Moderate Hero

[Warren 4 Secretary of Everything]

I'm gonna be a dirty attention whore here for a second. What exactly do you consider Moderate-Heroism and how do you feel about it? Also, which for forumite and politician do you consider the epitome of the term?

[Antonio the Sixth]

Moderate heroism is the idea that, in every issue, the right answer lies exactly in the middle of the debate. It's kinda like the middle ground fallacy, only applied to political views. In short, moderate heroes think of moderation as a quality in and of itself regardless of context. The difference between a genuine moderate and a moderate hero will be that the moderate will try to justify his moderate views with normal argumentation, while the moderate hero will just take pride in being the most moderate.

The worst moderate hero on this forum I can think of is Smolchanov.

[Donerail]

I agree with Tony's definition. To add on: A moderate hero is a person who takes centrist or moderate political views (usually with little coherent logical reasoning for them) - typically to increase people's respect or opinion of their views. It often couples itself with attention-seeking tendencies, as moderate heroes want to be the deciding vote on legislation. Sometimes this includes having diverse left and right views, sometimes it's placing one's self in the middle of a debate (an almost religious devotion to moderate compromise, even when a compromise would accomplish the goals of nobody). Other times it's merely taking the position of the majority, whatever it may be.

A forum example is HPJ.

[Marokai Backbeat]

Basically the Golden Mean Fallacy in human form, with a generally flaky and easily offended attitude on top of it. It's not only what Antonio alluded to (priding yourself in constant moderation, or taking the moderate path because it "feels" right) but also outright hostility to black or white positions, for seemingly no other reason than they are black or white positions. On some issues, the extreme or incredibly straightforward/blunt approach is sometimes the correct one. Basically, Moderate Heroes are nice and happy sounding but hold logically inconsistent or inefficient beliefs just because, deep down, they think being moderate lends them some sort of cachet.

Economic stimulus is a good example of how to detect moderate heroism: Do you think increasing food stamp aid (just as one issue from that category) is a good idea in times of economic weakness? If I propose an additional 20 billion in food stamp funds, the moderate hero response wouldn't be "Yes, this will expand the program and help those in need" or "No, because food stamps are not much more effective in times of crisis" it would be "Okay, but just 15 billion instead." There is no logical consistency to that position, because it apparently accepts the premise that food stamp benefits are a good thing and that expanding them is a good thing, but it reduces the effectiveness for no apparent reason. That is what a Moderate Hero position is like.

[Bacon King]

Mark Warner is the physical embodiment of Moderate Heroism

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Basically what everyone else has said - far more eloquently than I ever could. Moderate Herosim is being a moderate for its own sake. Like thus:

December 1, 1955: Montgomery, Alabama (paraphrased)

James F. Blake: Hey, all you n*****s have to move to the back of the bus!
Rosa Parks: Well, I don't want to and you can't make me 'cause I have the right to sit where I damn well please.
Moderate Hero: How about you just move one seat back, OK? I mean, let's not get too extreme here.

[Lief 🗽]

The best forum example is, of course, benconstine.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The best forum example is, of course, benconstine.

I don't find him nearly as bad as most people make him out to be. He's fairly bland, but he's not bitching everybody about how great and moderate his views are.

[© tweed]

an important addendum to everything mentioned above is that it is motivated by a strong desire to be respected (or "taken seriously") by the ruling elite.

[Kitteh]

The best forum example is, of course, benconstine.

I don't find him nearly as bad as most people make him out to be. He's fairly bland, but he's not bitching everybody about how great and moderate his views are.

Yeah, forum examples would be smoltchanov, HPJ, and, no offense, but the OP of this thread.

Economic stimulus is a good example of how to detect moderate heroism: Do you think increasing food stamp aid (just as one issue from that category) is a good idea in times of economic weakness? If I propose an additional 20 billion in food stamp funds, the moderate hero response wouldn't be "Yes, this will expand the program and help those in need" or "No, because food stamps are not much more effective in times of crisis" it would be "Okay, but just 15 billion instead." There is no logical consistency to that position, because it apparently accepts the premise that food stamp benefits are a good thing and that expanding them is a good thing, but it reduces the effectiveness for no apparent reason. That is what a Moderate Hero position is like.

This is a good example. I'd also like to add abortion as an issue where the Moderate Hero position really confuses me. An example would be something like "I'm pro-choice up until 20 weeks, but I support banning 'partial-birth' abortion, parental consent for minors, and mandatory waiting periods for women seeking abortion". It's really, really hard to come up with any sort of statement about the beginning of human life or the moral status of the fetus that justifies such a view without a lot of conscious twisting. The reason for that is because someone who holds the above position isn't seeing abortion as a moral or philosophical issue; they're seeing it as a political issue through the lens of modern American political debate.

