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The Political Thread

Started by The Legendary Shark, 09 April, 2010, 03:59:03 PM

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TordelBack

Totally agree IP: the problem we have to tackle is education, information and engagement, I think a more functional political establishment would inevitably follow, if only it could be done. 

A  democracy requires a level of enlightened self-interest, with emphasis on the enlightened.   That's the nut that needs to be cracked - on all sorts of levels, because the choices we're facing regarding the environment, biodiversity and mass migration are going to be very hard ones.  Disappearing down internet rabbit-holes of confirmation-bias bandwagonning and rampant Dunning-Kruger everyman 'expertise' is not going to cut it.

Professor Bear

Quote from: IndigoPrime on 21 June, 2018, 05:00:30 PMBrexit showcased brilliantly how the average person has no fucking idea how the world works, and what's largely in their best interests.

There should be some sort of tests or safeguards before people are allowed to vote, and the ones that don't pass shouldn't get a vote at all.

My local council was dissolved and absorbed into a "super council" located in another town, and apart from a nosedive in local services and works that happened almost overnight, another side effect has been the rise of Loyalist triumphalism in the area, as the town has a Catholic majority which translated into a Nationalist majority council in every election - just in case you are not familiar with the delightful tribalism of Northern Ireland, Catholics are generally Nationalists, while Protestants are generally Unionists/Loyalists, but obviously there's bit of overlap because that's what happens in any large body of contrarian bastards a politically active population.
Anyhoo, there's lots of flegs being flown trumpeting how "the people of Ulster have triumphed over the IRA establishment" because despite the aggressive improvement in the quality of life ushered in by the council over the last couple of decades (they were European socialists, so stuck their hands into that that phat EU honeypot), it was still a majority Catholic one, and thus run by the IRA.  Also, just to hammer in the metaphor, we used to be very, very white - I mean, there was like one black person in this town until somewhere around 2002 - but the increase in factories in setting up locally to take advantage of lower rent and rates (which used to be prohibitively high) has meant an influx of migrant labor, so the council was also responsible for the town's recent multiculturalism.

I mention all this because we don't have FPTP over here, we have PR, so the council, while majority Catholic/Nationalist, was still run as a co-operative that included Protestant/Unionist councillors, so the entire community was not only represented, but the town was doing pretty well.  Not so much anymore, and yet a small contingent have set to crowing about how they've taken back control of their tiny portion of the world, just as it goes to absolute shit.

Theblazeuk

Quotea small contingent have set to crowing about how they've taken back control of their tiny portion of the world, just as it goes to absolute shit.

Amazing how well this fits elsewhere


JOE SOAP


Professor Bear

When credibility remains elusive, UKIP is one's natural home.

Tjm86

Quote from: TordelBack on 21 June, 2018, 06:51:23 PM
Totally agree IP: the problem we have to tackle is education, information and engagement, [ .... ] on all sorts of levels, because the choices we're facing regarding the environment, biodiversity and mass migration are going to be very hard ones.  Disappearing down internet rabbit-holes of confirmation-bias bandwagonning and rampant Dunning-Kruger everyman 'expertise' is not going to cut it.

To quote the West Wing:

"Can I tell you something, honestly? This is one of those situations where I couldn't give a damn what the people think. The complexities of a global arms treaty, the technological, the military, the diplomatic nuances, it's staggering, Toby. 82% of the people cannot possibly be expected to reach an informed decision."

This is why, to me, what Cameron did was so criminally dishonest.  He took an insanely complex issue, wrapped it up in hyper-emotional rhetoric, phrased it in a dangerously simplistic question and then threw it out to the 'people' to reach some sort of decision.  Then having stepped out of the way, he left his party to fight over how to interpret the results.  Why?  To avoid some sort of internal split in his party and to satisfy the lunatic fringe.

Tony Blair famously said that history will judge him.  How much more will history judge Cameron and May?  What about the current 'government'?  The present 'opposition'?  There are days when I'm actually inclined to think that maybe Sharky is right.

Professor Bear

It was the Beeb wot done it.  Years of platforming they granted to UKIP rather than allow "the far left" (the Greens) to appear on publicly-funded political programming made the far right more of a threat to Cameron than the left, so he had to appease them rather than an ascendant Green party or Labour (which was then still center-right).  A political landscape where the discussion is between the right and the far right has arguably turned out exactly as we might have expected.

The Legendary Shark

Sorry it's taken me a while to spot these.

