democracy part 2
 

so this is basically just a sort of thought experiment or to put it more bluntly an assortment of random opinions i've come to hold and a way to explore certain hypothetical questions and situations in an attempt to stave off boredom at work.

tl:dr, i don't know if i think democracy is such a good system anymore and i have questions about top-down vs bottom-up solutions towards creating an effective and efficient system. maybe some of you can either share your own thoughts or criticize mine and make me rethink them.

basically i have come to question democracy and more specifically democracy combined with capitalism. it seems to me that this will always be the perfect recipe for propaganda as a tool for wealthy people to pursue goals that will ultimately benefit them even at the overall expense of the population at large.

one of the only semi-convincing objections to this that i've encountered is the idea that in more healthy democracies like switzerland, true democratic principles at work have produced even better results than our own half-assed system here in the states. while the light amount of research i've done about the swiss system since hearing about this does lead me to believe there might be legitimate benefits to their system, at the same time i also feel that they have a very different type of situation to wrestle with than us and ultimately their problems vs our problems are not necessarily that similar that we can assume that a system that works for a relatively small country will also work for a massive superpower/borderline empire.

i also have found an interesting example of democracy ****ing up in switzerland and interestingly enough the problem stems from one of the more thoroughly democratic facets of their system. basically when they decided to ban minarets or whatever. that to me seems like basically a sort of persecution of a local minority probably because some of the natives are discontented with some of the cultural problems caused for them by their country's immigration policies. this motion was actually brought into action by a popular initiative from what i recall reading, and not as some sort of organized political agenda.

and this leads me to think that the mob mentality can often take over and go in irrational ways since normal people can't be bothered to really try to understand what a complicated mess modern civilization really is all the time and thus don't always come to the right conclusions about how to fix things. and also and probably more commonly over here in the u.s. this same mob irrationality can easily be tapped into by more powerful and charismatic agents to pursue their own agendas through the power of popularity.

and i know some people say yea but you can strictly regulate elections and campaign finance and all that but once again i go back to thinking about capitalism and the power of popular appeal. it seems like commercials are every bit as brainwashing as political ads. really it just seems weird to me to say its fine for a company to drill it into people's heads to buy their product but it's over the line for that company to try to manipulate public opinion on politics to their own benefit. both seem to have the same goal and the same basic disregard for the overall well-being of society. it really seems like inventing fake rules that you can't enforce while trying to play a board game.

and i tend to think even if you managed to take the money all the way out of political campaigns specifically the politics would still be more about slogans and popular appeal than really making logical and smart decisions. it's like having an argument around a bunch of random lower-to-middle class people. the winner will very often not have the best answer, just the biggest voice.

and then i know people say but direct democracy can work much better from the ground up but i feel that actually it would be really uncoordinated and sloppy. like if you try to design a system you almost always want to take a top-down approach because then its easier to see the full scope of what you are trying to achieve and how you're going to achieve it.

so i was wondering about possible ways to make a dictatorship actually better than democracy. cause i know they have tended to turn into an even bigger cynical nightmare but i wonder if there is a way to make a system that has a top-down approach to running a country/society without losing the overall goal of consistently improving that society instead of exploiting power for personal benefit. and that's the really hard part but i feel like it might be possible.

say the top smartest scientists, engineers, diplomats, etc get together and work out an overall strategy for successfully managing such a system. like some objective criteria are defined up front and basically to deter abuse of power the smart people might get fired if their numbers start getting ****ed up. it would have to be run by some sort of computer that basically is impartial and says oh you ****ed up bye bye. and everyone with power to act buys into it collectively cause they continue to draw power from it unless they try to exploit the system to their gain.

what do you guys think?

I don't know much about this kind of stuff but I feel like the people are as much to blame as a system. It won't be until our culture is actually focused around education/science more than entertainment/profit that we can expect to see major changes. It's not that we aren't doing great things everyday or a leading force in technology. It's the fact that these great things are not the driving force behind our culture. We are gluttonous consumers and a resource monster who's primary function is keeping itself fed (via technological advances). Scientists have to battle against large corporations to make positive changes because it will affect their bank accounts. That just doesn't make sense to me, I understand why it happens, but it still leaves me dumbfounded.

The greatest thing about Democracy is that it gives everyone an opportunity to create and improve. The problem is: how do we handle all the creativity, filter the good from the bad, and put it to use to benefit society as a whole?

yea i tend to agree with you about the people vs system point. that's why my hypothetical system only gives power to a few smart people but makes them compete with each other at the same time.

I am completely open to a change like that. I'd love to see a counsel of 3-5 of the leading scientists in many fields in charge of our nation, and have the military, politicians, and diplomats below them.

No idea how you would even begin the process or how it would realistically function. I used to think like you, and than I realized that unless some miracle happens I will never see the kind of society I'd like to believe humans can achieve. Furthermore, I don't have the answers or understanding of how to pull something like that off so it's probably best I refrain from forming opinions about it or the current system.

