on the heels of an historic election that shook the world under the sway of two polarized movements and one man who told them we are all in this together, it is worth considering: what does it mean to be moderate? how did we end up so far apart? how can an evil empire begin for one friend and fall for another?

i think true political moderation is not characterized by an averaging of public opinion. i think that there are some instrinsic properties attached to moderation; that is, the space being explored matters as well as the people exploring them. perhaps, ideally, these converge, if only because statistical and empirical truths about the world imply that the true middle and the sampled middle ought to be close together. but it is clear that much of the world has diverged from the american model of moderation; our shared realities bend to fit the scales of our neighbors. and yet they still become perilously passionate, often overcoming our objectivism to show us false faces of the people we thought we knew.

i see moderation not as some notch on an arbitrary spectrum, but in openness. it is demonstrated by a belief that whatever answers we may have now, they need not be the answers we have tomorrow. it is a reliance on empirical evidence, sound argument, and tempered passions. i think you can have a moderate opinion while being the only soul on the planet to have it. to be extreme is not to be different, but to be irrational and immovable, to fall into ideology without remembering or being able to defend why. indeed, in the extremes we often see the worst of shared realities - realities so disconnected from the world that we are no longer able to see from one side to the other, no longer able to give someone the benefit of the doubt, no longer able to see the human being behind the belief.

so what, then, of american politics? how did we get so far apart? i think the common ground is still there: the left can agree on the virtues of individual liberty, self-reliance, and only spending what you can afford. the right can agree on the virtues of tolerance, fairness, and a belief in a common good. we do not live in a society of islands; if we are to perservere, it must be together. at the same time, the world is inherently inequal, and no amount of artifical posturing will make it otherwise. i believe that our responsibility is one of moderation: we must have the compassion to lift each other up when one of us falls down, but the humility to accept that we cannot catch everyone. we must have the foresight to see a better world for all of us is a better world for each of us, but the cautiousness that comes with knowing good intentions alone are not enough. we have to offer our children the solid footing to stand, but the freedom to run. in each case, we require the wisdom to know when one ends and the other begins, and so we argue.

but what we cannot afford is a scale that hinges on personal value. we cannot allow ourselves to demonize our differences, even when they are so close to our own hearts. what does being against gay marriage say about someone? all too often, i would argue that it makes them intolerant and homophobic, at the very least. but my own parents are against it, as are so many others'. there is a generational divide that i cannot understand. that doesn't mean i won't stop fighting for what i believe is a more just world, but it does mean that i'll try hard to make my argument in words, not in condemnations. like a thief of reason, these wedge issues sneak in to our cores, threaten our foundations, and leave us vulnerable. there cannot be moderation if you believe the only possible explanation for someone's belief is their evilness; and yet, somehow, sometimes, we can think of no other.

so am i a moderate? i hope so. am i a hippie liberal? absolutely. are these things mutually exclusive? i don't think so. because tomorrow i might find that liberals have overreached, as conservatives did the past 8 years. i am afraid that i've missed out on some good arguments by the other side lately - but there will be time. what i fear most is to slip into cant, to lose that critical eye that sees through ideology and party. i'm terrified of making my arguments without questioning my assumptions.

so to those of you who are close enough to me to actual read this:

don't let me get away with it.