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You're not going to be able to. America and other classical democracies are in a phase of aging where a decline in prosperity combined with a die-hard (unthink
by supernova87a 7y ago
You're not going to be able to.
America and other classical democracies are in a phase of aging where a decline in prosperity combined with a die-hard (unthinking) application of absolute freedom of speech are paralyzing action. Everyone is disagreeing with each other over a shrinking pie, pitting demographic against demographic, and not only that, any genuine disagreement and decision making is muddied by agents trying to confuse people.
There is no prioritization or restriction on who may say what, how loudly, or regardless of how harmful or counter to the public good it is. And, may I add, most democratic governments do not have a strong enough perspective (in this period) on what the public good is.
As a result, those places that have harnessed the power of demographics while also controlling the message are gaining power. Obviously I mean China. Yes they have anti-absolute-free-speech restrictions that are repugnant to us. But you're damn sure they stay on message as a country/government.
Unfortunately this situation is also to the benefit of chaotic actors like Russia, where they benefit from just other countries being paralyzed and them being able to do what they want.
In the absence of government leadership, corporations had the chance of filling in the role. But now we see that in the face of power, they recoil as well. We did this to ourselves, by letting our priorities get muddled as we got richer. We didn't "stay hungry", my friends.
- rpmisms 7y agoSo, you're pro-china, or at least, you like their attitude. Good to know.
- chirau 7y agoHow did you come to that conclusion? They simply described and explained the reality of the world as it is today without picking a side
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- m3kw9 7y agoWhat’s so good to know. Everyone still gonna eat their lunches
- yourbandsucks 7y agoTheir only mention of China used the word 'repugnant', so I'm not sure how you reached that conclusion.
- birdyrooster 7y agoBecause they were touting the strength of staying on message as if it actually was a beneficial thing (which it isn't). It leads to very dangerous failures in society when people cannot talk about unpopular problems. It leads to them fumbling and missing obvious truths.
- yourbandsucks 7y agoIt has upsides and downsides. You realize that you're criticizing someone right now for having a take on relative weaknesses of the US system? Going so far as to immediately accuse them of loyalty to another country? Not to snark too hard, but 'physician, heal thyself' comes to mind.
- birdyrooster 7y agoI certainly don't accuse them of loyalty to China. That's a straw man.
- yourbandsucks 7y ago'pro-China' was a little confusing on that score, but I did misquote you, so sorry. Cheers.
- supernova87a 7y agoI guess I have a historical enough view that I'm not so unshakably sure that the good old USA is absolutely right in every policy. Which from your tone, you sound like you are. I'm not pro China. But I'm not die hard pro USA either. For example, I'm not sure that the US approach to free speech or commercial regulation is the most reasonable, or even the most representative. Plenty of other countries that you probably don't criticize in general impose forms of restriction on free speech that you'd object to (if you knew). Germany has strict censorship laws on several kinds of racially oriented speech. Singapore does too, regarding religion. Yet those are admired democracies. And while we criticize China here for imposing restrictions that impact US companies, I might ask, where were you (or HN) when it had to do with Chinese companies? Where are all the stories about those infringements, which go on every day? So, is the principle here that you truly object to China imposing speech regulations? Or just when it extends to an American company? Hence my philosophical ambivalence about whether we have the right to be so indignant after becoming 10 minute experts on the subject...
- kodablah 7y agoIf inaction due to inability to decipher signal from noise is the consequence of a more absolute definition of free speech, it's an acceptable trade off. Too often not accepting the good with the bad results in attempts to correct the bad but instead "corrects" the good. Not every problem requires a proactive, legislative solution. In these cases I fear, in the long term, we just have to count on the human nature to want to be able to make noise.
- birdyrooster 7y agoMonocultures are a weakness and not a strength when it comes to technological innovation, physical/information security and foreign policy. From my perspective, the pie is continuing to grow and the disagreement is who takes the bigger slices from the ever growing pie. Corporations never had a chance of filling the role because they are very undemocratic, even in the United States. Things need to get bad enough for the only democratic system we have to take action. We aren't there yet.