Centrism Quotes

The basis of the self is not thought but suffering, which is the most fundamental of all feelings. While it suffers, not even a cat can doubt its unique and uninterchangeable self. In intense suffering the world disappears and each of us is alone with his self. Suffering is the university of ego-centrism.

Political centrism ≠ neutrality. Being a centrist doesn't make you unbiased; it biases you in favour of the centre.

You would never do anything like that, would you?" my wife asked him. "You would never hurt animals." Our son shook his head, looking offended by the question. He might have been lying, but my knowledge of his belief system, composed of equal parts off-kilter Far Side animal-centrism and a dark Captain Nemoesque contempt for humanity, inclined me to think he was telling the truth. Gigantic fish pulling the limbs from cruel little boys, that might be something you could get him to sign on for.

That which I call a text is practically everything… Speech is a text, gesture is a text, reality is a text in this new sense. This is not about re-establishing graphocentrism alongside logocentrism or phonocentrism or text-centrism. The text is not a centre. The text is an openness without borders, of ever-differentiating references.

Transcending divisiveness is one of the dreams of centrists, as if disagreement were a bad habit rather than fundamental to politics.

Centrism is the engine that makes the will of the Right palatable.

One of the effects of indoctrination, of passing into the anglo-centrism of British West Indian culture, is that you believe absolutely in the hegemony of the King's English and in the proper forms of expression. Or else your writing is not literature; it is folklore, or worse. And folklore can never be art. Read some poetry by West Indian writers--some, not all--and you will see what I mean. The reader has to dissect anglican stanza after anglican stanza for Caribbean truth, and may never find it. The anglican ideal -- Milton, Wordsworth, Keats -- was held before us with an assurance that we were unable, and would never be able, to achieve such excellence. We crouched outside the cave.

Game driven emancipation from the control that fem-centrism has maintained for so long. Make no mistake, the Feminine Imperative needs men to be necessitous of it, and it will always be hostile to the Men attempting to free other men from that necessity. In this respect, any Game, even the co-opted Game the imperative will use itself, is by definition sexist. Anything that may benefit Men, even when it associatively benefits women, is sexist. Freeing men from the Matrix, breaking their conditioning and encouraging them to re-imagine themselves and their personalities for their own betterment is, by feminine definition, sexist. In girl-world, encouraging men to be better Men is sexist.

we are left with a stark choice: allow climate disruption to change everything about our world, or change pretty much everything about our economy to avoid that fate. But we need to be very clear: because of our decades of collective denial, no gradual, incremental options are now available to us. ”(…) That’s tough for a lot of people in important positions to accept, since it challenges something that might be even more powerful than capitalism, and that is the fetish of centrism—of reasonableness, seriousness, splitting the difference, and generally not getting overly excited about anything. This is the habit of thought that truly rules our era, far more among the liberals who concern themselves with matters of climate policy than among conservatives, many of whom simply deny the existence of the crisis. Climate change presents a profound challenge to this cautious centrism because half measures won’t cut it. (…) The challenge, then, is not simply that we need to spend a lot of money and change a lot of policies; it’s that we need to think differently, radically differently, for those changes to be remotely possible. Right now, the triumph of market logic, with its ethos of domination and fierce competition, is paralyzing almost all serious efforts to respond to climate change. (…) It seems to me that our problem has a lot less to do with the mechanics of solar power than the politics of human power—specifically whether there can be a shift in who wields it, a shift away from corporations and toward communities,

The Frankfurt School’s studies combined Marxist analysis with Freudian psychoanalysis to form the basis of what became known as “Critical Theory” – the destructive criticism of Western culture, including Christianity, capitalism, authority, the family, patriarchy, morality, tradition, sexual restraint, loyalty, patriotism, nationalism, ethno-centrism and conservatism. Critical Theory repeats over and over a mantra of alleged Western evils: racism, sexism, colonialism, nationalism, homophobia, fascism, xenophobia, imperialism and, of course, religious bigotry (only applied to Christianity).

However, despite their synthesis of Yogacara and Centrism, all Yogacara-Madhyamikas, such as Jnanagarbha, Santaraksita, Kamalasila, and Haribhadra, unanimously refute the notion of a really existent consciousness or self-awareness in both the versions of the Real Aspectarians and the False Aspectarians, without, however, mentioning specific persons."They also attack Dharmakirti's presentations of causality (one cause producing many results, many causes producing one result, and many causes producing many results). At the same time, on the conventional level, they strongly rely on his principles of epistemology and reasoning.

