6 ms·

What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought.

by tehjoker 6y ago

thisiscorrect 6y ago
Others in recent history have tried this. Do we know how it went for them?
- sdenton4 6y ago
  Works fine for Ariz Mendi...
- fabianhjr 6y ago
  Mondragon, Orbea, and others are doing great.
toolz 6y ago
Is someone really your "lord" if you can just choose for them not to be your "lord" and freely choose for them to be your "lord" if they compensate you well enough for your liking? I'd suggest we already don't have lords and the analogy doesn't really hold.
- shuckles 6y ago
  This is always a matter of degrees, and most jobholders have much less freedom to choose than your line of questioning assumes. In general, and especially for those people, maybe this is a good mental model for how to operate in a workplace. Power imbalances may actually be so unequal.
- tshaddox 6y ago
  If you must choose and serve a lord in order to survive, is it really worth bragging about your “freedom” to choose the least bad lord?
swirepe 6y ago
How will we convince the lords?
- Beige_Wren 6y ago
  We debate them through rational discourse in the free marketplace of ideas!
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- enriquto 6y ago
  We need to convince the serfs, not the lords. The lords can keep lording alone, it doesn't matter.
  - notduncansmith 6y ago
    The real trick, assuming you succeed, is not becoming a lord yourself.
    - swirepe 6y ago
      "Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." - Mao Zedong
fossuser 6y ago
It’s been tried - mostly leads to disaster, see: animal farm. Hierarchy can work well, particularly for growing companies and making decisions. It obviously has problems as a form of government, but the incentive structure of capitalism is a good one for work. Even in democratic governments with elections you still have a decision hierarchy somewhere (hopefully just with some checks on their power)
- aaron-santos 6y ago
  > incentive structure of capitalism is a good one for work. The inventive structure of capitalism is good for capitalists. Why would they make it any other way?
  - fossuser 6y ago
    Growth (when controlled for environment destruction and human rights) leads to helping the most people the fastest: https://press.stripe.com/#stubborn-attachments https://press.stripe.com/#stubborn-attachments You get that from proper incentives. Capitalism is mostly about creating an environment where people can leverage those incentives as easily as possible. There's a deep irony that the system set up based on incentivizing and rewarding growth (and occasionally greed) has helped raise millions out of poverty while the systems based on altruism have led to the deaths of millions and massive amounts of suffering.
    - aaron-santos 6y ago
      > helped raise millions out of poverty You do know that 850M of those live in China, right?
      - fossuser 6y ago
        Where do you think that comes from? The modern CCP leverages market economies to build that wealth. That success is because Xi recognizes the power for capitalism and growth to create wealth. They then try to control that though and the recent disappearance of Jack Ma and the government block of that IPO is more what I'm talking about. The cultural revolution, hundred flowers campaign, and current Uyghur genocide are some of the classic negative aspects of CCP control. Those aspects are more the standard fare communist policy. The good that's there comes from their embrace of capitalism and market incentives. The bad comes from the standard communist one party control, it's also what eventually leads to problems.
solveit 6y ago
Any different group with a semi-competent lord will absolutely destroy you and take your resources. You'll soon send around resumes begging for a lord to take you.
- ardy42 6y ago
  >> What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought. > Any different group with a semi-competent lord will absolutely destroy you and take your resources. You'll soon send around resumes begging for a lord to take you. Not really. IIRC, in the French Revolutionary Wars, French troops were more effective because they were better motivated than those who were fighting for some lord. It's probably necessary to have leaders, but that doesn't mean lords are necessary.
  - number6 6y ago
    Clearly it's a nice analogy. So there is a need for leadership. There are good leaders and bad (call em leaders or lords) but there is always a hierarchy. Let say there where no hierarchy by rank, there would still be a hierarchy in competence. It may shift as situations shift. Given that. But if someone is a competent leader he will succeed dominating evey hierarchy. That's what leadership leads up to: being a efficient and hopeful a competent leader. So even if you are in a group of mercenaries you will and want to have a leader who makes a call in critical moments. Even if you vote who the leader might be you will choose the one who makes the best decision (could be yourself) or even persuades you into believing that the decisions he made are good. On this grounding all the other systems emerge like nepotism, bad leadership, fall guys... and HR
xornor 6y ago
You just get much worse lords and lose all your freedoms which you may still have. Free market democracy is not ideal system, but it offers at least some freedoms for serfs. All other systems take them all away.
- semi-extrinsic 6y ago
  Yes, the social democracies of Europe where governement restrict the rights of corporations for the benefits of people are just a fantasy invented by left-wing media, in reality people living there are all suffering. /s Honestly, it is still jarring to see people in the US actually believe the system they are living in is some sort of "lessest evil system", not realizing how much easier they would have it in Scandinavia/Germany/France/Switzerland/Netherlands/Belgium/etc. And this is a region with comparable population and resources to the US. I mean, just think about implementing socialized healthcare, a proper tax system which is short and understandable with few loopholes, a reasonable minimum wage and parental leave for all paid by the federal government. Those are a handful of measures that would significantly improve life for 99.5% of everyone in the US. And there is no plausible mechanism where these measures take away all your freedoms. Sure you can argue that it's impossible to get American politicians to enact these. But that is just another point of failure of the free market democracy, that elected politicians are most interested in the outcomes for people and organizations who pay them money (literally or indirectly), and not in the people they are elected to represent.
thayne 6y ago
You mean like in a co-op (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative)?
Pinegulf 6y ago
In my experience this approach only works with small groups. In larger power/lordship(?) tends to accumulate. Why this is, I don't know. It would make and interesting study topic.

