The picture above demonstrate why the left-right divide is so meaningless. Serious discussions are replaced with simplistic models and meaningless slogans. So meaningless, in fact, that even small amounts of scrutiny is enough do show how flawed it really is.
This is obviously a very deep topic, and I will write more about it in the future. What this article will focus on, is communism and Nazism. Which according to this model is far away from each other, but have far more similarities that the picture above suggest.
As a student of political science, people always asks me where I stand politically. I know exactly what they mean, but I tend to pretend that I don’t. Therefore, I tend to ask back what they mean with where I stand. In nine out of ten times, I get the same reply – are you on the left or the right? In which I answer neither.
Now, the logical thing to assume after such a reply is that I’m a centrist – if I’m neither on the left nor the right, that must mean that I must be in the center. And since I’m in the center, my views are approximately in between the left and the right. I’m therefore a moderate …
The problem with this type of argumentation is the implication that the complexity and totality of politics can be simply divided into three camps – Left or right or center. All other nuances are completely ignored in order to promote this dichotomy. However, if you think about it, many things can’t be putted into a left/right line.
To use a very extreme example of two of the most destructive people in human history. One of them considered a rightwing extremist, the other a leftwing extremist, namely Hitler and Stalin. Where they that different?
Let’s use some examples. On free speech, both of them really despised the idea, putting hundreds of thousands of people in jail, and even murdering many of them, just for voicing opposition to their regime or because these dictators assumed that they were voicing opposition towards them.
What about the rule of law? Well, both of them corrupted the courts. Political prisoners were put to jail without trials. Millions of people were put to extermination camps, whether it was the concentration camps in Germany or the GULag archipelago in the Soviet Union.
What about a free market economy? The most common understanding is that the right is pro free market, while the left wants to regulate the market. But if you use the ultimate leftwing and the ultimate rightwing, you see that both of them organized the economy in a way of complete state domination.
Some might say that using these people to illustrate the difference between rightwing and leftwing might be a bit misleading. This is something I would agree with. Yet, it’s other people, not me, that insists upon calling Stalin for leftwing, and Hitler for rightwing. However, if you say that Stalin is leftwing, you thereby imply that the opposite of Stalin is rightwing. Yet, when talking about civil rights, rule of law and the organization of economy, both the rightwing and the leftwing dictators that I just mentioned, had far more similarities than differences.
I therefore thinks that the left/right dichotomy is an artificial divide, and are more or less useless in serious political discussions. If one manage to liberate oneself from the simplicity of these slogans, I think it will increase one’s ability to clear thinking when it comes to politics.
These examples are of course extreme. In my next article, I will explain how this dichotomy is equally pointless when talking about more moderate parties.
If you have any questions, please ask them in the comment section. I'f you disagree with anything, feel free to present your counter argument as well!
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