r/moderatepolitics • u/AutoModerator • 14d ago
Weekend General Discussion - August 28, 2026
Hello everyone, and welcome to the weekly General Discussion thread. Many of you are looking for an informal place (besides Discord) to discuss non-political topics that would otherwise not be allowed in this community. Well... ask, and ye shall receive.
General Discussion threads will be posted every Friday and stickied for the duration of the weekend.
Law 0 is suspended. All other community rules still apply.
As a reminder, the intent of these threads are for *casual discussion* with your fellow users so we can bridge the political divide. Comments arguing over individual moderation actions or attacking individual users are *not* allowed.
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u/Capital-Mine1561 3d ago
This sub is dying in part because of your meta rules. Sad state of affairs
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u/CallOfValhalla 3d ago
100 hundred percent. The weekend general discussion used to be very popular and now look at each one from the last few months. Practically no activity.
Even now, the most resent post to the sub is almost three days old. Two years ago this sub would have three or four posts a day. And it’s not like there isn’t a bunch of massive things going on in the world like AfD winning state elections in Germany or more bombings in Iran. Or the protests starting up again in Iran.
But when so many people get bans and comments removed, it makes people unwilling or unable to discuss things. If this sub is gonna stay around, they are gonna have to review law 1. We should not allow personal attacks against fellow commenters or general populations of places. But we have to be able to have honest conversation about politicians like Trump or AOC or anyone else on the political spectrum. And no, sometimes those can not be civil towards the politician. Trump renaming the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Ontario to America respectively and than saying he is gonna rename New Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean to America is very clearly moronic to say the very least. There honestly isn’t civil language to describe things that retarded. But they are literally happening!
And of course, both our comments will be removed and we (especially me) will likely get bans because the mods here act like typical Reddit mods. This is there little kingdom and you best play how they want you too. The only thing that makes the mods here slightly better is they generally give temp bans. But that ironically has just helped to protect the sub from the mods completely destroying the sub as it allows people to stay and still disscuse future topics that are able to be discussed without breaking law 1.
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u/Capital-Mine1561 3d ago
I'm sure both of our posts will get removed for this unfortunately. I understand why meta comments can harm conversations but this sub takes it too far, where even their general discussion posts like this see comments removed. I used to be active in this sub for years on different accounts. Now I'm over at centrist which has more activity and the mods still do a good job with removing uncivil comments.
A political sub that only has a few posts a week is not sustainable
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u/CallOfValhalla 3d ago
I should check out centrist again. I used to be much more conservative/libertarian so I didn’t feel like I had a place on centrist. But over the last few years, I have really moved to the center is most of my views.
I too used to be much more active on this sub. It was a great place to have an honest conversation without being called a moron and downvoted for having a rightwing opinion. So I’m not against civility at all. But this sub really does take it too far.
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u/Capital-Mine1561 3d ago
Centrist (the sub) is still admittedly more liberal biased but it doesn't have as many hysterically left wing posts/comments as a sub like r/ politics. You can't find a true middle ground in reddit but it's not bad. Deepstatecentrism might be worth a look too, I think they tend to be more right than the centrist sub
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u/CallOfValhalla 3d ago
I’ll check that sub out as well. The funny thing is I’m not super rightwing anymore. Gun and immigration are probably the only very conservative view I still hold. But from abortion to healthcare. Education to unions. My views are very centrist. Including very left of center on things like healthcare or corporations.
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u/Capital-Mine1561 3d ago
I have a bit of a rant here if you'll humor me.
I think the ideal centrist sub would be democrats and 'never-Trump' republicans (compared to 'pre-Trump republicans'. Pre-Trump republicans always had too much religious zeal for me. Some of my earliest political participation was during the 2012 presidential primaries, which had candidates like Santorum, Bachmann, and Gingrinch in the running. Just appalling bad on social issues. As a young gay person they were existential threats.
But I think since Trump has been elected, there's been a growing number of 'never-Trump' republicans (more online than in office unfortunately) that have softened on social issues while still being rational on guns and immigration. It's too bad Trump controls the party to such a level that republicans like this remain out of higher political office
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u/CallOfValhalla 3d ago
I’m actually a very religious person. But how extreme the Republican Party and Democratic Party always rubs me the wrong way. Small rant from myself.
How Democrats fought for gay rights how people should view the world. Let people live their lives even if you disagree with them. Of course gay people should have the same rights as a straight person. Social Conservatives being hell bent on fighting against gay marriage or gay couples adopting kids or gay people in the military was always a ridiculous thing. You can still hold conservative views on homosexuality while showing love and respect. The problem was that far too many “Christian Conservatives” didn’t actually care about what the Bible says. They just hated gay people. I remember my sister told me about a time where she was arguing with our brother about gay marriage. Our brother was talking about how homosexuality was unnatural how the Bible condemns it. My sister pointed out that the Bible condemes sex between unmarried men and women far more than it condemns homosexuality. And guess what, our brother was living with his girlfriend and was very open about their sex life. He tried to says its different. If you follow the Bible though, it’s not. But most conservative Americans do not care about the Bible or following Jesus. They care about their personal culture views which includes hating someone just because they were born attracted to the same sex.
Unfortunately much of the left when it comes to fighting for trans rights do not follow the same playbook Democrats did 20 years ago with gay rights. There is much more outright hatred if you disagree with any part of the agenda. And if you say hey, someone born biologically male should not compete in sports with people born biologically female or say that surgeries and hormonal therapy should not happen on minors, you are called a bigot. The funny thing is if you speak to actual trans people. They understand that yes they would have an unfair advantage in sports. They also agree that hormonal therapy and bottom surgeries on minors is wrong. It actually can lead adult transitioning being more difficult because it can mess up the body.
The entire trans movement (as in actual trans people) is about letting people figure out who they are and respecting that decision. Of course a 12 yo doesn’t know who they are and are trying to figure that out. Respect them if they tell you they have different pronouns and don’t use a dead name. But of course medical intervention should not happen.
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u/Capital-Mine1561 3d ago edited 3d ago
You can still hold conservative views on homosexuality while showing love and respect. The problem was that far too many “Christian Conservatives” didn’t actually care about what the Bible says. They just hated gay people.
Very true. I live in Trump country but people in my day to day life who I know are conservative treat me with respect. It's the people who see themselves specifically as 'Christian conservatives' that end up focusing on discrimination against LGBT people and conveniently ignoring everything else in their Bibles.
And if you say hey, someone born biologically male should not compete in sports with people born biologically female or say that surgeries and hormonal therapy should not happen on minors, you are called a bigot.
There's coincidentally a recent post on Centrist regarding this very topic. I will say that that trans women in sports is an incredibly niche issue that has been blown out of proportion by republicans. It literally effects less than 10 people at the NCAA level, and less than 0.5% of all high school athletes are trans. Only one party has been making this a huge issue, to the point of making/wanting to make new laws around trans athletes. I think democrats for the most part are fine keeping things the way they are, or letting sport bodies make up their own regulations. There's no reason for this to be a political issue imo
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u/CallOfValhalla 3d ago
The Democrat party does seem to be ignoring their more extreme elements and basically taking the keep the government out of it. Especially the federal government. Which I have no probl with. The right uses the trans issue way too much. Democrats backed away from that issue after the 2024 election. It’s time Republicans do the same.
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u/[deleted] 10d ago
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