Dictatorship is neither left nor right

[untermensche]

Hillary got more votes than Trump.

Democracy was replaced with some system to protect slave owners.

The US was founded to protect slave owners.

I don't think it's fair to call Hillary Clinton "a slave owner". Sure, she doesn't seem like a very pleasant person but that's a little over the top.

In any case Trump's win proves smart candidates who understand the system and appeal directly to the voters can beat the big money candidates.

It is fair to call James Madison a slave owner.

The electoral college system perverts democracy.

Saying Trump likes perversion is definitely true.

Donald Trump, the schmuck who singlehandedly destroyed the USFL.

 

[dismal]

Hillary got more votes than Trump.

Democracy was replaced with some system to protect slave owners.

The US was founded to protect slave owners.

I don't think it's fair to call Hillary Clinton "a slave owner". Sure, she doesn't seem like a very pleasant person but that's a little over the top.

In any case Trump's win proves smart candidates who understand the system and appeal directly to the voters can beat the big money candidates.

It is fair to call James Madison a slave owner.

The electoral college system perverts democracy.

Saying Trump likes perversion is definitely true.

Says guy who three posts ago declared we need a Constitution to subvert democracy.

 

[untermensche]

It is fair to call James Madison a slave owner.

The electoral college system perverts democracy.

Saying Trump likes perversion is definitely true.

Says guy who three posts ago declared we need a Constitution to subvert democracy.

You see protecting rights as subverting democracy and I see it as an essential feature of a democracy.

That explains our differences pretty good.

 

[dismal]

It is fair to call James Madison a slave owner.

The electoral college system perverts democracy.

Saying Trump likes perversion is definitely true.

Says guy who three posts ago declared we need a Constitution to subvert democracy.

You see protecting rights as subverting democracy and I see it as an essential feature of a democracy.

That explains our differences pretty good.

Well, I think the big difference between us is I can read and understand other people's posts.

 

[untermensche]

You see protecting rights as subverting democracy and I see it as an essential feature of a democracy.

That explains our differences pretty good.

Well, I think the big difference between us is I can read and understand other people's posts.

Dodge.

Goodby.

 

[bilby]

Huh? I think I said early on: democracy is a process. It can do good, it can do bad.

I'm against bad.

When democracy does 'bad', the only way forward is more democracy plus better communication, better education, and eventually a better democratic outcome. It's not just a means to an end that we can swap out for totalitarianism, but an end in itself. At least that's what libertarianism used to mean.

Democracy can be overdone. It's a useful component of governance, and helps keep the worst authoritarians away from permanent or excessive power. But it's not inherently a good thing, and there are many circumstances where a consensus of experts is a far better decision making methodology than a popularity contest.

Democracy should be the methodology we fall back on, when knowledge and reason are not able to select between alternatives - that is, in matters that are opinion rather than fact.

No single methodology should be allowed to monopolize government decision making. This is why we have separation of powers, with the various components of government selected in different ways.

I would like to see someone try a Westminster style of bicameral legislature, where the upper house is not elected, but is instead made up of subject matter experts whose selection is based on knowledge rather than popularity.

The English House of Lords was originally somewhat similar in concept, with the unfortunate error of equating wealth and social standing with expertise. The idea of hereditary peers was that as they are neither subject to election nor to dismissal, they would give their impartial consideration to the effect of legislation on the nation, rather than its effects on public opinion. It didn't work very well, but its problem wasn't a lack of democracy - rather it was a lack of merit based selection.

The idea that 'more democratic' necessarily means 'better for the people' or 'better for the nation' is simply wrong. It was true in the past, because no nation had sufficient democracy in the mix; But it is untrue where democracy has become too large a part of the mix, allowing stupid people rather too much ability to drown out the minority of people who actually have a clue about most complex subjects.

Donald Trump is exhibit A. Brexit is exhibit B. Both are failures caused by over emphasis of democracy over competence, knowledge, and expertise.

 

[bilby]

Sorry, but I’m gonna score “it affects a lot of people” as a reason NOT to force lazy, apathetic people to vote.

So your analogy is stupid and short-sighted, just like your concept of "freedom".

Yeah I cling more to the old pre-1984 “freedom means not being forced to do things” notion whereas you’ve gone for that more modern “freedom is slavery” bit.

You appear to be putting far too much emphasis on the 'ignorance is bliss' idea.

