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What's so special about squiggly lines drawn by politicians generations ago? You realize there's no divinity in the division between South and North Dakota, rig

What's so special about squiggly lines drawn by politicians generations ago? You realize there's no divinity in the division between South and North Dakota, right? Even back then these territories were being divided up to maximize political power. I could be wrong, but I genuinely believe the problem with your line of reasoning is you're rationalizing for a system that benefits you. Your ideology benefits from how things are, and so you find reasons to justify why the way things are is good, actually. If say states had been divided up differently, would your entire belief system crumble? Assume city-states were the norm and the Senate was overwhelmingly controlled by whichever party controlled urban populations. Like say North Carolina got divided into Raleigh-Durham, Charlotte, the Triangle, Wilmington, and the rest of the state as just one big territory. And every state was like this. Would you suddenly say hey this is a bad system, not because it benefits people I don't agree with, but because of some other silly reason? What is so magical about lines put on maps by our great-great-great grandfathers? If there was a magical US with three states, two with only 1 citizen and one with 1,000,000, would you still hold by your principle that they have their own governments that federate with those of states so this is good? Where in your system do you draw the line and make a distinction between fair and unfair? How do you determine if one arrangement is more fair than another? Why would you not push for the most fair arrangement? My principle is embarrassingly simple. Political power should be equal to the number of people represented. That's it. Easy to explain, easy to grasp, easy to measure whether something is fair or unfair. It's imperfect--Lord knows population majorities can still be bastards--but it's the best, most egalitarian system created. And, importantly, it's a principle that doesn't change just because it doesn't benefit me. You're right, it's not very nuanced. Simple often works best.

pie_flavor 4y ago
> Would you suddenly say hey this is a bad system, not because it benefits people I don't agree with, but because of some other silly reason? What if 60% of the population wanted to slaughter the other 40%? That's right, I too can come up with wacky hypotheticals that won't happen and presuppose a lot of other important variables don't change. > What is so magical about lines put on maps by our great-great-great grandfathers? The governments whose jurisdiction extends to them. > Where in your system do you draw the line and make a distinction between fair and unfair? How do you determine if one arrangement is more fair than another? Why would you not push for the most fair arrangement? Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Why do you assume that an arrangement where states just as important to the union have two orders of magnitude less representation would be more fair? Probably because, as you keep asserting about me, it benefits you. If a state thinks that the union is a negative for it, and in a way that the union would never agree to change, and it would get a better deal outside of the union, maybe it should just secede. But it's not a net negative, you're just not thinking any further than the culture war; say what you want about the difference between North Dakota and New York, but I'll bet New York really appreciates North Dakota being its breadbasket.
- danaris 4y ago
  > Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Because, by their (and my) definition of "fair", "Political power should be equal to the number of people represented," and you're pushing for something that is not that. It doesn't take any "presupposing".
- divided 4y ago
  > What if 60% of the population wanted to slaughter the other 40%? That's right, I too can come up with wacky hypotheticals that won't happen and presuppose a lot of other important variables don't change. This was my point about how the majority can be bastards. There are countless examples where the majority wanted something that punished the minority throughout history and throughout the world. Having said that, humankind hasn't come up with a better system--at least to my knowledge. Yours certainly only introduces the potential to make problems like this worse. > Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Why do you assume that an arrangement where states just as important to the union have two orders of magnitude less representation would be more fair? Probably because, as you keep asserting about me, it benefits you. If a state thinks that the union is a negative for it, and in a way that the union would never agree to change, and it would get a better deal outside of the union, maybe it should just secede. But it's not a net negative, you're just not thinking any further than the culture war; say what you want about the difference between North Dakota and New York, but I'll bet New York really appreciates North Dakota being its breadbasket. First, the "culture war" is not a real thing. It's just right-wing propaganda to frame any expression or change they disagree with as an attack on them. Framing wanting fair representation as not thinking beyond an imaginary attack on conservatives is sorta funny. I don't think you're pushing towards a more fair arrangement because you can't even outline what makes a system fair to you. You don't think North Dakota with 0.8m population should have 1/10th the representation of New York with 8m. OK what is fair to you then? What makes it fair or unfair? What knobs could I change in theoretical compositions of the US that would make you say this federation is fair and this federation unfair? Surely you can admit that not all federations are fair, right? Again, my principle shared before is super simple and easy to represent and I would argue intuitively feels fair to most people. It's not rocket science. Does it benefit my beliefs? Yes. But that doesn't invalidate it as wrong when I think it's also the solution most uninvolved third parties would agree with (also weird, it's what the article in this post states). And I think even _you_ agree with it if the system weren't stacked in your favor or if we were talking about another country. You magically think that each state is "just as important to the union" when that's impossible. The US without CA is significantly worse off than it is without CT. Just not a matter of opinion or feelings. North Dakota really appreciates New York buying its produce, too. And producing its science, technology, and art (no matter how much they complain about it now, I mean come on, Fox News is in NYC!). Also, their agricultural output is 20th (ND) and 24th (NY) in the US, so it's not as if NY is entirely reliant on others. Food output is important for sure, but ND gains more benefit from being in a country with NY than NY does from being in a country with ND.

