5 ms·

And what do you do if someone disagrees with the crowd? How do you force him without coercieon? (hint those two words are synonyms).

nicoburns 5y ago
It would be possible to simply give up on the collectivism if someone disagrees and can't be persuaded otherwise. This of course limits where such collectivism can be found, but examples of this kind of collectivism do exist.
iostream24 5y ago
While the “ism” suggests an ideology rather than an attribute of a real world society, what you describe is the essential balance every society needs to strike between the group and the individuals, and so you find jail and fines as coercion across a wide variety of countries and systems. As a native English speaker myself, I urge you to get into etymology and understand socius and collective and community and thereby inoculate yourself against a weird strain of anti logic parading as American political discourse and often used by folks who know better sponsored by the federalist society and Cato institute and such… typically for lowbrow crowd appeal. No society, by definition, is free from a collective aspect.
- rayiner 5y ago
  I’ve heard a lot of smears about Federalist Society but “lowbrow” is a new one. I’ll have you know we drink our tea with our pinkies in the air. :D
- luciusdomitius 5y ago
  Please, answer the simple question. I refuse to go by the collective will and there could be no violence involved. What happens next? I cannot believe that you went on insulting large groups of people while being unable to answer a simple 6 words question. P.S. I speak relatively fluent Latin, so the etymology play made me chuckle a bit.
  - don_esteban 5y ago
    you will become pariah until you leave or change your mind?
    - luciusdomitius 5y ago
      If Pariah means the collectivist people not trading or communicating with you and no violence then I am OK with that. Now, could you explain how this is collectivism and not voluntaryism?
      - catawbasam 5y ago
        If you define collectivism is group activity enforced by violence vs voluntarism being group activity not enforced by violence then this entire discussion is a word game and a waste of time.
      - TaylorAlexander 5y ago
        You can have voluntary collectivism. This is where everyone works to find agreement with the group as a matter of course, but only proceeds if that agreement is found. You might find this kind of management in a collectively owned business for example.
TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
Another hint: coercion is not necessarily direct violence. Capitalism is almost completely coercive and controlling, but direct violence is mostly reserved for minorities and for war adventures in distant countries. At home it's coercive through financial violence (especially income restriction and forced debt), extreme economic apartheid, and overt and covert behaviour modification narratives in the various media. "The crowd" is very much not in charge of any of this, but is persuaded that it is. Arguably all of this is better than a more overtly dictatorial system where any form of dissent attracts direct violence. But it's not necessarily less coercive - just less obvious. And more efficient. You can scale that back and have collective systems which rely on a tradition of consensus. It's not even all that unusual on a smaller scale. Teams/groups make decisions, some people disagree, but when consensus is reached everyone works towards the same goals even if they have misgivings. This works if you allow feedback, goal monitoring, and resets so the system is responsive and self-correcting. But it also requires all participants to be rational, reasonably intelligent, non-sociopathic, and capable of adult decision making. Which is why it doesn't work at scale. Only about half the population - at best - has those abilities, and as soon as your group includes at least one sociopath they will destroy that dynamic and replace it with a toxic one which relies more on coercion than consensus.
- luciusdomitius 5y ago
  How can someone force you to take debt? Can you give one example when someone was punished physically for refusing to take debt?
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    Punishment goes beyond physical means. You have the choice between poverty, or debt, which is definitely a form of coercion. Coercion is the use of a power differential to make someone act against their interests, physical force is not necessary.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    Unconscious people being taken by an ambulance to the hospital. The falsely accused needing legal representation and to pay a bail bondsman to get out of prison. Do those examples work for you for people being physically punished for refusing to take on debt? Because I'm also happy to include sick people who need medical care and people who need money for food/heat/shelter/clothiers as being punished physically for refusing to take on debt by being deprived of those things
TuringNYC 5y ago
>> And what do you do if someone disagrees with the crowd? How do you force him without coercieon? (hint those two words are synonyms). I think as the parent poster was saying, this is possible with smaller groups. I think the best example would be townships in the US. Different townships decide on the level of tax and investing (especially into school systems.) Then, individuals self-select themselves into groups by choosing where to live. I have friends upset about how not all schools are "top-tier" schools. I quote "top-tier" as it is in the eye of the beholder what that means. The thing is, not everyone wants their kids to have 5hrs of homework a night. Nor does everyone want to pay 20k+ in annual property taxes. Some would rather home-school or send their kids to private or parochial schools. People often achieve this by joining a township that agrees with their appetites in spending and other political choices.
- luciusdomitius 5y ago
  Alright. It is a township then. I refuse to go by the collective will. What happens next if violence is not an option and private property is respected?
  - pmyteh 5y ago
    In general, you have the same three choices you have in any other situation where you don't like what's going on: loyalty, voice, or exit. In the first, you decide to accept the general will in order to maintain your individual credit, hoping that by cooperating on this occasion you encourage people to encourage with you later. Alternatively, you can protest the decision, hoping in doing so to encourage your fellow townspeople to change their mind, or to raise the reputation cost to them of proceeding down that route. And if you don't like that either, you can leave (highly visibly or otherwise). Not all collective decision-making processes are coercive, either, FWIW. There are systems built on unanimity where your issue doesn't even arise: if you dislike the decision of the other group members enough then you can veto the decision. This creates other issues (and doesn't scale very well) but it does happen.
    - luciusdomitius 5y ago
TaylorAlexander 5y ago
> How do you force him without coercieon? You’re missing the point. You don’t force anyone. If someone doesn’t want to do the thing, you don’t make them. You find a different way to accomplish your goals.

