(07-04-2019, 05:18 PM)americus 2.0 Wrote:

(07-04-2019, 12:48 PM)TJBender Wrote: You guys do realize that there are as many moderate Democrats who resent being lumped into the "left" as there are moderate Republicans who hate being lumped into the Trump crowd, right? Howsabout we start calling the wackos "wackos" on both sides and leave the left and right labels for those of us who try desperately to cling to the center despite being surrounded by idiots.

Sadly there is only a "left" and a "right." The MSM certainly aren't going to separate the "radical left" from the "left" or the "radical right" from the "right". They can't argue from a rational position so they lump everyone together. People do it as well. 

As a Libertarian no one knows what to say to me as most don't even know what it is. Some think it means I'm extreme right while others see re 'liber-' part and think some weird liberal faction. I tell them to go educate themselves on the website. Which most don't because they prefer to remain willfully ignorant.

I've stopped identifying as part of any one political ideology for the same reasons you cited above. Most Americans are mindless half-wits when it comes to politics who understand only two ideologies: left and right. They can't describe them beyond saying that the right are a bunch of hateful racist monsters who want to turn America into a paradise for rich white people and a prison camp for everyone else, and the left are a bunch of baby-killing country-hating thugs who want to steal all our money and hand the US over to Mexico. The second you answer with, "I'm libertarian," "I'm centrist," or, worst of all, "I'm independent," you get the third degree because the person you're talking to has no damn idea what that is, they just know that you disagree with them and clearly are on the other side. 

You think conversing on here can be rough sometimes? Try explaining to a massively pro-AOC gay man that a bakery is free to decorate a cake however they see fit. Suddenly, everything else that you agree on is out the window and you're a bigoted monster. I've just about given up on political discussion everywhere except here until we, as a nation, pull our heads out of our [BLEEP]. There's no point. No one's open to new ideas and differing opinions. All anyone wants to do anymore is tell you how right they are. It's old.

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