The truth about democracy

[Karl]

 

Great piece by Peter Hitchins on government and democracy. It's UK centric of course, but it dovetails nicely into the US election discussions.

 

Why the whole thing is a farce in which vested interests attempt to strip the population of ever more law, liberty and justice until they are little more than serfs.

 

Sound isn't great but listenable.

[dust]

The man is Christian, monarchist, pro-capital punishment, anti-weed, doesn't believe in man-made climate change, writes for the Daily Mail... I must admit, I don't feel like listening to him, on any subject.

 

How he feels qualified to lecture on democracy and liberty...

 

I don't think I'll be listening to the whole thing. I likely agree with his main argument here: the government has too much power. However, the ways in which we come to this conclusion and the things we'd do about it are, I imagine, very different.

 

Would that this were a talk by his brother. Not that I agreed with him on everything, but a lot more than Peter.

Edited February 13, 2016 by dustybeijing

[Karl]

The man is Christian, monarchist, pro-capital punishment, anti-weed, doesn't believe in man-made climate change, writes for the Daily Mail... I must admit, I don't feel like listening to him, on any subject.

 

How he feels qualified to lecture on democracy and liberty...

 

I don't think I'll be listening to the whole thing. I likely agree with his main argument here: the government has too much power. However, the ways in which we come to this conclusion and the things we'd do about it are, I imagine, very different.

 

Would that this were a talk by his brother. Not that I agreed with him on everything, but a lot more than Peter.

 

Yes, those things are certainly true of him and mostly I'm on the opposing team in many respects, but this is a talk on democracy, which, is in fact the world we currently inhabit. No doubt it irks him that his form of big C conservatism has ceased to exist and that allows him to see the blemishes.

[Boy]

writes for the Daily Mail... 

 

The Daily Mail On Sunday darn it!!   Also guilt by association is a fallacy. I love Peter Hitchens, his belated brother and Karl. That might also amount to a fallacy  .

[vonkrankenhaus]

Media must be installed before modern democracy.

 

Modern democracy is used to insure conformity to corporate interests.

 

By stifling any but mainstream majority opinion.

 

In a modern democracy 99 idiots beat 1 intelligent person every time.

 

Media insures a majority for such democracy to "work".

 

In any given week, the products that are most advertised are the best sellers.

 

Doesn't matter what they are.

 

Nature is a better way to judge correct actions than any human system.

 

Hence, the race to "defeat" Nature.

 

 

 

-VonKrankenhaus

[zerostao]

Yes, those things are certainly true of him and mostly I'm on the opposing team in many respects, but this is a talk on democracy, which, is in fact the world we currently inhabit. No doubt it irks him that his form of big C conservatism has ceased to exist and that allows him to see the blemishes.

what exactly are the big C conservatives conserving?

certainly not the air, water, land, or liberty

the thing about a true democracy is the majority decides

frankly it is the big C capitalists that have ruined democracy

with big C corruption and Cronyism

oh yeah like the big C corporatists

Edited February 15, 2016 by zerostao

[Karl]

what exactly are the big C conservatives conserving?

certainly not the air, water, land, or liberty

the thing about a true democracy is the majority decides

frankly it is the big C capitalists that have ruined democracy

with big C corruption and Cronyism

oh yeah like the big C corporatists

We haven't had big C conservatives for quite a long time in the UK. They are what you might call true republicans I suppose. Western Christian values embodies it. Not a literal interpretation but an anglicised one. Virtues, values as set out under religious doctrine-you might see here that Sharia law is something that would certainly be acceptable even if it isn't totally Christian it does contain all the moral certitude that Peter would like.

 

Well the 'majority' doesn't decide much at all, it's only a political party democracy not a real democracy (which was discovered to be problematic in Greeece). Its mob rule in which one group votes to loot the other. If you think about it, that's the only reason people vote is 'more free stuff for me and less stuff for them'.

 

Why blame the Cronies and Corporates ? They took advantage of the political system. That's what big Christian conservatism aims at preventing. It won't achieve those aims of course because it is equally flawed. The problem with political party democracy is that it will always tend towards some form of collectivism-be it economic fascism or Socialism.