nicoburns 5y ago

It would be possible to simply give up on the collectivism if someone disagrees and can't be persuaded otherwise. This of course limits where such collectivism can be found, but examples of this kind of collectivism do exist.

iostream24 5y ago

While the “ism” suggests an ideology rather than an attribute of a real world society, what you describe is the essential balance every society needs to strike between the group and the individuals, and so you find jail and fines as coercion across a wide variety of countries and systems. As a native English speaker myself, I urge you to get into etymology and understand socius and collective and community and thereby inoculate yourself against a weird strain of anti logic parading as American political discourse and often used by folks who know better sponsored by the federalist society and Cato institute and such… typically for lowbrow crowd appeal. No society, by definition, is free from a collective aspect.

rayiner 5y ago
I’ve heard a lot of smears about Federalist Society but “lowbrow” is a new one. I’ll have you know we drink our tea with our pinkies in the air. :D
luciusdomitius 5y ago
Please, answer the simple question. I refuse to go by the collective will and there could be no violence involved. What happens next? I cannot believe that you went on insulting large groups of people while being unable to answer a simple 6 words question. P.S. I speak relatively fluent Latin, so the etymology play made me chuckle a bit.
- don_esteban 5y ago
  you will become pariah until you leave or change your mind?
  - luciusdomitius 5y ago
    If Pariah means the collectivist people not trading or communicating with you and no violence then I am OK with that. Now, could you explain how this is collectivism and not voluntaryism?
    - catawbasam 5y ago
      If you define collectivism is group activity enforced by violence vs voluntarism being group activity not enforced by violence then this entire discussion is a word game and a waste of time.
    - TaylorAlexander 5y ago
      You can have voluntary collectivism. This is where everyone works to find agreement with the group as a matter of course, but only proceeds if that agreement is found. You might find this kind of management in a collectively owned business for example.

TheOtherHobbes 5y ago

Another hint: coercion is not necessarily direct violence. Capitalism is almost completely coercive and controlling, but direct violence is mostly reserved for minorities and for war adventures in distant countries. At home it's coercive through financial violence (especially income restriction and forced debt), extreme economic apartheid, and overt and covert behaviour modification narratives in the various media. "The crowd" is very much not in charge of any of this, but is persuaded that it is. Arguably all of this is better than a more overtly dictatorial system where any form of dissent attracts direct violence. But it's not necessarily less coercive - just less obvious. And more efficient. You can scale that back and have collective systems which rely on a tradition of consensus. It's not even all that unusual on a smaller scale. Teams/groups make decisions, some people disagree, but when consensus is reached everyone works towards the same goals even if they have misgivings. This works if you allow feedback, goal monitoring, and resets so the system is responsive and self-correcting. But it also requires all participants to be rational, reasonably intelligent, non-sociopathic, and capable of adult decision making. Which is why it doesn't work at scale. Only about half the population - at best - has those abilities, and as soon as your group includes at least one sociopath they will destroy that dynamic and replace it with a toxic one which relies more on coercion than consensus.

luciusdomitius 5y ago
How can someone force you to take debt? Can you give one example when someone was punished physically for refusing to take debt?
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  Punishment goes beyond physical means. You have the choice between poverty, or debt, which is definitely a form of coercion. Coercion is the use of a power differential to make someone act against their interests, physical force is not necessary.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  Unconscious people being taken by an ambulance to the hospital. The falsely accused needing legal representation and to pay a bail bondsman to get out of prison. Do those examples work for you for people being physically punished for refusing to take on debt? Because I'm also happy to include sick people who need medical care and people who need money for food/heat/shelter/clothiers as being punished physically for refusing to take on debt by being deprived of those things

TuringNYC 5y ago

>> And what do you do if someone disagrees with the crowd? How do you force him without coercieon? (hint those two words are synonyms). I think as the parent poster was saying, this is possible with smaller groups. I think the best example would be townships in the US. Different townships decide on the level of tax and investing (especially into school systems.) Then, individuals self-select themselves into groups by choosing where to live. I have friends upset about how not all schools are "top-tier" schools. I quote "top-tier" as it is in the eye of the beholder what that means. The thing is, not everyone wants their kids to have 5hrs of homework a night. Nor does everyone want to pay 20k+ in annual property taxes. Some would rather home-school or send their kids to private or parochial schools. People often achieve this by joining a township that agrees with their appetites in spending and other political choices.

luciusdomitius 5y ago
Alright. It is a township then. I refuse to go by the collective will. What happens next if violence is not an option and private property is respected?
- pmyteh 5y ago
  In general, you have the same three choices you have in any other situation where you don't like what's going on: loyalty, voice, or exit. In the first, you decide to accept the general will in order to maintain your individual credit, hoping that by cooperating on this occasion you encourage people to encourage with you later. Alternatively, you can protest the decision, hoping in doing so to encourage your fellow townspeople to change their mind, or to raise the reputation cost to them of proceeding down that route. And if you don't like that either, you can leave (highly visibly or otherwise). Not all collective decision-making processes are coercive, either, FWIW. There are systems built on unanimity where your issue doesn't even arise: if you dislike the decision of the other group members enough then you can veto the decision. This creates other issues (and doesn't scale very well) but it does happen.
  - luciusdomitius 5y ago

TaylorAlexander 5y ago

> How do you force him without coercieon? You’re missing the point. You don’t force anyone. If someone doesn’t want to do the thing, you don’t make them. You find a different way to accomplish your goals.