Talk:alt-center

RFV discussion: November 2022–February 2023

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alt-center

"(slang, politics, derogatory) A set of centrist ideologies that delegitimise political dissent, depend on conspiracy theories or otherwise are paradoxically authoritarian, whose presence is mainly confined to the Internet." —@Lingo Bingo Dingo

It seems that the current sense should either be amended or another, strict / literal, non-pejorative sense should be added; in the latter case, I'd contest that it be listed first as the primary sense. The one above is misleading and calls for conclusion rather than plainly defining 'alt-center' . Instead, I propose the definition be changed to something like...

• (politics, uncommon) Abbreviated from alternative-center; a centrist movement displaying novelty principles distinct from mainstream political ideologies such as conservatism and liberalism. —WbK @Wordbookeeper

Wordbookeeper (talk) 00:19, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

"It seems that"—why? Terms don't always have non-pejorative senses, and the current definition already has three durably-archived quotations (and matches my own anecdotal experience of how the term is used). If you're aware, or suspect the existence, of another sense it should be discussed and attested separately. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 00:50, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

Two of the three current quotations don't do any work to support or contextualize the verbiage "delegitimise political dissent, depend on conspiracy theories or otherwise are paradoxically authoritarian". Maybe the third one does slightly, in that it says "the left and right are chasing equally fictitious boogeymen", which could support "delegitimise political dissent".

I don't have any agenda with this word, I'm legitimately confused by what this is meant to refer to (and how other sources seemingly use it in different ways). I wonder whether this is a coinage, based on the precedent of alt-right, that has been invented multiple times with different meanings. 98.170.164.88 01:13, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

IMO the first one does work as pure attestation, it just requires contextual knowledge that makes it less helpful as an illustrative example for the reader. And yeah, I think the far-right sense mentioned below being derived independently is a given. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 01:18, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

To be honest, I don't really understand either the current definition or the new one. I'm not sure whether this is because the wording is confusing, or whether I am just out of touch with politics. The second citation is a mention that doesn't provide any helpful context. The first one could help me if I knew who Eichenwald and Jeffery were. I looked this term up on Google and RationalWiki essentially says this is a euphemism "race realists" use. But then again, RationalWiki is far from neutral. Urban Dictionary seems to just define alt-center as the political center, along with the idea of Hegelian dialectic/synthesis, which doesn't explain what makes it "alt". I'm more confused now than I was before. 98.170.164.88 01:07, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

You're right about the second one being a mention, to be fair. This one from a student newspaper might work if admissible. I'm not sure how the definition could be improved, though: it's a derogatory term (generally used by left-wingers) for people who are politically centrist but e.g. habitually produce conspiracy theories claiming that anyone with more radical political inclinations is a Russian or Chinese agent, argue that supporters of left-wing politicians like Corbyn are equivalent to the far right, and the like. Its use as a self-description by the far-right is another sense again. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 01:16, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

What you just wrote is already a more helpful definition (to me) than what's on the page. 98.170.164.88 01:21, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

The term, at least in the form ‘alt-centre’, is basically used to refer to right-wingers who claim to be centrist like the awful Kier Starmer. I don’t think a belief in conspiracies is a defining characteristic, though many such people like to claim (without evidence) that Corbyn conspires against Jewish people. The part of the definition saying ‘whose presence is mainly confined to the internet’ is rather bizarre as (self-proclaimed) centrists exist, communicate and vote in the real world like everyone else does. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 01:54, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

An article on the website of US media watch group FAIR offers a definition of the alt-center: “the aggressively pro-centrist vanguard who rush to exploit every misstep of leftist activism”.^[1] Further on in this article, it becomes clear that a characteristic of alt-center pundits is that they preach a false equivalence of “those protesting–and occasionally causing property damage–in the face of emboldened fascists, and the fascists themselves”. This very point of view of a false equivalence is also labelled alt-center in an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times, where we read, “this silly, alt-center notion that the left and right are chasing equally fictitious boogeymen”.^[2]  --Lambiam 17:35, 30 November 2022 (UTC)

I get where everyone is coming from. The current sense is valid under a leftist dialectic. This leads me to believe that a second sense should then be added for those who use alt-center as an endonym. I suspect that those using the term as a self-descriptor would not take kindly to being labeled as illegitimate dissenters, conspirators, nor contradictive authoritarians. In its plainest sense, alt-center simply blends the words alternative + center. Alongside alt-right, alt-centrists hold controversial, yet moderate opinions that diverge from the mainstream narrative. Conversely, the current sense, although seemingly of left-wing origin, is one-sided and is perversive unto those who use alt-center to refer to themselves. —WbK @Wordbookeeper

