3 ms·

> What this means is having everything which lends itself to monopoly to democratic control, not private control, and to work together to make democratic contro

> What this means is having everything which lends itself to monopoly to democratic control, not private control, and to work together to make democratic control as efficient, localized and legitimate as possible. How do you feel about the perspective that democracies allow the majority (or plurality) to force their values on the rest of us? How do you feel about the notion that the rich and powerful are well acquainted with the techniques used to manipulate democratic systems (such as the double bind)? > Technology and interconnection is kinda neutral here, it has helped to raise awareness of the problems but has also helped to spread misinformation and lies by the likes of Prager U And their ilk I agree that technology is value-neutral. my perspective is that just as its easier to spread misinformation, its also easier to compare different accounts of the truth and attempt to check them for consistency. If there had been social media in the 20s its likely that the Illinois Radium Girls may have heard about the legal proceedings in New Jersey, or possible that they would have heard about the dangers of radium (which were known in medical and scientific circles at the time).

dgb23 6y ago
Those are good points. A political system is often more of an expression of a problem, historical or cultural, rather than the root.
raxxorrax 6y ago
> How do you feel about the perspective that democracies allow the majority (or plurality) to force their values on the rest of us? Better than a warlord forcing their values on us, even if the majority often seems lacking and with the exception that you are the warlord. I agree that governments could do a better job at letting people pick their values themselves, especially with the current Victorian approaches edit: Well technically a authoritarian warlord doesn't care about your values, only a totalitarian one would require that you tell everyone how much you love him. Maybe the latter is worse, but what would it matter at this point.
- chordalkeyboard 6y ago
  > Better than a warlord forcing their values on us, even if the majority often seems lacking and with the exception that you are the warlord. I agree that its better. Would you say its a coincidence that if that question was posed to the warlord he would give a similar answer? "better than starving to death, growing up in a chaotic anarchistic hellhole with no stable values imposed, or being murdered by a warlord because of who you are rather than what you did"
  - mercer 6y ago
    One thing can be better than another, even if that other thing is better than something else. What point are you trying to make?
    - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
      > What point are you trying to make? One can advocate for terrible things by comparing them to even worse things. That doesn't make it ok to violate people's rights, it just means we can find even worse examples in history. Here we have an example of a democracy violating people's rights. Someone said government nowadays is unaccountable. I suggested that government has always been largely unaccountable. Someone said I was cynical and that democracy was good because that allows us to wrest control back from the elites. I suggested (in the form of a question) that the people in a democracy are just as capable of violating our rights as the elites. Someone else pointed out that's better than a warlord. I observed that the warlord is also better than what he replaced. Certainly we can agree that violating people's rights is bad, and just like we came up with something better than a warlord, we ought to be able to come up with something better than a democracy. > One thing can be better than another, even if that other thing is better than something else. We can keep coming up with better things.

dgb23 6y ago

Those are good points. A political system is often more of an expression of a problem, historical or cultural, rather than the root.

raxxorrax 6y ago

> How do you feel about the perspective that democracies allow the majority (or plurality) to force their values on the rest of us? Better than a warlord forcing their values on us, even if the majority often seems lacking and with the exception that you are the warlord. I agree that governments could do a better job at letting people pick their values themselves, especially with the current Victorian approaches edit: Well technically a authoritarian warlord doesn't care about your values, only a totalitarian one would require that you tell everyone how much you love him. Maybe the latter is worse, but what would it matter at this point.

chordalkeyboard 6y ago
> Better than a warlord forcing their values on us, even if the majority often seems lacking and with the exception that you are the warlord. I agree that its better. Would you say its a coincidence that if that question was posed to the warlord he would give a similar answer? "better than starving to death, growing up in a chaotic anarchistic hellhole with no stable values imposed, or being murdered by a warlord because of who you are rather than what you did"
- mercer 6y ago
  One thing can be better than another, even if that other thing is better than something else. What point are you trying to make?
  - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
    > What point are you trying to make? One can advocate for terrible things by comparing them to even worse things. That doesn't make it ok to violate people's rights, it just means we can find even worse examples in history. Here we have an example of a democracy violating people's rights. Someone said government nowadays is unaccountable. I suggested that government has always been largely unaccountable. Someone said I was cynical and that democracy was good because that allows us to wrest control back from the elites. I suggested (in the form of a question) that the people in a democracy are just as capable of violating our rights as the elites. Someone else pointed out that's better than a warlord. I observed that the warlord is also better than what he replaced. Certainly we can agree that violating people's rights is bad, and just like we came up with something better than a warlord, we ought to be able to come up with something better than a democracy. > One thing can be better than another, even if that other thing is better than something else. We can keep coming up with better things.