As we mature, our brain develops the ability to mix things together, to hold different perceptions, senses, thoughts, feelings, and impulses all at the same time without becoming confused in thinking or paralyzed in action. This is the capacity I called “integrative functioning”. Reaching this point in development has a tremendous transforming and civilizing effect on personality and behavior. The attributes of childishness, like impulsiveness and ego-centrism, fade away and a much more balanced personality begins to emerge. One cannot teach the brain to do this; the integrative capacity must be developed, grown into. The ancient Romans had a word for this kind of mix: temper. That verb now means “to regulate” or “to moderate,” but originally referred to the mingling of different ingredients to make clay.

But this is not where the true corruption lies. The secret vice, already pointed out by Umberto Eco, lies in the way the media become self-referring and speak only among themselves. The multimedium is becoming the intermedium. This already problematic situation is aggravated when it is a single hypermedium — television — eyeing itself. All the more so as this tele-centrism is combined with a very severe implicit moral and political judgement: it implies that the masses basically neither need nor desire meaning or information — that all they ask for is signs and images. Television provides them with these in great quantities, returning to the real world, with utter - though well-cammouflaged — contempt , in the form of'reality shows' or vox-pops — that is to say, in the form of universal self-commentary and mocked-up scenarios, where both the questions and the answers are 'fixed'.

At the tail end of the Reagan years the Democratic Party, with the aid of Clinton/Gore–led groups like the Democratic Leadership Council, presented us with a new kind of “business-friendly” Democrat, one who voted the right way on choice and minority rights but was “willing to work with business” on such matters as free trade, deregulation, privatization, government spending, and personal debt. Such a Democrat, we were told, could win: we’d be giving up a thing or two in terms of workers’ rights and other matters, but at least Roe v. Wade would be safe for now.

In summary, prior to Bhavaviveka, the Yogacaras sought to assimilate rather than to oppose Centrism. A particularly striking example of this is Kambala's (early sixth century) Garland ofLight,1212 which displays a most remarkable early synthesis of Yogacara and Madhyamaka. After Bhavaviveka's critique, however, though never rejecting Nagarjuna and Aryadeva, on certain points the later Yogacaras seemed to be at odds with the later Centrists,"" mainly accusing each other of reification or nihilism respectively. However, what often happened in these controversies was the general problem of one philosophical system attacking the other with its own terminology and systemic framework and not on the grounds of the terminology and the context of that other system. In particular, Bhavaviveka's interpretation of Yogacara is a perfect example of an extremely literal reading without considering the meaning in terms of the Yogacara system's own grounds, instead exclusively treating it on Centrist grounds. Thus, when abstracted from the obvious polemical elements and out-of-context misinterpretations of what the opponents actually meant by certain terms, not much is left in terms of fundamental differences between the later Centrists and Yogacaras,'''" which basically boil down to two issues: (i) whether there is an ultimately real mind (no matter whether this is called other-dependent nature, self-awareness, ground consciousness, or nondual wisdom) and (2) whether any epistemology is possible at all.

The Republicans appear gutless because few have dared complain even while their party is taken over by people who despise them; the Democrats seem unaware that something similar might happen to them. The vital center, which in the past has saved the country from divisions over a host of contentious issues, has become a lonely place—historically an augury of more extreme problems in the offing. What the country needs is a plainspoken commitment by responsible leaders from both parties to address national needs together, accompanied by a general plan of action for doing so. Instead, Republicans are guarding their right flank and Democrats their left, leaving a gaping hole in the only place in the ideological spectrum where lasting agreements on behalf of the common good can be forged.

All our scientific instruments and our scientific experiments are just different ways of seeing the world. The world we perceive through our unaided sensory apparatus is just one view of the universe. Change the sensory apparatus and you change the world you live in. At present we have no way of knowing how the world really is, if it has some real form at all. All our knowledge of the world comes through our sensory apparatus and our scientific instruments and experiments and they give us views of the world conditioned and controlled by the nature of our sensory apparatus, scientific instruments and experiments. If anyone was able to get to a real world not controlled or conditioned by sensory apparatus, instruments and experiments, it may be the greatest intellectual achievement in human history.

The belief that "existence" and "reality" are synonymous with the human sensory world is just a case of human centrism that fails to recognize that the human view of the world is just one view of the universe and there are many other views just as valid as ours. It is an irrational bias or prejudice that cannot be justified as our sensory apparatus arose through a process of biological evolution, the same as those of all other species. It is also obvious our sensory apparatus is not any better than that of other species. It is our careless, sloppy and imprecise use of language, and our failure to understand the existence of other sensory worlds, that constitute the problem with wave function collapse.

