Thing is, not all possible combinations of issue positions actually exist as factions, to say nothing of factions with any influence in society. And the degree to which people are willing to get along with each other, express common political identities (such as parties), or work politically toward common goals, doesn't seem to particularly agree with the projection of their views onto a left-right spectrum. Factions and the links between them are sparse and discontinuous, and people accept or reject others on the basis of specific issues that matter to them. These are all much more interesting facts than that we can project them all onto a spectrum if we want to.
I suspect that each combination of {racist, anti-racist} × {transhumanist, bioconservative} × {socialist, libertarian} exists, and that they don't all agree on which of those issues is the most important to whether they can get along with each other.
Thing is, not all possible combinations of issue positions actually exist as factions, to say nothing of factions with any influence in society.
That's true.
And the degree to which people are willing to get along with each other, express common political identities (such as parties), or work politically toward common goals, doesn't seem to particularly agree with the projection of their views onto a left-right spectrum.
There's a grain of truth here, but overall I disagree. A person's more likely to get along with someone similarly left- or right-wing...
This is a great article at Aeon magazine. The author argues that the new ideological dichotomy is going to be between people who have great faith in technology and human innovation (Up) and the people who believe that humans are much more tied to their biology and the Earth (Down).
LW of course is a very Up community.