4 ms·

Do you want to make it even easier for the government to do that? Sure the government can come to our house tomorrow and seize from us under one charge or anoth

by euix 4y ago

Do you want to make it even easier for the government to do that? Sure the government can come to our house tomorrow and seize from us under one charge or another - but there is a price to pay in terms of public opinion and the physicality and limitations of applying coercive force to you. But digital tools, if you made it easy and convenient enough, then it becomes another matter. Justifying extensions of government power with "but they can already do that" is cowardice at best and disingenuous at worst.

scotty79 4y ago
Sometimes government needs to do that and when it does it's costly and the cost comes from our collective pocket. So making it easier just saves us money. There's of course argument that if it's easier it will do it more often so it costs more. But that's something that will need to be controlled through political system. Basically development of humanity is making forms of oppression increasingly more painless and predictable to both the oppressor and the oppressed. Predictability and painlessness is good for business so we thrive. You can't get rid of oppression. Humans will always divide into the ones that hoard power and those who don't with former living off the latter. Best we can do and the best we've actually done is to make this process as painless and as predictable as possible. Currently we are at the stage of territorially divided monopolies on violence. We learned in world wars that "territorially divided" is a very important part.
- euix 4y ago
  Starting to go off topic but, there is no such thing as painless oppression or making it "less painful". You can view the matter in abstract from a distance like this, but if it ever falls on you or your family then it becomes a different matter. We can all view the matter impersonally and without passion, the philosophizing stops the moment it lands on our own heads - and I don't believe one can go through life without ever being on the wrong end of that.
  - scotty79 4y ago
    > there is no such thing as painless oppression or making it "less painful" What kind of opression do you prefer? Filling a tax form every year and paying what you calculated under the threat of arrest (while telling yourself you are voluntarily contributing to society and less fortunate) or being raided by a warband with guns on random intervals taking whatever they please and leaving you only what they at the time believe will let you bounce back so they can raid you again sometime in the future? Either you are one who enacts or profits from violence or you are affected and robbed by violence. It's a constant setup since the beginning of the human race (or even before that). The only change that evolution of civilization delivers is making the violence predictable and gradual, thus less painfull, thus allowing for more efficient economic activity. If you make oppressors work harder for their cut they'll just take more from you once they do take it.
    - int_19h 4y ago
      Winning elections is a lot of work to get to the point where one can collect their cut. Should we get rid of that obstacle and return to hereditary nobility in the interest of making violence less painful?
      - scotty79 4y ago
        Hereditary nobility doesn't result in less painful violence. It results in way more painful violence less often in the form of revolutions either successful or supressed. The main value of democracy is making the oppressed docile and easily subjugated. And yes, winning election in US is way too costly. Budgets for campaigning should be capped. Other countries manage to sustain democracies with far less. Ultimately it doesn't matter who wins as long as it's not the same faction all the time. In that case unrest wouldn't be suppressed and violence would necessarily get more painful. Democracy didn't win because it's moral or just. It won because it's most efficient system of maintaining oppression in post industrial technological landscape. You can look at how fragile single party system of China is, or Soviet Union was in comparison to even just rudimentary two party system like in US.

by euix 4y ago

scotty79 4y ago

Sometimes government needs to do that and when it does it's costly and the cost comes from our collective pocket. So making it easier just saves us money. There's of course argument that if it's easier it will do it more often so it costs more. But that's something that will need to be controlled through political system. Basically development of humanity is making forms of oppression increasingly more painless and predictable to both the oppressor and the oppressed. Predictability and painlessness is good for business so we thrive. You can't get rid of oppression. Humans will always divide into the ones that hoard power and those who don't with former living off the latter. Best we can do and the best we've actually done is to make this process as painless and as predictable as possible. Currently we are at the stage of territorially divided monopolies on violence. We learned in world wars that "territorially divided" is a very important part.

euix 4y ago
Starting to go off topic but, there is no such thing as painless oppression or making it "less painful". You can view the matter in abstract from a distance like this, but if it ever falls on you or your family then it becomes a different matter. We can all view the matter impersonally and without passion, the philosophizing stops the moment it lands on our own heads - and I don't believe one can go through life without ever being on the wrong end of that.
- scotty79 4y ago
  > there is no such thing as painless oppression or making it "less painful" What kind of opression do you prefer? Filling a tax form every year and paying what you calculated under the threat of arrest (while telling yourself you are voluntarily contributing to society and less fortunate) or being raided by a warband with guns on random intervals taking whatever they please and leaving you only what they at the time believe will let you bounce back so they can raid you again sometime in the future? Either you are one who enacts or profits from violence or you are affected and robbed by violence. It's a constant setup since the beginning of the human race (or even before that). The only change that evolution of civilization delivers is making the violence predictable and gradual, thus less painfull, thus allowing for more efficient economic activity. If you make oppressors work harder for their cut they'll just take more from you once they do take it.
  - int_19h 4y ago
    Winning elections is a lot of work to get to the point where one can collect their cut. Should we get rid of that obstacle and return to hereditary nobility in the interest of making violence less painful?
    - scotty79 4y ago
      Hereditary nobility doesn't result in less painful violence. It results in way more painful violence less often in the form of revolutions either successful or supressed. The main value of democracy is making the oppressed docile and easily subjugated. And yes, winning election in US is way too costly. Budgets for campaigning should be capped. Other countries manage to sustain democracies with far less. Ultimately it doesn't matter who wins as long as it's not the same faction all the time. In that case unrest wouldn't be suppressed and violence would necessarily get more painful. Democracy didn't win because it's moral or just. It won because it's most efficient system of maintaining oppression in post industrial technological landscape. You can look at how fragile single party system of China is, or Soviet Union was in comparison to even just rudimentary two party system like in US.