I've come to accept I am a lowly middle-class citizen who just goes with the flow. I don't try to understand or change the decisions of our country mostly because none of them have ever affected me so negatively I felt a desire to do so. Life's too short to even bother. It's a piss poor defeatist attitude, but I don't care anymore. I'm just gonna do me and hopefully enjoy the 50+ years I have left. America/human nature has left me completely uninspired after 28 years of life, I have no faith left in me.

lol i'm not starting some kind of revolution bro i know it's not going to happen. i love going through hypothetical scenarios though.

a lot of it is psychology. really you can only expect so much from people at the end of the day. there will always be slow people who have to do ****ty jobs and resent it. there will be discontents in any machine. but if you're smart you can probably utilize people to the best of their ability and have them be reasonably happy.

a random thing that popped into my mind from today was when i was checking out at the cvs. the lady didn't hear me come in or whatever and i was going to tell her eventually that i needed help but then this manager came up and scolded her for not knowing i was there and made it really awkward. and i said to her that it's fine and i was hoping the manger would hear in my tone that i wasn't worried about it but he just stood there behind me silently and awkwardly. so i had to walk away and of course he went at her as soon as i left i'm sure. it was ****ed up too cause he was standing there making her nervous so she even messed up scanning the ****. but i know at the same time somebody probably told her stock the shelves if there's no customers and she was trying to do that and just didn't hear me come in.

that's how the system works currently the **** just rolls down hills. cause at the end of the day he's just asking too much of her and being a dick and any petty **** that goes wrong is gonna be her fault cause he needs his image clean and then his boss does him the same way etc. it's like they're reasonably smart people who understand how business works ok but don't understand people well enough to really manage them. if i was the kind of customer to get pissed at someone for that kind of **** i'd hope that i would go home and blow my brains out cause really my life must be insignificant as **** if that kind of **** would get to me.

When start messing with separation of powers and checks and balances you're getting into some **** that can go wrong fast. I mean really wrong and really fast.

I say we start electing politicians by lottery. It'll be ****, but I'm sure it'll be pretty funny.

nah i'm pretty sure we need to go ahead and make robots so they can destroy our species anyway.

i might read that later but i just don't have it in me right now. you have to understand i've been up since 4:45 am this morning. but i am kind of curious how anarchists could possibly make anything work without falling back on either democracy or capitalism. you have to have some sort of system. leave people to themselves and the whole world will basically go africa.

Well there's all types of stuff going on in Africa.

Step one of anarchism shouldn't be over throwing anything. Step one is taking personal responsibility for yourself, treating your neighbor with kindness, and trying not to tread on people. If you don't want to be governed behave like you don't need to be governed. And sure, it might be a million years away. But what we're doing isn't working either. Whatever system you're stuck in you make it better by being a better person yourself.

I, personally, don't vote for people because I think it's humiliating to actually put it on an official piece of paper that I submit to the rule of another human being. I don't feel like I need a leader so I don't vote for one.

i don't vote either but i also know for a fact the way **** plays out, you being a good person to others will only make you a sucker and an easy victim so that **** would never work as an overall strategy. it's a nice thought but you'd have to get everyone to think it at the same time and that would require a pretty enormous amount of organization. my system wouldn't have voting. they would try to keep the populace reasonably comfortable and content because that'd really be necessary for the system to function efficiently but beyond that it doesn't really matter what the average person thinks should be done about any particular situation.

This exactly.

JWB is right though. It hasn't bit me yet but I can't argue against reality.

:laughing: you so Above Average. How would your non-voting system (try to) decide to keep the populace reasonably comfortable? How would it define reasonable? You sound dumb as **** right now.

Didn't mean for it to sound that way. The counsel of scientists would replace our president. I didn't really think it through, like I said I don't pretend to have the answers or even try to, but that has to be better than some rich business man in charge.

uh.. basic quality of life ****. maybe you can be more explicit with your question cause i'm really confused as to how it's hard to figure out what a reasonably comfortable lifestyle is in a first world nation.

I think a democracy would be ideal but the truth is we don't live in a democracy. I think this is largely due to racism, classicism and poverty.

I don't put my faith into the government because I recognize at the end of the day it doesn't give a damn about me.

We will never live in a true democracy. There will always be some unbalance and a side favored above the rest. In America, white people and the rich get the better end of the stick despite America's declaration of equality. It has always been like this, nothing has really changed. It is just that these old issues are currently being exposed through social media.

Goddamnit we live in a constitutional republic! With overtones of democracy.
Just to be sure we are talking about the Us right?! .....God's country ;)

yea a constitutional republic fine but basically a representative democracy. you would be the type to come in my thread and correct me on some arbitrary technical ****, roxy.