This is more complex than you want to think; Your narrow focus that assumes (incorrectly) that freedom on small scale questions implies greater freedom on a larger scale is deeply flawed, but you would rather stick to your ideology than consider any possibility that it might be in error.

Freedom from participation in democracy is no less dangerous to freedom for an entire polity than are any other limitations on the franchise.

Too much democracy is bad; But fake democracy (in which only the enthusiasts and extremists have a voice) is even worse. Of course you disagree with both of these claims - but I implore you not to let that stop you from thinking about whether they might not nevertheless be true.

As H L Mencken said, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong".

 

[untermensche]

Democracy can be overdone. It's a useful component of governance, and helps keep the worst authoritarians away from permanent or excessive power. But it's not inherently a good thing, and there are many circumstances where a consensus of experts is a far better decision making methodology than a popularity contest.

Democracy is inherently good.

It grants those with power legitimacy.

It is the only way for someone to have legitimate power over others.

And nobody with sense would ever make the claim that engineering decisions or what a surgeon should do next should be up for popular vote.

Democracy is not merely voting on stuff.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

And it was something I have never claimed should be open to a vote. I have said the opposite.

So you do not believe in majority rules, because if the majority believes it should be open to a vote you want to be a dictator and tell them no.

Your excuses are transparent. The majority voted against you so you're trying to find a way to invalidate it. That means you love dictatorship.

Democracy is more than voting.

It is more than the majority wins every time.

You need constitutional protections.

But you can't have a democracy worth much with a system dependent on therefore corrupted by money.

The need for constitutional protections shows that you know the voters are sometimes wrong.

 

[dismal]

Sorry, but I’m gonna score “it affects a lot of people” as a reason NOT to force lazy, apathetic people to vote.

So your analogy is stupid and short-sighted, just like your concept of "freedom".

Yeah I cling more to the old pre-1984 “freedom means not being forced to do things” notion whereas you’ve gone for that more modern “freedom is slavery” bit.

You appear to be putting far too much emphasis on the 'ignorance is bliss' idea.

This is more complex than you want to think; Your narrow focus that assumes (incorrectly) that freedom on small scale questions implies greater freedom on a larger scale is deeply flawed, but you would rather stick to your ideology than consider any possibility that it might be in error.

Freedom from participation in democracy is no less dangerous to freedom for an entire polity than are any other limitations on the franchise.

Too much democracy is bad; But fake democracy (in which only the enthusiasts and extremists have a voice) is even worse. Of course you disagree with both of these claims - but I implore you not to let that stop you from thinking about whether they might not nevertheless be true.

As H L Mencken said, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong".

You babbled a lot and did not address my actual point.

My point is involving apathetic, disinterested, uneducated people in decision making likely makes decision making worse.

Many of us experience this in our daily lives. We don't force lazy uninformed people to vote on how our brain surgeries ought to be done, or how our taxes ought to be filed, our on what we have for dinner tonight.

Generally the more important the decision is to me, the less I want to point guns at lazy uninformed people and force them to make it for me.

Now, If you want to argue elections are so stupidly trivial we want to force the lazy and apathetic to participate in them you'd be on more solid ground, but you still don't have a good reason for "why?"

If elections are trivial and unimportant why use force to make people participate in them?

 

[PyramidHead]

Huh? I think I said early on: democracy is a process. It can do good, it can do bad.

I'm against bad.

When democracy does 'bad', the only way forward is more democracy plus better communication, better education, and eventually a better democratic outcome. It's not just a means to an end that we can swap out for totalitarianism, but an end in itself. At least that's what libertarianism used to mean.

Democracy can be overdone. It's a useful component of governance, and helps keep the worst authoritarians away from permanent or excessive power. But it's not inherently a good thing, and there are many circumstances where a consensus of experts is a far better decision making methodology than a popularity contest.

I would like to see someone try a Westminster style of bicameral legislature, where the upper house is not elected, but is instead made up of subject matter experts whose selection is based on knowledge rather than popularity.

The English House of Lords was originally somewhat similar in concept, with the unfortunate error of equating wealth and social standing with expertise. The idea of hereditary peers was that as they are neither subject to election nor to dismissal, they would give their impartial consideration to the effect of legislation on the nation, rather than its effects on public opinion. It didn't work very well, but its problem wasn't a lack of democracy - rather it was a lack of merit based selection.

