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Mostly stupid/unsuccessful people. The elite is very good at disagreeing with each other on a polite manner. I work in the public sector, as a manager who is o

Mostly stupid/unsuccessful people. The elite is very good at disagreeing with each other on a polite manner. I work in the public sector, as a manager who is on a board that designs suggestions for our national digitization strategies. I know how to play the game now, but the most eye opening thing to me when I was starting out was how people disagree at those levels of society. If you want to say that you think something is a bad idea, you sugarcoat it to hell and back, focusing first on complimenting your counterpart on where you think they are successful. Then you politely present your view and the facts that support it. In public it’s different, here you’ll sometimes get heated for the audience, but you’ll still be beat friends once the cameras stop rolling. The reason behind this is that the world evolves around compromise. These days you’re seeing more and more people who don’t understand how necessary compromise is, but hopefully we’ll kick them out before we destroy our democracy.

afarrell 8y ago
Note that this sort of thing is explicitly advised in books like How to Win Friends and Influence People, which is 90 years old—-So it is an old game. > hopefully we’ll kick them out I’d prefer that they learn. “Kick the bastards out” just leads to a cycle of interns building your product.
watwut 8y ago
Unfortunately, this is also how elite enables those who abuse power as long as those mistreated are not part of elite. This how and why bullies and abusers keep and gain powerful positions. This is how sexual assault becomes sex scandal and this is why Jerry Sandusky could abuse so many boys. This is how outright self-serving lies become part of consensus. This works the way you described because those people have little personal stake at policies they pursue while people loosing/gaining housing, getting probation or prison time, being able/unable to pay for layer/healthcare or otherwise touched by those policies don't participate.
- eksemplar 8y ago
  I think it’s the last bit. That people don’t participate. I can’t remeber how many hearings we’ve done on changes that got nothing but crackpot replies because no regular folks want to spend time participating in the society they live in anymore. Only in one area do people actually take action, schools. If we close down a school, for various reasons but typically efficiency (money), parents will open a new private school in its place. I’m Danish so the laws are a little complicated, but basically a private school gets as much funding as a public school and that means we save no money by closing a public school that gets replaced by a private one. So our school system is extremely democratic, because you can’t make changes without the parents. Now, our school system isn’t the only system that works like this, most of them do really. But almost every other system is run mainly by professional bureaucrats who make the plans, because they are never opposed by anyone, because nobody participate. I mean, crackpots participation has probably gone up over the years, but real involvement from real people with realist plans are almost nonexistent. I consider crackpots people too by the way, but you can’t power a city with special unicorn rays or by having a voulanteer threadmill. Which are the only two responses we got to a recent hearing on which power plant to build. Want actual influence or real change? Then get involved.
  - DoreenMichele 8y ago
    A few thoughts: The elites are in the best position to come up with time and energy to participate in things. They are also the most likely to have the knowledge needed to participate effectively. I participated in some online forums while openly homeless. Classism is a thing and it's quite hard to combat that. When the non-elites try to participate in such processes and don't know how and won't be given the same respect they are expected to give to their "betters" etc, it can easily wind up being a waste of time for them. Similar to the idea of "never attribute to malice that which is best explained by stupidity," a lot of people simply don't have solutions. Period. Regardless of their social class, background, etc. If no one knows a better answer, more people participating doesn't necessarily improve the outcome. I'm off the street. I'm tired of being poor. I'm working on improving my life. While homeless, I kind of had the luxury of being outside the system and relatively free to piss on it at will and criticize it liberally. I'm currently wrestling with the question of whether or not my supposed high morals can actually survive intact if I get connected and get money and power and influence. I don't know the answer to that. I have been badly used and mistreated by needy people while my life was in the toilet because I was apparently the only hope they had of getting their needs met. I'm quite angry about that. Maybe the answer is my supposed high morals really just make me a chump and that's it. Maybe choosing to not be a chump and choosing to line my own damn pockets at long last means me and my bleeding heart tendencies have to part company. Which is some attempt at saying "Maybe participating in The System is what makes you a bad person." Possibly not a very effective means of voicing what I'm trying to get at.

afarrell 8y ago

Note that this sort of thing is explicitly advised in books like How to Win Friends and Influence People, which is 90 years old—-So it is an old game. > hopefully we’ll kick them out I’d prefer that they learn. “Kick the bastards out” just leads to a cycle of interns building your product.

watwut 8y ago

Unfortunately, this is also how elite enables those who abuse power as long as those mistreated are not part of elite. This how and why bullies and abusers keep and gain powerful positions. This is how sexual assault becomes sex scandal and this is why Jerry Sandusky could abuse so many boys. This is how outright self-serving lies become part of consensus. This works the way you described because those people have little personal stake at policies they pursue while people loosing/gaining housing, getting probation or prison time, being able/unable to pay for layer/healthcare or otherwise touched by those policies don't participate.

eksemplar 8y ago
I think it’s the last bit. That people don’t participate. I can’t remeber how many hearings we’ve done on changes that got nothing but crackpot replies because no regular folks want to spend time participating in the society they live in anymore. Only in one area do people actually take action, schools. If we close down a school, for various reasons but typically efficiency (money), parents will open a new private school in its place. I’m Danish so the laws are a little complicated, but basically a private school gets as much funding as a public school and that means we save no money by closing a public school that gets replaced by a private one. So our school system is extremely democratic, because you can’t make changes without the parents. Now, our school system isn’t the only system that works like this, most of them do really. But almost every other system is run mainly by professional bureaucrats who make the plans, because they are never opposed by anyone, because nobody participate. I mean, crackpots participation has probably gone up over the years, but real involvement from real people with realist plans are almost nonexistent. I consider crackpots people too by the way, but you can’t power a city with special unicorn rays or by having a voulanteer threadmill. Which are the only two responses we got to a recent hearing on which power plant to build. Want actual influence or real change? Then get involved.
- DoreenMichele 8y ago
  A few thoughts: The elites are in the best position to come up with time and energy to participate in things. They are also the most likely to have the knowledge needed to participate effectively. I participated in some online forums while openly homeless. Classism is a thing and it's quite hard to combat that. When the non-elites try to participate in such processes and don't know how and won't be given the same respect they are expected to give to their "betters" etc, it can easily wind up being a waste of time for them. Similar to the idea of "never attribute to malice that which is best explained by stupidity," a lot of people simply don't have solutions. Period. Regardless of their social class, background, etc. If no one knows a better answer, more people participating doesn't necessarily improve the outcome. I'm off the street. I'm tired of being poor. I'm working on improving my life. While homeless, I kind of had the luxury of being outside the system and relatively free to piss on it at will and criticize it liberally. I'm currently wrestling with the question of whether or not my supposed high morals can actually survive intact if I get connected and get money and power and influence. I don't know the answer to that. I have been badly used and mistreated by needy people while my life was in the toilet because I was apparently the only hope they had of getting their needs met. I'm quite angry about that. Maybe the answer is my supposed high morals really just make me a chump and that's it. Maybe choosing to not be a chump and choosing to line my own damn pockets at long last means me and my bleeding heart tendencies have to part company. Which is some attempt at saying "Maybe participating in The System is what makes you a bad person." Possibly not a very effective means of voicing what I'm trying to get at.