Centrism in Politics ( மையவாதம்/நடுவுநிலைமை )

The following is yet another rant about a thing that has been torturing me for months now. So it might be even more incoherent than my other stuff.

Before starting this, I had to google what is the word for Centrism in tamil and the word for நடுவுநிலைமை in English. It is மையவாதம் and Impartiality respectively. My intuitive understanding of these two, were that they meant the same thing, albeit in different contexts.

But this changed, when I watched the teaser of the movie Nenjukku needhi ( The remake of the excellent movie Article 15 ).

The last dialogue piqued my interest a lot. I am still yet to watch this though. If it came from anyone else, this wouldn't have made me think for more than a second. The dialogue goes like

என்னை பொருத்த வரை, நடுவுல நிக்கிறது இல்ல சார் neutral, நியாயத்து பக்கம் நிக்கிறது தான் சார் neutral.

this roughly translates to

As far as I'm concerned standing in the centre is not neutral, 

Standing with justice is neutral.

To be fair, this is a very good dialogue and a very good point.

But what made me write this, was who said it. No... not the character. The person playing the character. Tamilnadu is known for its leaders coming from Cinema background, and famously using it to their advantage. This person is a standing MLA in the TN assembly, and the son of the current chief minister. The party he represents ( DMK ) is infamous for behaving like their opinions are the only correct way to handle things ( Example: their handling of NEET, LTTE issues ), and that everyone else is wrong, just like how BJP handles it in the centre. So when he says this in the movie, he obviously means standing with DMK is neutral.

But thinking about it, don't everyone think that they are in the side of justice ? If that is the case, then everyone should say they are centrists/neutral. This is where I realized I got the definition wrong, and possibly the writers of that dialogue also got some things wrong.

The mistake I made was conflating the political position ( Centrism ) in the political spectum, and Impartiality as equivalent things. 

Centrism

Centrism is the position where one doesn't identify with most qualities of the right wing and the left wing either. They get kicked from both the sides, and basically almost never get elected in the Indian context, as there is almost always a party which represents either extreme position, and both sides vote for their group, leaving centrists almost with nothing.

Centrism is also difficult in my opinion. I identify as a centrist, and for every new issue it is a constant battle when picking sides. Because, the key problem with centrists are is that, they beleive in some issues from the right and the left. But the issues other centrists beleive in, might not be the same. So one has to spend much time trying to weigh in extreme opinions from both sides to come to a conclusion, whereas a left/right wing person, can just use their side's arguments and accept it as it is, as anyway they straight away deem the other side irrelevant from the word go ( This might seem like an exhaggeration, but a person who proudly brags to me about not reading this blog EVER, behaves like this all the time, and just completely throws away any argument from the other side, saying it is their agenda. )

Impartiality

The key part where impartiality differs from centrism, in my opinion, is that now a person has to throw away his beleifs and decide every issue based on its merits. This is a tougher problem. The reason it is difficult for most people is, they cant fathom that the other side in the issue, might have a reason ( valid or not ) at all for opposing something, completely ignoring Hanlon's razor.

 

DMK as a party, always beleives in badmouthing political opponents about their political standing, and most times, dont even try to reason why the opposing beleif is wrong, but just keep repeating their beleifs over and over again. So a top leader in that party saying that dialogue is the most hilarious part. But also, they have clearly confused both centrism and impartiality, just like me, because if that is not the case, then the entire line is meaningless. Citing my previous rant about useless things, If everyone will claim they are standing with justice regardless of their opinion/political position, then everyone is a centrist/neutral whatever, now the word neutral as political position, completely loses it meaning. Why even have a word for something meaningless ?

Also, as a hilarious side note... when I was thinking about political sides and trying to fit parties into these sides, I realized that one of the few centrist parties in TN is hilariously NTK. Just that they managed to pick extreme opinions from both sides somehow and managed to form a political group from it ( Being so ready to form a nation out of a language identity is trademark right wing... whereas all the bullshit about his version of the self-sustainable economy mostly sounds like communism to me. )