World War II and the loss of Robin had taught him that life was “unpredictable and fragile,” a truth that meant those who were spared owed debts of service to others. He had come of age as a businessman and as a father under Eisenhower, whose conservative centrism had created the conditions for Bush’s own prosperity and happiness in postwar Texas. As a politician Bush had apprenticed in Johnson’s Washington, where presidents were neither angels nor demons but sometimes right and sometimes wrong. Under Nixon and Ford, he had learned about diplomacy, national politics, and intelligence gathering firsthand. And Reagan had given him an impressive model of leadership to which to aspire, even if Bush knew he could never match the Gipper as a presidential performer.

In brief, what Centrists refute is any notion of real or absolute existence or an intrinsic nature that is attributed to any phenomenon, whether it is material form, ordinary consciousness, omniscient wisdom, Buddhahood, the Dharma Body, or Buddha nature. Centrists make no difference in this respect between refuting the positions of Buddhists and non-Buddhists. They do not even hesitate to apply such a critique to anything that is-correctly or incorrectly-understood as "Centrism." Thus, if the teachings on the three natures are explained so as to even slightly suggest real existence, be it on the seeming or the ultimate level, be it by the Proponents of Cognizance, so-called Mere Mentalists, or Shen- tong-Madhyamikas, Centrists will speak up against this. However, when the presentation of the three natures is understood as the Karmapa explained it above, it is not something that has to be discarded by Centrists but comes down to the same essential point of ultimate non referential 1 ry that is explained in the Centrist teachings.

I have eyes that see through eternity. I see though the eyes of a Juggernaut in my midnight dreams. When I look towards the black vault that lies gaping overhead, it is impossible to tell if I am looking up or down, because, when you have given yourself over to the abyss, comfortable placeholders like gravity cease to have any meaning. Center of gravity becomes a heretical absolute. When existence will not acknowledge yours, you lose all notions of absolute center. Therefore, I am no centrist.

I mean, if I could choose between Democrat and Republican, I would choose Centrist.

Things had been different when Garveyism and Ethiopianism rather than afro-centrism and occultism set the tone. To contain modernity, to appreciate its colonial constitution and to criticise its reliance on racialised governmental codes all required finding an autonomous space outside it. A desire to exist elsewhere supplied the governing impulse. It was captured in compelling forms in the period's best songs of longing and flight, like Bunny Wailer's anthem ‘Dreamland’ 5. However, there is no longer any uncontaminated, pastoral or romantic location to which opposition and dissent might fly, and so, a new culture of consolation has been fashioned in which being against this tainted modernity has come to mean being before it. Comparable investments in the restorative power of the pseudo-archaic occur elsewhere. They help to make Harry Potter's world attractive and are routine features of much ‘new age’ thinking. They govern the quest for a repudiation of modernity that is shared by the various versions of Islam which have largely eclipsed Ethiopianism as the principal spiritual resource and wellspring of critique among young black Europeans. Their desire to find an exit from consumerism's triumphant phantasmagoria reveals them to be bereft, adrift without the guidance they would have absorbed, more indirectly than formally, from the national liberation movements of the cold war period and the struggles for both civil and human rights with which they were connected. Instead, an America-centred, consumer-oriented culture of blackness has become prominent. In this post-colonial setting, it conditions the dreams of many young Britons, irrespective of their ancestral origins or physical appearance. This brash and celebratory imperial formation is barely embarrassed by the geo-political fault-line that re-divides the world, opposing the overdeveloped north to the suffering south. That barrier provides the defining element in a new topography of global power which is making heavy demands upon the overwhelmingly national character of civil society and ideal of national citizenship. It is clear that the versions of black politics that belonged to the west/rest polarity will not adapt easily to this new configuration.

The crucial point here and in Centrism in general is that inherent existence is simply an incoherent notion altogether that does not withstand analysis. What is called emptiness is just the result of pointing out this fact. In other words, whether one conventionally speaks of "the thesis of emptiness" or says, "I have no thesis," both expressions just announce and highlight the Centrist procedure of demonstrating that all things lack inherent existence-that there are no reference points. Needless to say, such a "thesis of emptiness" is nothing to hold on to either.

His Heart of Centrism agrees: Its character is neither existent, nor nonexistent, Nor [both] existent and nonexistent, nor neither. Centrists should know true reality That is free from these four possibilities.

