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Moderatespeak
By heilreality ·
Introduction
In this article, I'll explain moderatespeak and why it must be opposed.
What's Moderatespeak?
I define moderatespeak as:
* language that deliberately substitutes terms for more "radical" terms with less "radical" ones (as they're perceived).
Examples of moderatespeak:
Market anarchism or voluntaryism* instead of anarcho-capitalism. The former is the classically leftist deviation, while the latter is the classically rightist one. The former is trying to escape the stigma associated with capitalism, while the latter is primarily trying to escape the stigma associated with anarchism.
Self-interest* instead of selfishness or egoism. It's trying to escape the image of the ruthless brute associated with selfishness. (Of course, when we literally refer to the interests of oneself, it's a proper term.)
The general motivation behind moderatespeak is simple: escaping stigma by means of term-hopping. Stigma surrounding a term describing one's own positions.
(One may support the terms listed above because one genuinely thinks that they're etymologically more accurate. While I'd still disagree with them, such a person is not necessarily committing this fallacy.)
The Problem With It
As an example, let's say the term "anarcho-capitalism" becomes obsolete, and now the customary term is "voluntaryism". Instead of the brutish chaos of "anarchism", we just support everything being voluntary. (Self-pseudo-motte-and-bailey?)
1. The new term will inevitably become associated with the old term to some degree. "Anarcho-capitalism" would likely be noted in most discussions as its old name.
2. As the old name gets popular, the stigma will start growing. If we wish to consistently support moderatespeak, then we must continue term-hopping as soon as the inevitable stigma starts to arise.
3. This tactic could easily backfire, since non-ancaps will now see that anarcho-capitalists had changed their ideology's name in an attempt to get rid of its stigma. One might then think: "How cowardly are these people that they can't even stand by their own name?"
And the primary problem with moderatespeak:
- It's pragmatism. It is the abandonment of principle for "practicality". Practical for what? Surely not for promoting radical (i.e., principled) ideas, but rather for winning over the kind of people who are too obtuse to get over stigma.
Instead of trying to appeal to the mainstream, our policy should be one of proud hard-linerism: a policy of complete non-compromise. The choice is simple: Will we conform to the mainstream, or will the mainstream conform to us?