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So you want to knock off the government. But you refuse to specify who you want to replace it with. This should arouse suspicion in any person capable of thinki

by pekk 14y ago

So you want to knock off the government. But you refuse to specify who you want to replace it with. This should arouse suspicion in any person capable of thinking critically.

mindslight 14y ago
Which part of 'not really actionable' did you willfully misunderstand? The main things I would like are for people to separate their perspective from that of the government, start seeing themselves as autonomous actors that only follow its practically infinite proscriptions out of pragmatism, and make sure the systems they create are empowering their fellow humans and not augmenting this unaccountable machine.
- pekk 14y ago
  You keep backsliding from your original stated intent to see the US Government "dead," which is plain enough. The key detail is that you have no vision whatsoever of what would be there instead. Would it be a US-scale Somalia? The Confederacy? You and your buddies running things? In the absence of any specifics it would be rational to assume the very worst. Even the Bolsheviks had specifics.
  - mindslight 14y ago
    In the presence of specifics, it would still be rational to assume the very worst. If we overthrew the government for a plausible movement to create a scarcity-free utopia, we still most likely wouldn't end up with such - the kind of people who seize the reins of power don't sit idly by just because we're hopeful. And correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the major reason you're having an allergic reaction to what I'm saying. But don't worry, democracies usually aren't overthrown. And this one, being ultimately ruled by capital, certainly won't be. But it still is dying, and may even get there in our lifetimes. In the worst case, it will face this long period of decline followed by ultimate economic and thus societal collapse. This process will not be pretty, and we can only hope that whomever fills the resulting power vacuum isn't preaching a message of a scarcity-free utopia, if you know what I mean. The better outcome is one in which this failing husk of a nation is used to incubate (and is slowly replaced by) more agile and sustainable methods of societal interaction and coordination - based on voluntary interactions on the Internet. For rough examples, we can look at the positive ideas of cryptoanarchism for example implementations of various things (and please note that these technologies evidently play out much differently than was forseen). We don't need a "first amendment" and constant struggles to define a uniform meaning of freedom of expression for 300M people. We can codify the first pass of this concept by running TOR, and let much smaller autonomous groups use the resulting environment as a starting point for refinements appropriate to their community. Likewise with economic policy and many other issues that are currently centrally and unaccountably dictated by Uncle Sam. There's obviously a whole host of things I'm not or am unable to address, and focusing on any particular philosophy/technology is missing the larger picture (which is why I avoid doing so). However, the beauty in this approach is that if you decide you don't like it, but still believe in everyone's right to be generally left alone, you can simply not participate.

by pekk 14y ago

So you want to knock off the government. But you refuse to specify who you want to replace it with. This should arouse suspicion in any person capable of thinking critically.

mindslight 14y ago

Which part of 'not really actionable' did you willfully misunderstand? The main things I would like are for people to separate their perspective from that of the government, start seeing themselves as autonomous actors that only follow its practically infinite proscriptions out of pragmatism, and make sure the systems they create are empowering their fellow humans and not augmenting this unaccountable machine.

pekk 14y ago
You keep backsliding from your original stated intent to see the US Government "dead," which is plain enough. The key detail is that you have no vision whatsoever of what would be there instead. Would it be a US-scale Somalia? The Confederacy? You and your buddies running things? In the absence of any specifics it would be rational to assume the very worst. Even the Bolsheviks had specifics.
- mindslight 14y ago
  In the presence of specifics, it would still be rational to assume the very worst. If we overthrew the government for a plausible movement to create a scarcity-free utopia, we still most likely wouldn't end up with such - the kind of people who seize the reins of power don't sit idly by just because we're hopeful. And correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the major reason you're having an allergic reaction to what I'm saying. But don't worry, democracies usually aren't overthrown. And this one, being ultimately ruled by capital, certainly won't be. But it still is dying, and may even get there in our lifetimes. In the worst case, it will face this long period of decline followed by ultimate economic and thus societal collapse. This process will not be pretty, and we can only hope that whomever fills the resulting power vacuum isn't preaching a message of a scarcity-free utopia, if you know what I mean. The better outcome is one in which this failing husk of a nation is used to incubate (and is slowly replaced by) more agile and sustainable methods of societal interaction and coordination - based on voluntary interactions on the Internet. For rough examples, we can look at the positive ideas of cryptoanarchism for example implementations of various things (and please note that these technologies evidently play out much differently than was forseen). We don't need a "first amendment" and constant struggles to define a uniform meaning of freedom of expression for 300M people. We can codify the first pass of this concept by running TOR, and let much smaller autonomous groups use the resulting environment as a starting point for refinements appropriate to their community. Likewise with economic policy and many other issues that are currently centrally and unaccountably dictated by Uncle Sam. There's obviously a whole host of things I'm not or am unable to address, and focusing on any particular philosophy/technology is missing the larger picture (which is why I avoid doing so). However, the beauty in this approach is that if you decide you don't like it, but still believe in everyone's right to be generally left alone, you can simply not participate.