What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought.

thisiscorrect 6y ago

Others in recent history have tried this. Do we know how it went for them?

sdenton4 6y ago
Works fine for Ariz Mendi...
fabianhjr 6y ago
Mondragon, Orbea, and others are doing great.

toolz 6y ago

Is someone really your "lord" if you can just choose for them not to be your "lord" and freely choose for them to be your "lord" if they compensate you well enough for your liking? I'd suggest we already don't have lords and the analogy doesn't really hold.

shuckles 6y ago
This is always a matter of degrees, and most jobholders have much less freedom to choose than your line of questioning assumes. In general, and especially for those people, maybe this is a good mental model for how to operate in a workplace. Power imbalances may actually be so unequal.
tshaddox 6y ago
If you must choose and serve a lord in order to survive, is it really worth bragging about your “freedom” to choose the least bad lord?

swirepe 6y ago

How will we convince the lords?

Beige_Wren 6y ago
We debate them through rational discourse in the free marketplace of ideas!
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
enriquto 6y ago
We need to convince the serfs, not the lords. The lords can keep lording alone, it doesn't matter.
- notduncansmith 6y ago
  The real trick, assuming you succeed, is not becoming a lord yourself.
  - swirepe 6y ago
    "Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." - Mao Zedong

fossuser 6y ago

It’s been tried - mostly leads to disaster, see: animal farm. Hierarchy can work well, particularly for growing companies and making decisions. It obviously has problems as a form of government, but the incentive structure of capitalism is a good one for work. Even in democratic governments with elections you still have a decision hierarchy somewhere (hopefully just with some checks on their power)

aaron-santos 6y ago
> incentive structure of capitalism is a good one for work. The inventive structure of capitalism is good for capitalists. Why would they make it any other way?
- fossuser 6y ago
  Growth (when controlled for environment destruction and human rights) leads to helping the most people the fastest: https://press.stripe.com/#stubborn-attachments https://press.stripe.com/#stubborn-attachments You get that from proper incentives. Capitalism is mostly about creating an environment where people can leverage those incentives as easily as possible. There's a deep irony that the system set up based on incentivizing and rewarding growth (and occasionally greed) has helped raise millions out of poverty while the systems based on altruism have led to the deaths of millions and massive amounts of suffering.
  - aaron-santos 6y ago
    > helped raise millions out of poverty You do know that 850M of those live in China, right?
    - fossuser 6y ago
      Where do you think that comes from? The modern CCP leverages market economies to build that wealth. That success is because Xi recognizes the power for capitalism and growth to create wealth. They then try to control that though and the recent disappearance of Jack Ma and the government block of that IPO is more what I'm talking about. The cultural revolution, hundred flowers campaign, and current Uyghur genocide are some of the classic negative aspects of CCP control. Those aspects are more the standard fare communist policy. The good that's there comes from their embrace of capitalism and market incentives. The bad comes from the standard communist one party control, it's also what eventually leads to problems.

solveit 6y ago

Any different group with a semi-competent lord will absolutely destroy you and take your resources. You'll soon send around resumes begging for a lord to take you.

ardy42 6y ago
>> What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought. > Any different group with a semi-competent lord will absolutely destroy you and take your resources. You'll soon send around resumes begging for a lord to take you. Not really. IIRC, in the French Revolutionary Wars, French troops were more effective because they were better motivated than those who were fighting for some lord. It's probably necessary to have leaders, but that doesn't mean lords are necessary.
- number6 6y ago
  Clearly it's a nice analogy. So there is a need for leadership. There are good leaders and bad (call em leaders or lords) but there is always a hierarchy. Let say there where no hierarchy by rank, there would still be a hierarchy in competence. It may shift as situations shift. Given that. But if someone is a competent leader he will succeed dominating evey hierarchy. That's what leadership leads up to: being a efficient and hopeful a competent leader. So even if you are in a group of mercenaries you will and want to have a leader who makes a call in critical moments. Even if you vote who the leader might be you will choose the one who makes the best decision (could be yourself) or even persuades you into believing that the decisions he made are good. On this grounding all the other systems emerge like nepotism, bad leadership, fall guys... and HR

xornor 6y ago

You just get much worse lords and lose all your freedoms which you may still have. Free market democracy is not ideal system, but it offers at least some freedoms for serfs. All other systems take them all away.

semi-extrinsic 6y ago
Yes, the social democracies of Europe where governement restrict the rights of corporations for the benefits of people are just a fantasy invented by left-wing media, in reality people living there are all suffering. /s Honestly, it is still jarring to see people in the US actually believe the system they are living in is some sort of "lessest evil system", not realizing how much easier they would have it in Scandinavia/Germany/France/Switzerland/Netherlands/Belgium/etc. And this is a region with comparable population and resources to the US. I mean, just think about implementing socialized healthcare, a proper tax system which is short and understandable with few loopholes, a reasonable minimum wage and parental leave for all paid by the federal government. Those are a handful of measures that would significantly improve life for 99.5% of everyone in the US. And there is no plausible mechanism where these measures take away all your freedoms. Sure you can argue that it's impossible to get American politicians to enact these. But that is just another point of failure of the free market democracy, that elected politicians are most interested in the outcomes for people and organizations who pay them money (literally or indirectly), and not in the people they are elected to represent.

thayne 6y ago

You mean like in a co-op (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative)?

Pinegulf 6y ago

In my experience this approach only works with small groups. In larger power/lordship(?) tends to accumulate. Why this is, I don't know. It would make and interesting study topic.