 

It's totally inevitable because each party will be forced into a race to give to the majority, who are inevitably the largest group of voters and therefore the poorest. Once there are vast tides of tax money flowing from the most productive to the less productive, then corruption happens. The Government gets bigger, more expensive and more corrupt and the people go the same way. It's far easier for a thief to steal tax payers money by state decree than to be an honest man who is robbed of his production at the point of state sanctioned violence. If the cronies win then we have economic fascism, if the mob win we get economic socialism.

 

So that it's clear, these are the virtues which I adhere to -Existence, independence, honesty, integrity, justice, production, pride.

 

These are the virtues which are vital to good living. Disturb any one of these and the others fall by degrees. A system which allows one group to vote itself the proceeds of the other groups labour defiles all of those virtues instantly.

 

Peter Hitchens believes that Christian virtues are the key, but, Christian virtues deny existence/independence/pride so are just as prone to the same failure as democratic liberalism.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Karl

[dust]

Well the 'majority' doesn't decide much at all, it's only a political party democracy not a real democracy (which was discovered to be problematic in Greeece). Its mob rule in which one group votes to loot the other. If you think about it, that's the only reason people vote is 'more free stuff for me and less stuff for them'.

 

Why blame the Cronies and Corporates ? They took advantage of the political system. That's what big Christian conservatism aims at preventing. It won't achieve those aims of course because it is equally flawed. The problem with political party democracy is that it will always tend towards some form of collectivism-be it economic fascism or Socialism.

 

Whatever you think about the state of any 'democracy', the majority -- almost all voting-age citizens -- can still decide what to buy, which is as big a vote as anything. One's green paper has more influence than their ballot paper.

 

Generally, I try to first blame education, but then must also lay blame on human-ness.

 

Everyone lacks education in something, at least, or has been indoctrinated or miseducated in some way. That's always an issue. And it leads to our monetary vote being corrupted as much as anything else.

 

But the greater issue will always be that humans, if they have the opportunity to be so, are selfish and lazy. Intellectually lazy. As soon as the means are there, as soon as we feel somewhat comfortable in our beliefs and have a plush chair to sink into every night, we stop thinking. This leaves even the most perfectly designed society, your ideal or mine, beyond any real redemption.

 

 

 

Also guilt by association is a fallacy.

 

Yeah. I'm intellectually lazy.

[Karl]

Whatever you think about the state of any 'democracy', the majority -- almost all voting-age citizens -- can still decide what to buy, which is as big a vote as anything. One's green paper has more influence than their ballot paper.

 

Generally, I try to first blame education, but then must also lay blame on human-ness.

 

Everyone lacks education in something, at least, or has been indoctrinated or miseducated in some way. That's always an issue. And it leads to our monetary vote being corrupted as much as anything else.

 

But the greater issue will always be that humans, if they have the opportunity to be so, are selfish and lazy. Intellectually lazy. As soon as the means are there, as soon as we feel somewhat comfortable in our beliefs and have a plush chair to sink into every night, we stop thinking. This leaves even the most perfectly designed society, your ideal or mine, beyond any real redemption.

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah. I'm intellectually lazy.

I would say you are quite correct about education, but it is democratised society which requires children to conform to the system and not to question it and therefore the education will not be about freeing the mind, but partaking in the structure without question.

 

I disagree fundamentally and violently with your assessment of humans. We haven't come this far because we were lazy. Quite the opposite. I don't see any evidence that on our own we 'stop thinking'. I see plenty of evidence that in a society in which we are educated and bound, that, like animals in a cage, we either accept the conditions or go bonkers. Very few stop thinking unless they have surrendered completely, many realise that thinking is the only thing left which they can do, many cant see a way in which thinking can change anything and the rest are struggling to know how to think-they equate thinking to reading the media and contributing to a poll.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Karl

[dust]

I would say you are quite correct about education, but it is democratised society which requires children to conform to the system and not to question it and therefore the education will not be about freeing the mind, but partaking in the structure without question.

 

OK...I don't know about democratised society, but I know that any government in which fewer than the majority hold power (monarchy, oligarchy, aristocracy, theocracy...) requires the majority to conform to the minority's will, which is surely worse than the minority having to conform to the majority's?

