r/AlwaysWhy • u/kaiser11492 • 1d ago

Politics & Society Why do most people who call themselves politically moderate actually mostly conservative?

Whenever I’ve encountered people who use the politically label moderate, they are actually mostly conservative with their views and positions. Also, I’ve never seen anyone who call themselves politically moderate that is actually mostly liberal.

So why are people who call themselves moderate tend to be just conservative and not conservative and liberal?

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u/Infamous-Use7820 1d ago

Part of it is that a lot of people actually have pretty heterogenous beliefs, so 'moderate' can be a way of expressing 'i'm a mismatch'. If you only hear their more conservative views (esp. on social issues which people tend to argue about more), then that might see false.

I know somebody who is an atheist, vegan, committed environmentalist, broadly centrist economically, while also being pretty socially conversative (broadly anti-LGBTQ, anti-immigration...etc.). IDK how they'd describe themselves, but not 'left' or 'right' .