No, Centrism is not "Right Wing" (President Sunday response) | Centrism, Leftism, Conservatism

No, centrism is not Right-wing.

Original Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqSyehQxJH8&t=61s

If you have been in the hellscape that is known as online politics for some time, you are probably familiar with the political left and the political right, as well as what they represent. In short, the political right wants to preserve good institutions of our society, while the political left wants to improve or change bad institutions. That least that’s their stated goals. There are much more complexities than that, but that is the Layman’s definition. Anyway, a middle ground to both sides is referred to as centrism, the theory that the answers to society’s problems are found roughly in the middle of these 2 ideologies. There has been pushback to this, but vocally from one side more than the other. Many online Leftists have condemned centrism with accusations that they in reality support the Right and fascism, intentionally or not. One such leftist is a Youtuber called President Sunday. He also has some disdain for liberalism. Let’s hear him out.

Ok, there is a lot to unpack there. First off, no, the Left-Right political spectrum is not a binary. And even if it were, I am not sure we would get that implication from your own definitions and descriptions of the Left and Right. You have described the Left as advocating for changing, critiquing or replacing old institutions. But what institutions? All institutions? Some institutions? These questions determine the validity of Sunday's framing of the spectrum as a political binary. If he means the Left wants to affect all structures, while the Right wants to keep all structures the same, then the President, then his assessment of centrists and liberals would be a more logical implication of his ideas. But if he means that the Left-wing only wants to change some historical structures at a time, and hence preserve others, then Sunday's statement about centrists would be wrong. The Right being the opposite would focus on preserving some structures that they consider important and will argue in defense of them. Any structures that either the Right or Left disagree on what to do about will become an issue of debate. But they would probably agree on changing some structures, and keeping others, even if this point of agreement is small. Sunday claims that the Left and Right are a binary with no continuum, hence centrists can't meaningly fully be a middle ground. But a centrist can choose to change/critique/replace some structures while deciding to preserve others. Does this make them left-wing? Does this make them right-wing? Or both? A possible Progressive Conservative even. If the centrist is really "right-wing" because they want to preserve some structures, could it also be argued that they are really left-wing because they want to change some structures? The logic that Sunday uses is self-defeating.

#conservative
#sjw
#centrist