 

What are the other options?

 

 

I disagree fundamentally and violently with your assessment of humans. We haven't come this far because we were lazy. Quite the opposite. I don't see any evidence that on our own we 'stop thinking'. I see plenty of evidence that in a society in which we are educated and bound, that, like animals in a cage, we either accept the conditions or go bonkers. Very few stop thinking unless they have surrendered completely, many realise that thinking is the only thing left which they can do, many cant see a way in which thinking can change anything and the rest are struggling to know how to think-they equate thinking to reading the media and contributing to a poll.

 

Ooh, good. I enjoy a violent disagreement

 

 

1. How far is "this far"? What does this mean?

 

As far as 'time on Earth'... we've been around a while. Not as long as many species, though.

 

As far as 'complexity of technology', again agreed. But our technology, and our understanding of stuff, is down to relatively few particularly creative and clever thinkers throughout history, not the average human. And a lot of the technology we have is generally invented in an attempt to allow people not to have to work as hard, and often utilised without thought for the long-term consequences.

 

In any other category, we as a species have not come very far at all. We like to think we're very special, superior to all the other animals etc, but if you look around the world, at human history and our current situation, all we've done is procreate and spread, using all that clever technology to help us. Generally, we don't ask "Why?" or "Is this a good idea?"

 

 

2. That we so often "accept the conditions" is evidence to me of mental laziness. People talk, complain, lamenting days gone by (or days yet to come), but most are absolutely complicit in a large amount of the waste, pain, war, etc that continues day by day.

 

People moan about global warming and fracking and species extinction and poverty, etc, all while they drive their cars around, eating McDonald's and the cheapest meats and imported foods, buying 3 iPhones every year, voting for duplicitous cronies in poorly organised democratic systems...

 

 

3. "many realise that thinking is the only thing left which they can do, many cant see a way in which thinking can change anything and the rest are struggling to know how to think"

 

You give people too much credit. Certainly there are people in every culture, society, family, who question and think and see that there's a better way to do things, a preferable belief system, etc. But the vast majority of people don't genuinely do that.

[Karl]

OK...I don't know about democratised society, but I know that any government in which fewer than the majority hold power (monarchy, oligarchy, aristocracy, theocracy...) requires the majority to conform to the minority's will, which is surely worse than the minority having to conform to the majority's?

 

What are the other options?

 

 

 

 

Ooh, good. I enjoy a violent disagreement

 

 

1. How far is "this far"? What does this mean?

 

As far as 'time on Earth'... we've been around a while. Not as long as many species, though.

 

As far as 'complexity of technology', again agreed. But our technology, and our understanding of stuff, is down to relatively few particularly creative and clever thinkers throughout history, not the average human. And a lot of the technology we have is generally invented in an attempt to allow people not to have to work as hard, and often utilised without thought for the long-term consequences.

 

In any other category, we as a species have not come very far at all. We like to think we're very special, superior to all the other animals etc, but if you look around the world, at human history and our current situation, all we've done is procreate and spread, using all that clever technology to help us. Generally, we don't ask "Why?" or "Is this a good idea?"

 

 

2. That we so often "accept the conditions" is evidence to me of mental laziness. People talk, complain, lamenting days gone by (or days yet to come), but most are absolutely complicit in a large amount of the waste, pain, war, etc that continues day by day.

 

People moan about global warming and fracking and species extinction and poverty, etc, all while they drive their cars around, eating McDonald's and the cheapest meats and imported foods, buying 3 iPhones every year, voting for duplicitous cronies in poorly organised democratic systems...

 

 

3. "many realise that thinking is the only thing left which they can do, many cant see a way in which thinking can change anything and the rest are struggling to know how to think"

 

You give people too much credit. Certainly there are people in every culture, society, family, who question and think and see that there's a better way to do things, a preferable belief system, etc. But the vast majority of people don't genuinely do that.

 

What are the key requirements of any Government ?

 

To protect Liberty, enforce law and give justice. We abdicate our right of self justice to an agreed upon group of people who act as objective bystanders intervening to prevent violence occurring and to pursue justice for the victim and retribution from the guilty.

