pushed, brought and put forward, - is it all in the same direction?

[StarOfValkyrie]

I always get confused with this. If something is brought forward, surely it happens later, since we are already going forwards, no?

And while we are at it, isn't next Tuesday, the next Tuesday to come, why do we have to skip on out?

If you think of the future as a line stretching away from you with upcoming events on it, then if you say that something has been "brought forward" it's logical to think of this as being forward relative to you, especially because of the word "brought", so it would be closer to you, and hence happening sooner. If it was "sent forward" then you could imagine it being sent in the other direction, away from you, and hence happening later. The fact that you are moving forward in time isn't relevant as the line is moving with you. So it's really the use of the word "brought" (we never do actually "bring" things away) and the fact that this is all relative to the speaker, not the whole of history, that gives to the phrase the sense of being sooner.

I do agree there's a certain illogicality to it but there is some sense too...

But if you say that, then "this Tuesday" no longer means anything. It's perfectly sensible for "next Tuesday" to mean "the Tuesday of next week", and then "this Tuesday" means "the Tuesday of this week" regardless of whether it's coming up or not. If it's Monday and something is happening the following day you can say it's happening on "Tuesday" or "this Tuesday", leaving "next Tuesday" for if it is in 8 days' time. If you insist that all three things mean the same, you devalue the language.