@Wordbookeeper You say on my talk page that "the de facto consensus is that [...] a non-pejorative sense also exist", but I'm not seeing such a consensus here...? Perhaps I'm missing something, but it seems like even your comment above recognizes that the term denotes one category and that the issue is simply that the people who identify themselves with the term don't want to be seen/labelled as right-wing/conspiratorial. But ... while I'm not sure if left-wing use of the term to link ostenibly "centrist" pundits who espouse alt-right-supportive/enabling views with the alt-right, and alt-right-adjacent folks' use of it to describe themselves more palatably (as Overlordnat mentions), should be two senses as Al-Muqanna seems to be suggesting, or just one, ... I'm not yet seeing evidence that there's any "centrist movement displaying controversial, novelty opinions" other than the aforementioned conspiratorial / right-wing(-supportive) folks who want to make themselves sound more palatable to other people or themselves, which "novelty opinions" is an uninformative euphemism for.
(Sure, some of "those using the term as a self-descriptor would not take kindly to being labeled as illegitimate dissenters, conspirators," etc, just like some alt-right people didn't like people noticing they were "often supportive of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, white nationalism and white supremacy", but... as long as it's what they're doing, it's a reasonable definition. I do agree with IP 98 that the initial wording of the first sense ("delegitimise [etc etc] paradoxically authoritarian") needs to be improved, as it's only with the extended context Lambiam provided that what it was getting at becomes clearer.) - -sche (discuss) 11:07, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

@-sche Between me and Al-Muqanna, the de facto, implicit agreement is that a second strict / literal / endonym / non-pejorative sense is valid:

"You're right about the second one being a mention, to be fair. This one from a student newspaper might work if admissible."

Likewise, a simple Google search will show that alt-center indeed does have a non-pejorative sense. These were all on the first page of results: [3], [4], [5].

You say you're not "seeing evidence that there's any 'centrist movement displaying controversial, novelty opinions' other than the aforementioned conspiratorial / right-wing(-supportive) folks who want to make themselves sound more palatable to other people or themselves, which 'novelty opinions' is an uninformative euphemism for. 'Novelty opinions' is a defining characteristic of any 'alt-' movement. This term is even used to describe the alt-right on the Wikipedia page, "A distinct far-right movement arising in the 2010s, it both drew on older far-right ideas, and displayed novelties"; alt-center is simply the centrist version of this. While no one is particularly satisfied with uninformative euphemisms, we do need to recognize 1. That this is an uncommon term. 2. The alt-center movement is widespread, just like the alt-right, and being a neo-political ideology, their principles are hard to define (though I'm sure there are plenty of articles out there that'll claim to know). 3. This is a dictionary, not an encyclopedia; less is more. By giving a plain, yet descriptive definition (like the one I provided), this serves as the stepping stone for folks to do more extensive research on their own.

Lastly, you say the following:

"Sure, some of 'those using the term as a self-descriptor would not take kindly to being labeled as illegitimate dissenters, conspirators,' etc, just like some alt-right people didn't like people noticing they were 'often supportive of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, white nationalism and white supremacy'".

These characteristics you gave of the alt-right are fact. Therefore, they are not inherently pejorative. Terms like illegitimate dissenters and conspirators are what you might call "uninformative" and biased given the breadth and novelty of the alt-center. Terms like "controversial" and "novelty opinions" connote less bias and encourage people to do their own research instead of going off what a Wiki dictionary told them. In summation, I still believe the second, non-pejorative sense I added to be completely valid. Regarding "uninformative" wording, it is our job to provide nominal (hope I'm using that word right) definitions, not extensive articles (less is more). —WbK @Wordbookeeper

Looks  cited, and definition has already been changed. Ioaxxere (talk) 19:19, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

RFV Passed. RFV Failed. Ioaxxere (talk) 22:14, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

? Not AFAICT. I've folded the two senses together. - -sche (discuss) 00:01, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

You're right, I didn't see that the quotations were added before the RFV. In this case the original sense "fails" but was simply rewritten. For the future, I don't think an RFV was necessary @Wordbookeeper Ioaxxere (talk) 00:52, 28 February 2023 (UTC)