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The Two Kinds of Moderate

paulgraham.com

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Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#221

Post by githaw »

roenxi wrote: post #187
asdfman123 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tons of people out there "can't join any tribe" because their belief systems are sufficiently different than those of people around them, and the way this is written suggests that it's almost a novel idea to Paul Graham. Has anyone cornered him and beaten him up for having moderate beliefs? And having beliefs across the political spectrum hardly makes him novel. I'm probably a classic left leaning liberal. I'm in fav…

> Has anyone cornered him and beaten him up for having moderate beliefs? Going again to the 'not actually reading the article' point, he has sneakily defined a moderate as someone potentially only holding extremest beliefs and probably as likely to be beaten up as anyone else. An extremist moderate, say. > I'm in favor of ... but I refuse to vote for Republicans There are good and bad people in every part of the spec…

> There are good and bad people in every part of the spectrum. If you think only the Republicans are dangerous to elect you are either talking about the very-short-term of one election cycle or you are not thinking for yourself.

You see, that's funny because having read the article, the above nicely nails the views an extreme moderate would hold.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#222

Post by eric_b »

tptacek wrote: post #206

It just can't be the case that this kind of content, which would never ordinarily survive on the front page if written by someone else, has a place here simply because Paul Graham wrote it. I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself! But if this would get shot down if it appeared in The Atlantic or The New Republic --- and it would, and should --- it shouldn't get a pass just because Harj Taggar and…

I agree the content is not terribly profound.

> I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself!

I had to laugh. As you are a reasonably prolific contributor here, I've seen dozens if not hundreds of your comments. It's gotten to the point I can reliably tell when it's a tptacek comment before I even read the byline. And it's not because you have stances on both sides of the political aisle.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#223

Post by tptacek »

glangdale wrote: post #216
tptacek wrote: post #206

It just can't be the case that this kind of content, which would never ordinarily survive on the front page if written by someone else, has a place here simply because Paul Graham wrote it. I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself! But if this would get shot down if it appeared in The Atlantic or The New Republic --- and it would, and should --- it shouldn't get a pass just because Harj Taggar and…

The PG quote that leads the essay on the topic of PG's extra-curricular rangings ("Dabblers and Blowhards") seems apposite: 'I actually worry a lot that as I get "popular" I'll be able to get away with saying stupider stuff than I would have dared say before. This sort of thing happens to a lot of people, and I would really like to avoid it' https://idlewords.com/2005/04/dabblers_and_blowhards.htm Edit: the essay its…

I want to be careful not to criticize the post on its own terms. Paul Graham should totally write things like this on his own site! It sucks having to be careful about what you because of what other people will do with it, and the weird debates you'll be forced into as a result.

I'm just saying, to the extent this post is political, it's political in a totally routine way that doesn't clear the "interestingness" bar for this site, other than that Paul Graham wrote it. It doesn't belong on the HN front page.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#224

Post by smolder »

SamReidHughes wrote: post #31

> Intentional moderates are similar to those on the far left and the far right in that their opinions are, in a sense, not their own. The defining quality of an ideologue, whether on the left or the right, is to acquire one's opinions in bulk. Well, no, not at all. People on the left and on the right tend to have a worldview and attitude that is the foundation of their stances on issues. It is not a coincidence that…

It'd be a stretch to say political opinions are for the most part a result of internal reasoning and self-formed world view, rather than indoctrination by a social group that suffers hard from confirmation bias. People are, overall, NOT good at thinking critically, and tend to accept the paradigm to which they have to most exposure. They tend not to reach outside of their bubble for clues about what could be wrong with their paradigm. It's more work.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#225

Post by AnimalMuppet »

youdontknowtho wrote: post #124
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you think something changed in the past 10-15, you're falling for GOP propaganda. You think that Democrats have not moved in the past 10-15 years? You think that the idea that they have is merely Republican propaganda? I think you haven't been paying attention. Or maybe you were paying too much attention. 15 years ago, AOC wasn't even old enough to vote. Were there Democrats in the House who held the same positi…

I'm trying to understand how you see Republican positions changing over time as well. From the perspective of policy or cultural issues. If I grant your point about how the last 15 years has seen a resurgent left, something that I'm stoked about, could you explain a little about how you've seen the republicans change over 10 to 20 years?

Honestly? I see Republicans unable to explain their own positions, perhaps because they don't understand it themselves. I see them stumbling around, too often not operating on principle or thought, and sometimes stumbling into saying things that manage to win an election.

It's unfair to say that that's all Republicans. But it's some of them, and it fits the one that collects all the press at the moment...

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#226

Post by tptacek »

eric_b wrote: post #222
tptacek wrote: post #206

It just can't be the case that this kind of content, which would never ordinarily survive on the front page if written by someone else, has a place here simply because Paul Graham wrote it. I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself! But if this would get shot down if it appeared in The Atlantic or The New Republic --- and it would, and should --- it shouldn't get a pass just because Harj Taggar and…

I agree the content is not terribly profound. > I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself! I had to laugh. As you are a reasonably prolific contributor here, I've seen dozens if not hundreds of your comments. It's gotten to the point I can reliably tell when it's a tptacek comment before I even read the byline. And it's not because you have stances on both sides of the political aisle.

Paul Graham isn't 50% of the way between American Democrat and American Republican either; he's using "moderate" in an idiosyncratically modern American way. The fact that we'd have to hash this out on the thread is just another good illustration of why this post doesn't belong here.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#228

Post by pgsbathhouse »

It's strange that if you're going to write this type of essay, it might behoove you to define right and left in your own words so the audience has a baseline for what you're really talking about.

Otherwise you're just saying "I'm right and everyone else is totally clueless. If you don't pick any side you actually have the most ~ ~ enlightened ~ ~ opinion."

I expect nothing less from PG but it's hilarious to see him just blandly admit how intellectually out of depth he is. He's basically ignored the most rudimentary topics in political science and just flat out spread his academic ignorance for the world to see.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#229

Post by sampo »

CameronNemo wrote: post #99

Right and left are arbitrary constructs necessitated by a first past the post voting system. Change the electoral system and you will see much more diverse and meaningful party affiliation. >The effect of a system based on plurality voting is that the larger parties, and parties with more geographically concentrated support, gain a disproportionately large share of seats, while smaller parties with more evenly distri…

> Right and left are arbitrary constructs necessitated by a first past the post voting system.

Most European countries have proportional voting systems, yet can anyway fairly well be characterized by the left-right political axis.

Re: The Two Kinds of Moderate

#230

Post by alexandercrohde »

tptacek wrote: post #206

It just can't be the case that this kind of content, which would never ordinarily survive on the front page if written by someone else, has a place here simply because Paul Graham wrote it. I say this as a moderate, of the accidental variety, myself! But if this would get shot down if it appeared in The Atlantic or The New Republic --- and it would, and should --- it shouldn't get a pass just because Harj Taggar and…

Well let's not conflate front-page and "getting shot-down." Something can be both.

Also, one reason this is getting shot down less hard than the atlantic is that it's a simple point being made in 10 pages to do so.

This thought would be even more viable as a tweet.

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