Kamalasila's Illumination of Centrism explains: Thus, those who cannot understand all at once that all phenomena lack a nature, for the time being, gradually engage in the lack of nature of outer objects on the basis of [them being] mere mind. Therefore, [ The Sutra of the Arrival in Lanka X.154ab] says: Apprehender and apprehended cease In those who look with reasoning. Following this, by gradually examining the nature of that mind, they understand that also the [mind] is without identity and thus engage in the profound way of being.

The other common Tibetan classification scheme is to label streams z and 3 as Mere Mentalism and place them doxographically below Centrism, which is then called "the system of self-emptiness" (rangtong). The system of Maitreya, Asanga, and Vasubandhu is labeled "the Centrism of other-emptiness" (shentong) and categorized under Centrism. This approach is usually taken by the followers of Shentong-Madhyamaka, such as Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Taye. Often then, this latter form of "Centrism" is considered to be superior to the former. In this approach too, the system of epistemology and reasoning of stream 3 is usually treated separately as the distinct topic of valid cognition.

No centrism based on the temporary historical "glory" of any nation or region should any longer be allowed to distort our universal human understanding of our one world history.

Buddhism in general and Centrism in particular is not meant as a philosophical edifice but as a set of tools for experientially attaining an irreversible state of freedom from suffering for both oneself and others. From the point of view of the Buddha, Nagarjuna, and Candrakirti, it is not at all the point to be eloquent and erect an impressive monument of brilliant ideas and concepts. If anything, this is the complete antithesis (if there is such a thing) of what Buddhism and Centrism are about and just turns the whole project of striving for the freedom from reference points upside down. Particularly in Centrism, we are not talking about philosophical elegance, systemic coherence, or the need to make perfect sense on the level of conceptual conventions, but about the liberation of our mind, which is a different ball game altogether. Setting up some philosophy is simply not the same as striving for all beings' freedom from suffering. 1131

what Nagarjuna and Candrakirti demonstrated so extensively is precisely that nothing makes sense when it is analyzed, not even such ordinary, everyday things as going. In this sense, the fact that nothing really makes sense is called samsara. Experientially, as long as nobody analyzes ordinary appearances, they just appear and function. From this perspective, the question of whether they make sense or not does not even arise. This is merely a matter of questioning what appears to us and trying to make sense of it. Nirvana then does not mean the grand idea that suddenly everything makes sense or that one realizes the true meaning of life. From the perspective of attaining nisprapanca, it just means letting go of trying to make sense of all these things that cannot make sense. Thus, the decisive criterion for any presentation of the heart of Centrism is not whether it makes good sense (which does not, of course, mean that, conventionally, it should not make sense) but whether what is presented serves as a means for ending ignorance and afflictions and thus leading to Buddhahood.

In brief, if Centrism is explained as a consistent philosophical, ontological, or logical system, that may appeal to our wish for some well-organized, all-explanatory picture of the world and how we perceive it. Usually, we just want to have something that makes good sense, something on which we can build our belief systems or, in the case of Centrism, a belief system for why and how we should not have any belief system. However, all attempts to force Centrism into any kind of system at all must necessarily fail due to the very nature of what Centrism is: the radical deconstruction of any system and conceptualization whatsoever, including itself. Reintroducing into Centrism any notions of justification, validity, or making sense (with more subtle ones being more tricky here than gross ones) precisely reestablishes and fortifies the very traps that the Centrist approach wants us to let go of altogether. To this, Centrists could be tempted to say, "Talking heads, stop making sense!

If the great challenge to democracies today is the emotional pull of populism and the way in which it is amplified by sections of the media and the algorithms of social media, then centrists must find a way to break through with an emotional appeal of their own.

Liberal democrats modify pure majoritarianism by insisting on protecting individual rights, however majorities may feel about them.

Instead of asking which idea is true, ask which is more suitable for the current, fleeting moment in history, the current context.

A zealot is one who thinks that a certain value is always the correct one. Zealots are blinded by ideology, and therefore blind to time and context.

Yet, as another economist, Wilhelm Röpke, reminds us, many areas of life will always remain beyond the spheres of supply and demand, largely unaffected by them.18 Friendship, grace, chivalry and beauty, for example, are not governed by the principles of the free market and never will be. These areas of life are no less important both in our daily lives and in our approach to government.

Centrism is the never-ending work of managing competing tensions,

As James Madison famously observed, in circumstances of liberty, individuals and groups are bound to diverge in both their interests and their beliefs. The alternative to accepting social pluralism is using power, public or private, to suppress it. This means, in turn, that politics must seek to balance competing interests and conceptions of good lives, a process that often requires compromise.