;)

If you had any yourself, I'd just tell you to mock her grammar. It's her Kryptonite.

Now I am just gonna throw this out here because I really feel like it needs to be said. Why on earth are "we the people," so complacent? We put these people in power, we can uhhh like take it away. I am not trying to be blase about it either. I am just pointing out that the government belongs to us. And the government that governs less governs the best. Now we have gotten so, far away right from what was initially established 200 years ago. The framers of this country set up an iron clad guideline of what the government can and can not do to, or do for, the people. The problem is simply the government wants you to believe they have more power then the actually do. Simply put If you don't like what they are doing, to you, for you etc. GO TAKE BACK WHAT BELONGS TO YOU. And give it to those you feel could do better. But that gets into social initeria, and easier said then done. But it first requires that the mind set and mentality change.

I am sorry I get very patriotic at times.


Ah how I wish you wouldn't share our pillow talk with the world.

No matter who you vote for government wins. If they added the option to leave the post unfilled for the next term I might go vote for that. I don't want a leader so I don't vote for one. I know people have died so I can choose either rich power hungry ******* A or rich power hungry ******* B. That just doesn't swell my chest with patriotic fervor.

What?^

The problem is that this is just how people are. They've lived under dictatorships for thousands of years, and they want to be ruled. To expect people to just "take back" power is actually unreasonable to a large extent. It's why so many people don't really pay attention to Congressional or local races. They unconsciously think of the President in terms of him being a king, so they treat him as a ruler, rather than as a representative of the people.

How are we being ruled?^

I said that the mentality of the public treats the president as a king.

True, to a degree. But I asked how we are being ruled? You also mentioned that people like to be ruled/ governed.

I should think that would be obvious. Look at how many people don't even vote. Look at how much influence the people who do vote have compared to corporations and lobbies. Look at how elected officials maintain long-term, or even lifetime, positions in their respective offices. We may have the ability to put people out of office, but we're more concerned with being pandered to much the same way rulers of old gave out crumbs and cheap entertainment to peasants to keep them quiet.

And I also think think it's pretty self-evident that we want to be ruled. People don't like to be saddled with the responsibility of governing. It's a pain in the ass to stay informed, to consider different points of view, to be politically active outside of their easy chairs, etc. We complain after an official screws up, but otherwise we like to elect and forget, while we go about our own lives, oblivious to what our representatives are actually doing.

The situation actually has parallels to people living in the ghetto. We are given a bunch of sh*tty options and rather than coming together to change what's going on we pick the lesser of evils.

Does anybody know what happens if we decided as a nation to not vote during the presidential election because we are not satisfied by the candidates? I've always thought about that as a peaceful way to start a revolution of sorts, no idea if it would work though.

wow man roxy is a stone cold patriot.

And heavy undertones of socialism for the rich.

Majority rules motha****a. ...

i mean i think america is pretty good i'm not gonna knock it but i think i could do better than the founding fathers

The problem with what you are saying is everybody is not included in "we the people" which is the point I am trying to make.

Your post is ideal.... but is not reality.

When I refer to this term, "We the people" I am mainly referring to African Americans/minorities specifically because my people and other ethnic groups are not treated the same as whites. We are not treated as an equal which that term "We the people" is suppose to represent.

Once again, this is not anything new but the latest devastating murders of two young black men by the hands of our own law system shows the true colors of America quite perfectly.

The truth is... we all are not included in "the people" of America because we as in black people and minorities were never represented in that group the fore fathers created.

With that being said,
You can't take back something that was never given to you in the first place.

i agree with you about some of the racial issues this country has but you seem like anytime there's a questionable case where a black guy is accused you take his side just cause he's black and you assume that white people are judging him based on that (which a lot of white people do, but a lot don't as well) and its like even in the face of obvious reasoning you'll stick with he's innocent just cause he's black. like the kind that would think that OJ really was innocent back in the 90's. i think honestly it limits your perspective cause it seems like you relate every topic back to your race. it's like getting caught up on just one aspect of things and that's all you know or care about.

I am not taking any sides and if you agreed with my point than this post is quite pointless.

Black people are not treated equally as whites which you agreed with.

lol i am not addressing your one post in a vacuum. i've read more than one of your posts and some of your opinions i agree with but i think you go overboard with it and like i said there's more than one issue in the world which is what you seem to be missing out on.

your bill cosby post just proved my bolded point for me but i mentioned it in this thread because even though the thread topic is a hypothetical question about the merits of democracy you still found a way to make it about racism.

What does my Bill Cosby post prove?

I could see your assumption if he was found guilty of a crime but he has not. So its absurd to imply that he is a criminal without any evidence.

I never said that it was never a possibility but I think it is unfair the way he is being treated in the media.

oj wasn't found guilty either. casey anthony either. some times you just have to use common sense tbh.