 

Nothing else is required of a Government. To perform these duties does no require any huge size, it isn't offering services such as welfare, health and education. It doesn't require huge taxation departments because a small fixed flat tax is all that is necessary. It would maybe be a pound per week. It doesn't require a central bank or large treasury department. It needs no Tarrif takers, subsidy givers, contraband agents. It needs no regulators, planners or officers. It would be impervious to big money because it could offer no incentive to them.

 

It doesn't require any form of democracy and is better without it. It's the democracy that allows a small government to grow and take ever more Liberty away.

 

You are wrong that it is 'a few thinkers'. Progress only appears to be due to a few, but the reality is that progress is the result of the many. The ideas don't come out of one persons mind, they occur to many people at similar times in different forms. It happens that one group is succesful in being first to the post, or having their idea become predominant, but others had that same idea. That's why we need to do away with IP and patent laws. They monopolise and therefore limit invention.

 

In a society without a welfare state, everyone is doing what they have to do to make their lives better. Some are talented and some are not-hence the Marxist labour theory of value which asserts a man cutting hair for an hour has no more value than a footballer who plays in a first division team for an hour, or the producer/owner of a business producing products customers desire, or an oil man who must risk everything to extract dirty crude from the ground.

 

Laziness is just a judgement and not a reality. If one wishes to survive then one must produce. To be wealthy one must offer great value to others. If one wishes to live on little, then one need produce little at all, just sufficient and then spend the rest of the time staring idly into space or riding a surf board-although either one of these may actually produce great wealth. The thinker dreams an invention, writes a best seller, the surfer designs a new board or wins competitions.

[dust]

What are the key requirements of any Government ? To protect Liberty, enforce law and give justice.

 

First off, we need to agree that liberty, law, and justice are needed. I agree with liberty, and I agree basically with justice, though I'll come back to that.

 

So let's say we agree that we need a few laws. We're agreeing on this because we know of our species' own propensity for selfishness and violence, and we want to outline the things we shouldn't do and punishments for when we do them anyway.

 

So someone has to come up with these laws that need to be enforced. Then we can get to finding someone to enforce them. Who decides the laws? This small group of people with everything to gain from it?

 

And if The Law needs to include prevention of physical violence, and punishment for it -- because some people are unable to take care of themselves physically -- I'd say that The Law should also involve prevention of mental violence, protection from economic violence, etc -- because there are also many people who are unable to take care of themselves mentally and economically. There will always be someone taking advantage, and someone else susceptible to being tricked or coerced or simply someone not clever enough to survive.

 

 

To perform these duties does no require any huge size, it isn't offering services such as welfare, health and education.

 

And if what I have said above stands, and our government needs to provide more than just prevention of physical violence, then it needs to take responsibility not only for Police and Courts for law enforcement, but also for Teachers and Schools, Customs and Border Control, etc, and we'll need bodies that oversee Religious Institutions and other brainwashing societies and prevent them from committing mental violence against the people, and protection from corporations that aim to trick us into buying things we don't need, gradually transforming us into moronic sloths...

 

 

You are wrong that it is 'a few thinkers'. Progress only appears to be due to a few, but the reality is that progress is the result of the many. The ideas don't come out of one persons mind, they occur to many people at similar times in different forms. It happens that one group is succesful in being first to the post, or having their idea become predominant, but others had that same idea.

 

Well...to take an example I was reading about the other day, Newton and Leibniz developed modern calculus around the same time. That's only 2 people. Foundations had been laid, other cultures had come up with similar ideas, there were a number of mathematicians doing mathematical things, and other creative clever people, but at that time, in the whole world, most people were not developing new mathematical systems or outlining the 'laws' of nature or laying new foundations for computer technology.

 

Most people, in Newton's lifetime, were engaged in war, executing 'witches', throwing rubbish in the streets, getting rich from the slave trade, etc etc.

 

Not much has changed. Society has gradually changed, for sure, and is better now, but that is again down to a few great people. Abolition, suffrage, forward steps in healthcare, etc... all due to a minority. The majority of people are not concerned with genuine thought.