That's another frequent sign of Moderate Heroism, that when you ask someone to describe their political views they'll give you a list of policy positions, as in

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etc.

In a related sense, such a person is often very interested in political matrix scores, or defines themselves as "socially liberal and fiscally moderate".

It all comes back to the central theme: no guiding philosophy, political views based on reading Politico and watching CNN rather than a view on the source and nature of morality or even something less abstract like the role of government.

[Leftbehind]

Persistent triangulation around whatever crazy horsesh**t the Right think to spout next.

I like Seatown's satirical ModerateCoward username.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I think a lot of complaints about 'moderate heroism' come from a discomfort towards people without a dominant philosophy, or those who have flexibility within that. Rigid adherence to an ideology or a philosophy (often with little more thought) is just as big a problem to me.

But I do think people who 'strive' for moderatation as a badge of honour, as opposed to having positions based on knowledge and experience (rather than dogma) are problematic.

I've been called a moderate hero. No, I'm not. I don't seek out attention by having what are seen as inconsistent positions by purists. I just happen to have come to conclusions that aren't pure.

[Starbucks Union Thug HokeyPuck]

Around here?  Being a nice feller. 

Anywhere else?  John McCain in 2000. 

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

Here's a good example of it:

FF, though he wasn't a really good president.  He handled Waco and Oklahoma City well, but had way too many scandals for his own good.  He refused to acknowledge Osama Bin Laden.  He refused to take out Saddam Hussein when he had the chance and left it for Bush to do and thus passed the blame onto Bush.  His deregulation of the banks in the late 1990's started the faucet dripping for the 2008-2010 recession that we're still trying to dig our way out of.  I won't even mention Monica Lewinsky.  He is a very likable guy, though.  I would really like to eat dinner with him one of these days, as long as he can leave Hillary at home.  With all that said, he's probably the best Democratic president in the last 40 years, including Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama.  He is also the best president we've had in the nearly 25 years since Reagan has been out of office.  Reagan is the best president in American History, but Clinton is the best in the past quarter century.

[Lambsbread]

The best forum example is, of course, benconstine.

[Keystone Phil]

an important addendum to everything mentioned above is that it is motivated by a strong desire to be respected (or "taken seriously") by the ruling elite.

[windjammer]

A moderate hero is a (wo)man who thinks that extremism  isn't good for the society and it's better to make compromise than being a poot extremist partisan who thinks he's always right! I don't understand why "moderation" is so detested on this forum

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

John McCain and Olympia Snowe are the best political examples.

[LastVoter]

John McCain and Olympia Snowe are the best political examples.

Lieberman is the best example of all time.

I like Seatown's satirical ModerateCoward username.

About time someone noticed that, I thought a lot of posters were not getting it.

[anvi]

I suppose I'd consider myself moderate, but there's nothing particularly heroic about it in my case. I certainly don't impress any elite group with it.  On the contrary, it usually ticks off both my academic friends, most of whom are lefties, and my personal friends, many of whom are righties.  Hasn't endeared me to too many people on this forum either.  But I don't really take my own particular form of "moderation" to mean always trying to look for solutions "in the middle" of existing proposals.  That would, to be sure, be a fallacious and ineffective approach to things.  I think it has more to do with trying to consider and tackle problems in all their complexity.  Policy matters are often represented to political constituencies in over-simplistic ways by the parties and their respective backers, and once those goods have been successfully sold to the public, there is that much less political room for either side to make good policy.  In some ways, it's unfortunate that this stance has been labelled "moderation" in the first place, and in turn given a bad name in our political discourse, since practical moderation, a "not too much, not too little" approach to life is, for many things, a wise one.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

A moderate hero is a (wo)man who thinks that extremism  isn't good for the society and it's better to make compromise than being a poot extremist partisan who thinks he's always right! I don't understand why "moderation" is so detested on this forum

Compromise for its own sake is as bad as extremism for its own sake. Quite a lot of the time, views considered extremist are 100% correct - see my example above.

[Lurker]

The best example is probably the late David Broder (Washington Post). Surprised nobody has mentioned that guy yet - and I challenge you to find a bigger Moderate Hero than him.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The best example is probably the late David Broder (Washington Post). Surprised nobody has mentioned that guy yet - and I challenge you to find a bigger Moderate Hero than him.

You're right. Krugman even used the term "Broderism" in his book The Conscience of a Liberal with a meaning roughly equivalent to that of "moderate heroism" here.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Fareed Zakaria and Jon Stewart strike me as moderate heroes.

[Kitteh]

Fareed Zakaria and Jon Stewart strike me as moderate heroes.

Stewart is a special kind of moderate hero; the one whose views are actually pretty extreme but likes to use rhetorical moderate heroism to sound "reasonable".