Dictatorship is neither left nor right

[untermensche]

It's "democratic" when the Constitution that was written by wealthy slave holders who didn't allow women and Black people to vote is loosely interpreted by unelected judges to undo a referendum of the people in which women and black people actually voted?

It's democratic when there is a separation from the church.

It is moving towards democracy when people with power are elected. When everybody is allowed to vote and the pollution of money is removed it might be a good democracy.

It is good when people have the freedom of speech and assembly. It is good when people have freedoms from unreasonable searches.

It was a good start ironically done by slave holding men that thought women were inferior.

The European Enlightenment had a lot to do with it.

So you can't have democracy where the people who vote go to church?

?

Pretty naive take on the separation of church and state.

It means the church is not part of the state power organization at all. That is why it is not even taxed. It is a separate thing.

But believers can be all over the place.

Another good thing about the separation is there can't be religious tests or qualifications for government service. At least there should not be.

 

[dismal]

So you can't have democracy where the people who vote go to church?

?

Pretty naive take on the separation of church and state.

It means the church is not part of the state power organization at all. That is why it is not even taxed. It is a separate thing.

But believers can be all over the place.

Another good thing about the separation is there can't be religious tests or qualifications for government service. At least there should not be.

OK, but people who go to church can vote and it still be democracy, right? Like they did in the California prop banning gay marriage?

 

[untermensche]

So you can't have democracy where the people who vote go to church?

?

Pretty naive take on the separation of church and state.

It means the church is not part of the state power organization at all. That is why it is not even taxed. It is a separate thing.

But believers can be all over the place.

Another good thing about the separation is there can't be religious tests or qualifications for government service. At least there should not be.

OK, but people who go to church can vote and it still be democracy, right? Like they did in the California prop banning gay marriage?

These ignorant prejudices from a primitive past are disappearing.

Even a non-functional democracy like the US is moving in the right direction on some things.

Adults have to step up some time and say that ignorant prejudices are unjust. They have to create Constitutional rights that delineate justice from injustice.

But many times ignorant prejudice can take power and do bad things. And when democracy fails to stop it that is a failure of democracy at a specific moment in time, not an inherent flaw.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

So if there is a referendum of the people and they vote in favor of a primitive prejudice that they majority believe in, is that democratic or not-democratic?

 

[untermensche]

So if there is a referendum of the people and they vote in favor of a primitive prejudice that they majority believe in, is that democratic or not-democratic?

What vote was this?

Where?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

So, why do you think money was for banning gay marriage? I seem to recall black people disproportionately supported the ban. Is it because they have so much money?

You keep choosing these issues that are actually on the wrong side of history.

You carefully choose times right before something becomes recognized to say there is a problem.

Right before we have the Civil Rights Act of 1964 we have a lot of bad things that led to it.

The gay marriage ban was overturned as unconstitutional.

Constitutional protections, and they are necessary in a democracy, won the day.

US Democracy is on the right side of both these issues.

Duh! He's showing the will of the people was to do something that is now considered wrong. In other words, a failure of your vaunted democracy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Well isn't this one? Democracy voted for the ban and unelected judges were on the right side of history.

The Constitution was a protection. Judges could be elected if we wanted that. And some are.

Lets look at elected judges. That's another clear indication of the will of the people being wrong. Elected judges are prone to paying attention to the will of the voters instead of the law. We had repeated examples of it here--the problem being people passing out prostitute ads. (Yeah, they said they were naked dancers. Only the most naive don't know what's really being offered.) I forget how many times the county commission passed measures against them--always clearly unconstitutional. Despite the clear unconstitutionality every (elected) state judge that saw the case upheld the law. The first federal (who won't be standing for election) judge to see them promptly smacked it down. Rinse and repeat until they finally gave up.

(Now, why they didn't attack it from a litter standpoint??--you pass out ads, you have to every hour clean up all copies of the material you were passing out that are within 100' of where you were and which you can both safely and legally pick up--you don't have to go into the street, across a fence or the like.)

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

So if there is a referendum of the people and they vote in favor of a primitive prejudice that they majority believe in, is that democratic or not-democratic?

What vote was this?

Where?

Evidence presented more than one page ago doesn't exist. I'll repeat what dismal wrote.

"In California, for example, they have had passing referendums that banned gay marriage, capped property taxes, and cut off benefits to illegal immigrants."

 2008 California Proposition 8
 1978 California Proposition 13
 1994 California Proposition 187

I guess you're still trying to figure out why those aren't democracy, so you can't acknowledge they exist.

 

[untermensche]

So if there is a referendum of the people and they vote in favor of a primitive prejudice that they majority believe in, is that democratic or not-democratic?

What vote was this?

Where?

Evidence presented more than one page ago doesn't exist. I'll repeat what dismal wrote.

"In California, for example, they have had passing referendums that banned gay marriage, capped property taxes, and cut off benefits to illegal immigrants."

 2008 California Proposition 8
 1978 California Proposition 13
 1994 California Proposition 187

I guess you're still trying to figure out why those aren't democracy, so you can't acknowledge they exist.

Those were not decided by a majority of the population.

They happened in a dysfunctional democracy filled with apathy.

I agree it is possible for people to become disgusted with a democracy that does not work.

A dysfunctional democracy is not a flaw of democracy, just like a dysfunctional family is not a flaw of the family system, it is something that needs to be prevented.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

So another rule - voting is mandatory and you only have a democracy if you have close to 100% turnout.

 

[untermensche]

So another rule - voting is mandatory and you only have a democracy if you have close to 100% turnout.

In a functioning democracy people will want to vote. Their vote will influence policy not just put some person who represents other interests in power.

