NOT SO LEFT

The term that came out a few years ago was ‘heterodox.’ As that became slanted to mean right wing, the term ‘centrist’ was born. Now, the label ‘Not So Left’ is being tossed into the word salad.

A heterodox person is just somebody who thinks every issue through on its own merits and therefore whose opinions are not predictable based on their opinions about other things. I’d suggest that centrists comprise those choosing to avoid picking a side as the very concept of sides is juvenile and silly when it comes to issues governance. Not So Left feels like those who were once considered Classic Liberals but have been completely disaffected by the often stupid ideas of the Far Left.

A (sort of) joke I tell is that in 2019 Chicago, there were those who would classify me as a David Mamet wannabe, formerly liberal but slowly converted into a goose-stepper. In Vegas, as I worked among Bernie Boys with sidearms and MAGA Moms with #BLM t-shirts, I was seen as relatively center with my NPR street cred combined with pro-abortion glee. In Kansas, the locals framed me as a dyed-in-the-wool, full-on Libtard ready to look aghast as the very conservative population.

As Bill Maher frequently intones, I haven’t moved much any all from my liberal beliefs, the Left moved further into cult territory. So I suppose I am Not So Left now.

There’s something grotesquely liberating about standing in the political space just shy of the tofu-scented gulag of the modern American Left. I’m not swaddled in the goose-feathered comfort of conservative delusion, but neither am I locked in the ideological chokehold of the professional Offended Class. I exist in the DMZ, ducking cancel attempts like Molotov cocktails thrown by people who still live with their parents and think “emotional labor” should qualify for health insurance.

I am Not So Left. Not quite center. Not radical, not complacent. Inconvenient. Suspicious. Free.

And that is a terrifying gift.

Being Not So Left means I can actually say “I don’t know” without getting banished to the Shame Mines. Free from the masochistic ritual of performative apology—those trembling, hostage-video-style social media statements where someone begs forgiveness for a 2011 tweet that said “guys” when addressing a mixed group.

The modern Left treats personal growth like a public execution. They don’t want improvement. They want scalps. But when you’re Not So Left, you’ve already made peace with being disliked by people who write “cishet” like it’s a racial slur.

No one gets out of this alive, so why die sweating under the klieg lights of ideological purity?

Try saying this out loud: “I believe racism exists, but not everything is racism.”

If you’re Too Left, you’ve just excommunicated yourself from the cult. If you’re Not So Left, you just said a basic truth—out loud—and then went on with your day, possibly even eating a cheeseburger without checking to see if the cow identified as non-binary.

There’s a sublime benefit in being able to call bullshit without being accused of betraying the cause. Because once you are Not So Left, you are no longer in service to the cause. You are in service to truth, to contradiction, to the messy, bruised reality of human behavior that doesn’t fit in a TikTok infographic.

Parts of the Left have become a religion with all the worst parts and none of the incense. The purity tests, the symbolic language, the sacred texts written in hashtags and academic gobbledygook. You know you’re in a cult when you’re terrified to speak an obvious truth for fear of ideological exile. Or when every sentence starts with “As a [insert identity]…”

Being Not So Left is like leaving Scientology but keeping the parts that made sense—like maybe Tom Cruise has some valid points about running really fast.

You get to deprogram. You get to think again. You get to use the phrase “men and women” without a panic attack.

There’s no comedy in orthodoxy. There is only reaction, followed by guilt, followed by correction, followed by a resignation letter. When you’re Not So Left, you understand that jokes are meant to pierce, not pacify.

You remember when South Park offended everyone, and no one sued. You remember when comedians weren’t afraid to tell the truth—when George Carlin didn’t have to end every special with a disclaimer and a GoFundMe link for transracial elk handlers.

I’m too queer for conservatives, too straight for progressives. Too masculine for academia, too feminist for barstool bros. It’s magnificent.

Free from dogma. Immune to cult think. I stroll through the fire of controversy and come out smoking—but not sorry. I will offend. I will be called names. And I will laugh, because I’m not anyone’s pawn, slogan, or mascot.

Happy to avoid being easily summarized.

And that, in this absurd, angry, algorithm-fueled age, is the most radical thing of all.