The idea that 'more democratic' necessarily means 'better for the people' or 'better for the nation' is simply wrong. It was true in the past, because no nation had sufficient democracy in the mix; But it is untrue where democracy has become too large a part of the mix, allowing stupid people rather too much ability to drown out the minority of people who actually have a clue about most complex subjects.

Donald Trump is exhibit A. Brexit is exhibit B. Both are failures caused by over emphasis of democracy over competence, knowledge, and expertise.

You're exemplifying a trait I mentioned earlier in the thread: in societies where democracy is lacking in most of its structures, such as the United States, it is unsurprising that when democracy is layered atop the underlying non-democratic structure, bad things can happen. So, because our educational priorities are geared toward maintaining the capitalist status quo and not informing citizens about the world, their voting against their own interests due to lack of knowledge is predictable and not an argument against democracy itself. It's actually an argument in favor of more democracy in education, in the economy, and in media, transitioning these structures to favor human needs rather than profit, so that people will no longer be inundated with distractions, condemned to work all the time, and taught only how to be useful to capital.

As always, the tempting short-term solution is just to locate some experts (who locates them, and who decides what an expert is?), give them temporary (how long?) power over the relevant areas of concern, let them decide what's best for everyone else, and then of course they'll naturally give up that power before they make any bad decisions. It's not a real answer.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

It is fair to call James Madison a slave owner.

The electoral college system perverts democracy.

Saying Trump likes perversion is definitely true.

Says guy who three posts ago declared we need a Constitution to subvert democracy.

You see protecting rights as subverting democracy and I see it as an essential feature of a democracy.

That explains our differences pretty good.

So what we've got here is:

The Constitution, written by slave owners to protect slave owners, is necessary to restrain the majority even though tyranny of the majority doesn't exist, to prevent them from voting on things like Proposition 8 due to their regressive beliefs, even though any impediment to the will of the majority is a love of dictatorship. Democracy only works when everyone participates, even those with regressive beliefs, even if they are the majority, as long as they don't express their regressive beliefs. Also, if people spend their own money on causes they believe in that subverts their own will as part of the public. So, as a self-described anarchist, untermenche wants mandatory voting and 100% public funding of electoral campaigns.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

You guys argue too much.

 

[untermensche]

You see protecting rights as subverting democracy and I see it as an essential feature of a democracy.

That explains our differences pretty good.

So what we've got here is:

The Constitution, written by slave owners to protect slave owners, is necessary to restrain the majority even though tyranny of the majority doesn't exist, to prevent them from voting on things like Proposition 8 due to their regressive beliefs, even though any impediment to the will of the majority is a love of dictatorship. Democracy only works when everyone participates, even those with regressive beliefs, even if they are the majority, as long as they don't express their regressive beliefs. Also, if people spend their own money on causes they believe in that subverts their own will as part of the public. So, as a self-described anarchist, untermenche wants mandatory voting and 100% public funding of electoral campaigns.

A bunch of rich guys wanted to get rid of the king and protect themselves.

They wrote a constitution that said it was legal to own slaves. They didn't let blacks or women or people that had no property vote.

I know you see that as democracy.

 

[bilby]

You appear to be putting far too much emphasis on the 'ignorance is bliss' idea.

This is more complex than you want to think; Your narrow focus that assumes (incorrectly) that freedom on small scale questions implies greater freedom on a larger scale is deeply flawed, but you would rather stick to your ideology than consider any possibility that it might be in error.

Freedom from participation in democracy is no less dangerous to freedom for an entire polity than are any other limitations on the franchise.

Too much democracy is bad; But fake democracy (in which only the enthusiasts and extremists have a voice) is even worse. Of course you disagree with both of these claims - but I implore you not to let that stop you from thinking about whether they might not nevertheless be true.

As H L Mencken said, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong".

You babbled a lot and did not address my actual point.

My point is involving apathetic, disinterested, uneducated people in decision making likely makes decision making worse.

Many of us experience this in our daily lives. We don't force lazy uninformed people to vote on how our brain surgeries ought to be done, or how our taxes ought to be filed, our on what we have for dinner tonight.

Generally the more important the decision is to me, the less I want to point guns at lazy uninformed people and force them to make it for me.