pie_flavor 4y ago

> Would you suddenly say hey this is a bad system, not because it benefits people I don't agree with, but because of some other silly reason? What if 60% of the population wanted to slaughter the other 40%? That's right, I too can come up with wacky hypotheticals that won't happen and presuppose a lot of other important variables don't change. > What is so magical about lines put on maps by our great-great-great grandfathers? The governments whose jurisdiction extends to them. > Where in your system do you draw the line and make a distinction between fair and unfair? How do you determine if one arrangement is more fair than another? Why would you not push for the most fair arrangement? Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Why do you assume that an arrangement where states just as important to the union have two orders of magnitude less representation would be more fair? Probably because, as you keep asserting about me, it benefits you. If a state thinks that the union is a negative for it, and in a way that the union would never agree to change, and it would get a better deal outside of the union, maybe it should just secede. But it's not a net negative, you're just not thinking any further than the culture war; say what you want about the difference between North Dakota and New York, but I'll bet New York really appreciates North Dakota being its breadbasket.

danaris 4y ago
> Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Because, by their (and my) definition of "fair", "Political power should be equal to the number of people represented," and you're pushing for something that is not that. It doesn't take any "presupposing".
divided 4y ago
> What if 60% of the population wanted to slaughter the other 40%? That's right, I too can come up with wacky hypotheticals that won't happen and presuppose a lot of other important variables don't change. This was my point about how the majority can be bastards. There are countless examples where the majority wanted something that punished the minority throughout history and throughout the world. Having said that, humankind hasn't come up with a better system--at least to my knowledge. Yours certainly only introduces the potential to make problems like this worse. > Why do you presuppose I'm not pushing for the most fair arrangement? Why do you assume that an arrangement where states just as important to the union have two orders of magnitude less representation would be more fair? Probably because, as you keep asserting about me, it benefits you. If a state thinks that the union is a negative for it, and in a way that the union would never agree to change, and it would get a better deal outside of the union, maybe it should just secede. But it's not a net negative, you're just not thinking any further than the culture war; say what you want about the difference between North Dakota and New York, but I'll bet New York really appreciates North Dakota being its breadbasket. First, the "culture war" is not a real thing. It's just right-wing propaganda to frame any expression or change they disagree with as an attack on them. Framing wanting fair representation as not thinking beyond an imaginary attack on conservatives is sorta funny. I don't think you're pushing towards a more fair arrangement because you can't even outline what makes a system fair to you. You don't think North Dakota with 0.8m population should have 1/10th the representation of New York with 8m. OK what is fair to you then? What makes it fair or unfair? What knobs could I change in theoretical compositions of the US that would make you say this federation is fair and this federation unfair? Surely you can admit that not all federations are fair, right? Again, my principle shared before is super simple and easy to represent and I would argue intuitively feels fair to most people. It's not rocket science. Does it benefit my beliefs? Yes. But that doesn't invalidate it as wrong when I think it's also the solution most uninvolved third parties would agree with (also weird, it's what the article in this post states). And I think even _you_ agree with it if the system weren't stacked in your favor or if we were talking about another country. You magically think that each state is "just as important to the union" when that's impossible. The US without CA is significantly worse off than it is without CT. Just not a matter of opinion or feelings. North Dakota really appreciates New York buying its produce, too. And producing its science, technology, and art (no matter how much they complain about it now, I mean come on, Fox News is in NYC!). Also, their agricultural output is 20th (ND) and 24th (NY) in the US, so it's not as if NY is entirely reliant on others. Food output is important for sure, but ND gains more benefit from being in a country with NY than NY does from being in a country with ND.