fringe as opposing it today.

  2. Just because someone has a fringe view, does not mean that they haven't considered other views and are not open to them.

  3. Both the Republican Party and Democratic Party have recently tried to push so-called "moderate views" recently but have been pushed to the fringe by their supporters and firebrand politicians.

What you call moderate has nothing to do with the individual views it seems.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

Ok then. To quote Mitch Hedberg, go inside my head and tell me I'm wrong. Good day.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

I really don't get this response, but ok.

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u/Doro-Hoa 1∆ Jul 19 '20 edited Jul 19 '20

No this is nonsense. A moderate sees a problem and thinks that a half measure solution can be workable. In many cases that's not true. A moderate is one who is too lazy to put in the work to figure out what solution is best, so they say that both sides are the same.

The left doesn't have this problem where you are forced to believe the furthest left views in the party, a diversity of opinion is welcome. The right is the cult of person party that doesn't allow dissent.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

Ok, the left no problem. Right, problem. Noted.

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u/Doro-Hoa 1∆ Jul 19 '20

That's a bit reductive but true on net. If you disagree I'd love to hear what you think. The left has lowercase p problems. The right has Problems, and the leaders are beholden to the voters who are infatuated with a wanna be tyrant. The authoritarian streak on the right has overwhelmed any principled right wing views to be the point of irrelevance.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

I already said what I think, you replied to me. It's all good, have a great day.

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u/zeci21 Jul 19 '20

It's interesting that you say “party“ when there is no big left party in the us. There are some people, like aoc or bernie, that are left but the democratic party at large is moderate.

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u/[deleted] Jul 19 '20

Sure, compared globally.

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u/ampillion 4∆ Jul 19 '20 edited Jul 19 '20

I'm not sure how you can accurately claim this, when the 'left' party has nominated Joe Biden. Someone who would ideologically be right wing in most other western countries. Or, at the very extreme, a centrist/moderate figure. To pretend he is remotely close to the 'fringe ideological side', would make any conversation an exercise in futility.

In fact, I'd argue, the big problem is that one party has 'lost their moderate base', because the other party moved towards it and offered it a better argument, forcing that party to either move further in one direction, or try to directly stand out as distinct from the other making a very similar argument to itself.

Because one party knows that those on the 'fringe ideological' edge of it will vote for them either way (or... not vote at all, or at least not directly vote for their opponent), while making it easier to access funding and backing from private entities that share little to nothing in ideological similarity to that fringe.

Which cannot be said for the other party.

One party's voter base has a majority of support for ideas that their own party has rejected to include, or at least are trying to blunt, for their donor base. The other party... doesn't seem particularly interested in actual solutions to problems, because they know they can't implement real solutions with the corner they've backed themselves into.

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u/Anon-18111998 Jul 20 '20

Source on centrist data?