In a dysfunctional democracy there is massive voter apathy. Voting has no effect on policy. Without a functioning democracy voting is a stupid futile endeavor.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Since I actually live in California, I can attest that when you vote on a ballot proposition you always have an effect on policy. Not so much when electing a candidate, but a ballot prop is direct democracy and everyone knows it. However getting a proposition on to the ballot, that can be a chore.

So, for you to finally say that it is a real democracy there must be 100% franchise and 100% turnout.

 

[untermensche]

Since I actually live in California, I can attest that when you vote on a ballot proposition you always have an effect on policy. Not so much when electing a candidate, but a ballot prop is direct democracy and everyone knows it. However getting a proposition on to the ballot, that can be a chore.

So, for you to finally say that it is a real democracy there must be 100% franchise and 100% turnout.

You have to go to the polls to vote on the initiative.

The process has turned people off from going to the polls.

And you have not shown harm.

The gay initiative violated the constitution.

It never should have been voted on.

The thing that does need to be watched is when government officials violate the constitution.

But in the US that is everyday.

Everyday the president is waging war somewhere without a Congressional declaration of war.

 

[dismal]

Since I actually live in California, I can attest that when you vote on a ballot proposition you always have an effect on policy. Not so much when electing a candidate, but a ballot prop is direct democracy and everyone knows it. However getting a proposition on to the ballot, that can be a chore.

So, for you to finally say that it is a real democracy there must be 100% franchise and 100% turnout.

You have to apply the unter-no-likee test. If unter-no-likee there will always be a reason why it's not democracy.

If unter-likee then even those slave owning Christians who didn't let Black people and women vote were democratic.

 

[untermensche]

Since I actually live in California, I can attest that when you vote on a ballot proposition you always have an effect on policy. Not so much when electing a candidate, but a ballot prop is direct democracy and everyone knows it. However getting a proposition on to the ballot, that can be a chore.

So, for you to finally say that it is a real democracy there must be 100% franchise and 100% turnout.

You have to apply the unter-no-likee test. If unter-no-likee there will always be a reason why it's not democracy.

If unter-likee then even those slave owning Christians who didn't let Black people and women vote were democratic.

It is what happens in a democracy that is so dysfunctional it has turned half the voters off.

And of course we are discussing a case where no harm occurred.

What a horror the democracy produced.

Almost as bad as allowing dictators to have control which is the only alternative.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Since I actually live in California, I can attest that when you vote on a ballot proposition you always have an effect on policy. Not so much when electing a candidate, but a ballot prop is direct democracy and everyone knows it. However getting a proposition on to the ballot, that can be a chore.

So, for you to finally say that it is a real democracy there must be 100% franchise and 100% turnout.

You have to go to the polls to vote on the initiative.

Oh the horror, you have to go vote if you want to vote. No wonder no democracy ever meets the unter test of a True Democracy.

And you have not shown harm.

So you have no problem with any of those three initiatives?

The gay initiative violated the constitution.

It never should have been voted on.

It was the will of the people, and you have attested that if anything ever violates the will of the people that is dictatorship. That was the answer you gave me every time I asked if there are limits to the will of the people. You just advocated dictatorship, again.

 

[untermensche]

Oh the horror, you have to go vote if you want to vote. No wonder no democracy ever meets the unter test of a True Democracy.

The functioning of the democracy is so corrupted by wealth it creates the phenomena of learned helplessness in many voters. It creates massive voter apathy.

When 40-50% of the people don't even bother to participate that is a sign of a corrupted worthless system.

So you have no problem with any of those three initiatives?

I have no problems understanding why a certain kind of person would want them.

But democracy is not just voting. People should not be voting about the rights of others.

Democracy is constitutional protections and voting and a lack of the corruption of money. It is many many things.

You want to reduce it to just voting and look merely at voting.

It never should have been voted on.

It was the will of the people....

The initiative was in place because of the will of a minority.

But allowing people to vote on rights is not what is done in a democracy.

Rights are spelled out in constitutional provisions and the courts.

In any democracy all rights have to be the same for everyone.

Injustice is not democracy.

You are pointing out flaws in US society. A society filled with racists and bigots.

When a society is bad it is possible bad votes will be cast.

But a democracy has protections in place to prevent those votes from doing harm.

The good news is the US has less racists and less bigots than it had just 2 generations ago.

US democracy is slowly moving in the right direction, even if it has it's problems and reversions to things related to religious bigotry.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

But allowing people to vote on rights is not what is done in a democracy.

So what you are saying is that there have to be limits on the power of the majority otherwise we get tyranny of the majority, the very thing you say doesn't exist.

You're not even going to get near what happens if the majority decides to vote away those limitations.

When a society is bad it is possible bad votes will be cast.

You said the majority never does that.

 

[untermensche]

But allowing people to vote on rights is not what is done in a democracy.

So what you are saying is that there have to be limits on the power of the majority otherwise we get tyranny of the majority, the very thing you say doesn't exist.

I have asked for an example of tyranny of a majority in a functioning democracy.

And all I got were US societal problems of racism and bigotry. Problems we still have.

But god forbid you kneel before the game if you are a little too dark.

When a society is bad it is possible bad votes will be cast.

You said the majority never does that.

I asked for an example of a true majority acting tyrannically in a true democracy.

You gave me some societal problems in a half-assed democracy.

You equate US racism that exists because of centuries of slavery with democracy.

Your inability to see what forces are creating problems and which forces are solving them is astounding.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I have asked for an example of tyranny of a majority in a functioning democracy.

And you got Prop 8.

I asked for an example of a true majority acting tyrannically in a true democracy.

Prop 8 passed by a majority vote. Your only defense now is that not enough people voted, but if you choose not to decide you'll still have made a choice.