 

 

Laziness is just a judgement and not a reality. If one wishes to survive then one must produce. To be wealthy one must offer great value to others. If one wishes to live on little, then one need produce little at all, just sufficient and then spend the rest of the time staring idly into space or riding a surf board-although either one of these may actually produce great wealth. The thinker dreams an invention, writes a best seller, the surfer designs a new board or wins competitions.

 

I'm not, you realize, talking of laziness in the general or physical sense, though the same applies.

 

People are hard-working when they need to be. When they need to do physical work, they do. When they genuinely need to think, and have learnt how to, they can. And people these days still need to work to survive, but they don't need to think much, and so they don't.

 

It is so obvious to me that I'm genuinely surprised there's any disagreement. Again, look around the world. Most people are incapable of or unwilling to put their mind to some really honest and creative thought. Me included, probably.

[dust]

Oh. I forgot to come back to justice. Can't remember what I was going to say about that. Probably nothing very interesting

[Karl]

 

 

Nice reply.

 

Let me take that first part then I will make another post. I see the first part as the most critical. Firstly it isn't inherent that we are all violent, or selfish in the modern sense you mean. However, we have to accept that there will be bad and irrational actors.

 

To understand the role of a Government we must first see that the protection of Liberty is paramount. This is not the protection of people themselves but of the principle of freedom from the state except where it breaks the rule of the initiation of force. It's here that the state will intervene.

 

There doesn't need to be many laws at all, only those pertaining to property rights and defence. No laws can be made that break the law of protecting Liberty and it's concrete the law of property rights.

 

The laws apply equally to the law makers, they are not above, or beyond the law and any attempt to impose new laws would contravene the first and second laws and by implication the third. This government would be restricted in size and finance.

 

It would require a second chamber of commons with authority to oversee the first. This chamber would be randomly selected in the same manner as jury duty. The members woukd serve for a single year and all people would be made familiar with the duties involved from an early age.

 

The first chamber would be selected by the second and replaced as necessary. It would consist of objective judges and men who had proven themselves capable of the post by having a history of fair play and wisdom-it's really only at this time when pragmatism is on top that we look at that as being quaint. In a society of real education in which schools did not pour knowledge into children's heads, then the educated would be a long way brighter than we are currently. Virtues and morals would automatically be seen as important for those who would act as judges and law makers.

 

When you think about it, we don't elect doctors, judges or policeman so we don't need to elect the first chamber, they can be judged against certain criteria and their history just like any job applicant.

 

Those unfit to care for themselves are equal under the law. The law is blind to anything but Liberty, property rights and initiation of force. The law would intervention if people were abused as that would be an initiation of violence. It also means a big ramp up of family and personal responsibility. No more blame society. No more getting away from full justice because you were from a certain kind of back ground.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Karl

[Karl]

So, to your second point. With no state schools then parents are free to send their children for education to whom ever they wish. Even if this is religious. Remembering that there is no social safety net except charitable institutions and the parents will need to pay.

 

Any religious, or otherwise ideologically dangerous institution would find themselves without being able to grab levers. There is no Government they can take over, no mechanism for furthering their aims other than directviolence. That would be immediately cracked down upon and wouldn't be tolerated within the community.

 

There woukd be no need for customs officers as nothing would be illegal as such, although there would be restrictions on the owning of weapons and a need to register them.

 

To your third:

Even if what you said was true, the community would be entirely different when it no longer had a state to intervene everywhere, a welfare system or central planning. This would be a laissez faire capitalist community in which people could form any kind of organisation they wished as long as it was lawful. Investors would not have government decreed financialisation from monopolistic banks. They would have to invest in much riskier ventures which woukd mean a push towards very sound investment. Schools woukd no longer be teaching just skills, but real education for students that had that capacity.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Karl

[Karl]

Finally. Everyone has to have creative thought, but each obviously has a certain capacity and ability. At present there is a policy which is suppressing innovative thinking.

 

It's not necessary for everyone to develop nuclear energy, some are happy to wash cars, but whatever they do they must provide something others value or their productivity will be useless and they will be thrown on the mercy of the charitable until they find their feet again.

 

It's the laziness that provides motivation to produce in the present in order to enjoy the fruits of the labour in the future. Even the bible tells of resting on the 7th day :-) who doesn't dig the garden, wash the car, paint the Windows then sit back and take in a good job done ?