[/quote]
Quote from: Dandontdare on 21 June, 2018, 09:06:34 AM
ah... so Sharky's theories are possible, we just need to fundamentally alter human nature. Sorted.

Not at all. Human nature is fundamentally sound and most people are basically good, with instinctive knowledge of how to be social animals. The problem is how human nature is manipulated through the compulsory state schooling system and the media. 
If one thinks of how much knowledge of human psychology and manipulation thereof goes into something as simple as the advertising and sale of a chocolate bar, then how much more must go into the advertising and sale of the idea of authority? We all know that if we get sick or injured it's logical and desirable to defer to a person with knowledge of and experience with healing, or if our house catches fire we'd be better served following the lead of an experienced firefighter. These instincts and lessons are constantly manipulated to con us into thinking the same way about government authority over virtually every aspect of our lives.

Fundamental human nature does not need to be changed - it needs to be encouraged and strengthened.


Quote from: TordelBack on 21 June, 2018, 08:39:45 AM


SO ELECT DIFFERENT PEOPLE. 

Look, in a representative democracy we aim to elect people who we feel demonstrate our biases and concerns, and can listen to the advice of public servants and others who are genuine experts in a range of fields and parse that into policy and action that (we hope) is what we would do ourselves.  We do this because no one person has the time to have a competent understanding of every aspect of decision making that affects a society, so we do what humans always so: we choose specialists to do it full-time on our behalf, no different from bronze-workers or sysadmins. I pay a kid in China to make my phone, I pay a ham-faced twat in Dublin to navigate health funding.


The fundamental problem with this idea, as I see it, is that there can be no such thing as a representative democracy as most people understand it.

For example, the person currently pretending to represent me is called Seema Kennedy, I think. She does not know me, couldn't pick me out of a crowd or attach my name to my face. She doesn't know my family, has no idea where I live, doesn't share my history or background, has a different income bracket, doesn't understand my beliefs or perspectives, doesn't care about what I have to say, knows nothing of how live I live my life or earn my keep, has no knowledge of my hobbies or the books I read or the podcasts I listen to or the films I watch, can't grasp my thoughts or dreams, doesn't understand my personal needs and has no idea whether I even voted for her or not or which of her ideas I might agree or disagree with. How can she possibly represent me, except in the most fundamental basics as my needs for oxygen, water, food, clothing, shelter, energy, medicine and the like, when she knows virtually nothing about me? And there are hundreds of thousands of people in the same situation - all complete strangers to her - who she pretends to represent. It's impossible.

Not only does she pretend to represent me, but she also believes she has the right to impose what she thinks is right on me - and on all the other unique thousands, and to have me punished if I disagree. Even if she knew me intimately and represented me perfectly to government to ensure my life goes how I want it to go, what's right and helpful to me will not fit with all those other people, but she'd impose what I want on everyone else anyway, she'd become the proxy through which I impose my will on others and the agent of retribution against anyone who disagrees with me.

When trying to understand government, I often find it useful to look at what it does through a mirror. Having Seema Kennedy represent me to government makes no sense to me, but when I look at it as Seema Kennedy trying to represent government to me it suddenly makes perfect sense.

She simply cannot represent me, she can only re-present me in an abstract manner, stripping me of everything that's unique and counting me as a symbol or simple statistic. I would much rather present myself in person to the world around me than be re-presented by a complete stranger to a distant group of power-addled sociopaths who expect nothing from me other than unquestioning obedience.

[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




JayzusB.Christ

I must say I'm looking forward to Trump's reaction to that angry baby balloon. For a chap who admires 'tough-guy'-style leadership so much, he's a remarkably insecure wuss.
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

von Boom

I think it's a good idea that Trump is spending the weekend in Scotland. The Scots are such a calm and easy going sort. He'll have no trouble there, I'm sure.  ::)

Tjm86

See I'm in the 'let's not bother about his visit' camp.  The infantile egomaniac thrives on this sort of attention.  The greatest way to drive home our lack of regard would be to simply not show up.  Let his visit pass off with absolutely no attention whatsoever, a gesture of 'who is he?'  Can you imagine the implosion?

The Legendary Shark


I'm of the same mind with the lot of 'em.

[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




von Boom

That is a perfectly elegant and simple solution Tjm.

*Get Downing St. on the line!*

JayzusB.Christ

Personally I think ridiculing him is a better solution. As we've seen time and time again, he gets VERY upset about that
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"