People who feel a sense of loss for a world that once was and fear the world that is coming are drawn to politicians who offer simplistic solutions, especially if no one else is willing to take those valid fears seriously.

He wrote, “A disposition to preserve and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman.

One of the major effects of fear-driven politics is that it destroys trust in public institutions and poisons the public sphere.

As the majority of researchers are part of the dominant culture in the west, it makes sense to suspect that cultural centrism could compromise the objectivity of studies.

Here are the basic commitments that run behind and through wokeness (or UJP more descriptively): Anthropology: Neo-paganism (no Creator, no creation order, we are our own rulers) Sexual ethics: Compulsive libertinism (we express our desires, and all should approve) Political theology: Marxist Statism (we trust the state to rule us and make things right) Metaphysics: Postmodern Darwinism (evolution explains life with no absolute truth) Theology Proper: Mystic Selfism (we should follow our hearts, not any authority) Soteriology: Therapeuticism/Ritualism (we become our best self by doing the work) Eschatology: Utopian Earth-Centrism (we’ll make the earth right through social justice)

Despite their shared centrism, there was an ideological difference that separated them. They championed different constituencies. Where Sinema built an alliance with Wall Street, Manchin enjoyed occasionally sticking it to the bankers, like a good old-fashioned populist from the hollers. And where Manchin felt a home-state duty to the fossil fuels industry, and personally benefited from its success, Sinema wanted to break its stranglehold over climate policy. In the course of negotiations with Schumer, Manchin had insisted on a provision ending the carried-interest loophole—a gaping unfairness in the tax code that allows hedge fund and private equity managers to count their revenue as capital gains and avoid the income tax. But Sinema had a history of defending that loophole. Manchin had every reason to believe that Sinema would despise his proposal—and that she would likely consider it a red line—but he insisted on pushing forward with it, regardless. Schumer didn’t fight Manchin. He wasn’t going to worry about his Sinema problem when it was theoretical. But now her objection was more than a theoretical source of worry. Sinema constituted the primary obstacle to the realization of Schumer’s greatest achievement, and he was stuck.

It is important to make the case for centrism in a positive and persuasive way, not as a compromise with some pure vision of left or right-wing extreme truth, but as an independently standing political position. And that’s why it’s equally important to make the case against extremism on both the left and the right, not as matter-of-degree, but rather as independent dangers to be combatted in the marketplace of ideas.

Giving and altruism plays a large role in bringing happiness to humans and transcending them towards Allah. It plays a key role in helping us break free of our self-centrism and annihilate ourselves in the love of Allah

The illusion that George W. Bush “understands” the struggles of working-class people was only made possible by the unintentional assistance of the Democratic campaign. Once again, the “party of the people” chose to sacrifice the liberal economic stance that used to connect them to such voters on the altar of centrism. Advised by a legion of tired consultants, many of whom work as corporate lobbyists in off years, Kerry chose not to make much noise about corruption on Wall Street, or to expose the business practices of Wal-Mart, or to spend a lot of time talking about minimum-wage issues.

Self-centrism creates another problem on the response side. The problem with commercially motivated technological change is that if it does not make good business, the idea does not see its growth. Sanitation and clean water is still a problem in localities where everyone has 4G connection and mobile wallet accounts. Commercially motivated research is more intensely pursued than socially urgent ones. Technological improvements to ease sanitation, bring clean water and achieve recycling are given less attention than telecommunication and digital financial services which are commercially more profitable ventures.

How the Twelve Steps Relate to Soulmaking 1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable. This prompts the ego to yield its ego centrism. 2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. This introduces the idea of a higher unconscious/nous being present as a resource for change. 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. Here is further letting go by the ego. This links the higher unconscious to God, but it allows those not yet theistic to participate. If one cannot believe in God yet, at least they can still activate the higher unconscious. 4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. In these next steps, we see that purgation is necessary for deeper illumination: 5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. 6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. 7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. 8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. 9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. This follows Jesus’ instruction: “So if you are offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift (Matthew 5:23, 24, RSV).” 10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. 11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. Here we see the main point I am making at this time—acknowledgement that meditation is an important, necessary step. Taking the issues raised in the above steps to the still point and offering them to God for healing, aids transformation. 12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

This kind of present-centrism is parodied beautifully in a 2020 TV adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World in which the ‘Savage Lands’ – more like an Indian reservation in the novel – are reimagined as a theme park devoted to twenty-first-century American decline.

To quote H. L. Mencken, ‘For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.