Matt Lutz at Humean Being:
It often seems that there is no more despised creature than the political moderate. “Moderate,” and its synonym “centrist,” are often used as terms of abuse. The moderate, in the popular political imagination, is wishy-washy, an inveterate hair-splitter who stands for nothing, the kind of collaborator who would say that lynchings are sometimes good or allow that Hitler should be empowered to kill half of the Jews. Many people who in fact take moderate positions are loathe to describe themselves using the term “moderate,” to distance themselves from these kinds of implications.
I, however, am happy to call myself a moderate or centrist, because it is the best label to describe my politics. However, I don’t recognize my own politics in the standard caricatures of political moderates. So I want to take the opportunity to lay claim to political moderation as an ideal by saying what political moderation means to me.
For me, being a political moderate means three things.
More here.
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