Now, If you want to argue elections are so stupidly trivial we want to force the lazy and apathetic to participate in them you'd be on more solid ground, but you still don't have a good reason for "why?"

If elections are trivial and unimportant why use force to make people participate in them?

You missed my point.

Politics is one of the few fields of human endeavour where thkse who are most enthusiastic are least able to make reasoned decisions.

In politics, the apathetic say things like 'I will vote for him, because he plans to <insert policy here>'; or 'I will not vote for him, because when last in office, he did <insert undesirable behaviour here>'.

Those reasons may or may not be well informed or a sound basis for picking him as your preferred candidate. But they are likely to be FAR better than the enthusiast's 'reason', which is usually 'I'm voting for him because he is a member of the party I have always supported'.

If you want to know which is the best football team, asking fans just gets you an answer that has had zero recent thought applied to it. Asking people who don't much care for football is more likely to get you an answer that is based on actual performance.

People who are apathetic about politics nevertheless are affected by it. There are very few people who don't have an opinion; And the ones with the strongest opinions are most likely to put zero thought into their selections.

 

[untermensche]

Apathy is something that happens when you begin to see your contribution has no effect.

When the Republican wins your life gets harder. When the Democrat wins your life gets harder.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I know you see that as democracy.

You make many assumptions about my views, based on my attempts to get you to elaborate on your views.

I know, I know, asking you to explain yourself is a love of dictatorship, yada yada.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Apathy is something that happens when you begin to see your contribution has no effect.

When the Republican wins your life gets harder. When the Democrat wins your life gets harder.

When you have a lot of people the voice of any one person is very small.

 

[untermensche]

I know you see that as democracy.

You make many assumptions about my views, based on my attempts to get you to elaborate on your views.

I know, I know, asking you to explain yourself is a love of dictatorship, yada yada.

Loving dictatorial structures in the workplace is loving dictatorship.

If you has been born in monarchy you would worship the king.

You lack a democratic sensibility. You don't mind dictatorships you were born within. That is why none of this makes much sense to you.

You can be told democracy is not just voting a thousand times and it will never register.

In a functioning democracy voting is the end point after many things have happened. And it is just voting for people to implement plans that arise from the people. It has nothing to do with "leaders". In a democracy the popular will is the leader.

And you can't have a real democracy when running is dependent on money instead of ideas.

But in the US mere voting is the totality of the input from the people. After the vote the elected dictators just do what they want. Most become party hacks always voting along party lines.

Campaigns are exercises in carefully crafted manipulation.

Not a reflection of the needs of the people. A reflection of human greed.

 

[dismal]

Apathy is something that happens when you begin to see your contribution has no effect.

When the Republican wins your life gets harder. When the Democrat wins your life gets harder.

Well, you've stumbled over an unsolvable problem. Math. There's no way you will ever cast a vote in a national election where your vote is likely to have any effect.

- - - Updated - - -

You appear to be putting far too much emphasis on the 'ignorance is bliss' idea.

This is more complex than you want to think; Your narrow focus that assumes (incorrectly) that freedom on small scale questions implies greater freedom on a larger scale is deeply flawed, but you would rather stick to your ideology than consider any possibility that it might be in error.

Freedom from participation in democracy is no less dangerous to freedom for an entire polity than are any other limitations on the franchise.

Too much democracy is bad; But fake democracy (in which only the enthusiasts and extremists have a voice) is even worse. Of course you disagree with both of these claims - but I implore you not to let that stop you from thinking about whether they might not nevertheless be true.

As H L Mencken said, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong".

You babbled a lot and did not address my actual point.

My point is involving apathetic, disinterested, uneducated people in decision making likely makes decision making worse.

Many of us experience this in our daily lives. We don't force lazy uninformed people to vote on how our brain surgeries ought to be done, or how our taxes ought to be filed, our on what we have for dinner tonight.

Generally the more important the decision is to me, the less I want to point guns at lazy uninformed people and force them to make it for me.

Now, If you want to argue elections are so stupidly trivial we want to force the lazy and apathetic to participate in them you'd be on more solid ground, but you still don't have a good reason for "why?"

If elections are trivial and unimportant why use force to make people participate in them?

You missed my point.

Politics is one of the few fields of human endeavour where thkse who are most enthusiastic are least able to make reasoned decisions.

The solution to this is to put as few decisions as possible into the hands of politicians.