4 ms·

It deeply saddens me that a tiny tiny percentage of the population can really fuck up the lives of everyone - financially, socially, politically, religiously.

by rorrr2 13y ago

It deeply saddens me that a tiny tiny percentage of the population can really fuck up the lives of everyone - financially, socially, politically, religiously. The real problem is in how we set up the governments. We give to much power to a few people. What we really need to do is let people vote on individual issues. Want to go to war that will affect everyone and will cost trillions? Let's have a vote.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
w_t_payne 13y ago
Our democratic systems are not really as democratic as they claim to be. Indeed, it could be argued that the democracy that we have is a thin veneer that hides the autocracy instead. Certainly, in the UK, the unelected civil service wields a huge amount of power, and whilst they do answer to elected officials, and do have to implement the policies of the ruling party, in reality they have a huge amount of freedom on those matters not explicitly laid out in policy, and can lobby ministers very effectively to get what they want. If a minister is weak, he will end up acting (unknowingly) as the de-facto press officer for the department. In any case, we end up electing representatives, not delegates. Our power to influence policy starts and stops at the ballot box (actually, we have rather more power than that through MP's letters & party policy groups - but for the sake of argument we will ignore these). Indeed, even in systems with impeccable democratic credentials, decisions end up being made by relatively small numbers of individuals; individuals that can be effectively lobbied, influenced or coerced into making decisions that are not in the best interests of the nation, or of the people. We need a technological solution that will help facilitate a general broadening of participation in the legislature. Universality is unrealistic, but open and broad participation is both achievable and realistic - Why should we limit government to a small fixed number of permanently employed elected representatives? Why not a larger, more flexible group of part-time specialists, each participating in only one or two issues?
- embolism 13y ago
  Who other than Google could set such a thing up?
_k 13y ago
I understand what you're saying but letting people vote on individual issues isn't always good. Here's an example : I live in Belgium, a country where 3 million people are paying for 8 million others. Those 8 million include kids, people without a job and people in retirement or who got sick. And we should help them. But it also includes 1.3 million government employees (hundreds of thousands more than The Netherlands where they got 6 million more citizens), people who aren't really sick, people who aren't willing to work, people who retired at an age way below the average European retirement age. So they want the system to continue even though it's unsustainable. When asked, they aren't going to vote against a system they are taking advantage of.
- csense 13y ago
  This is the fundamental problem with communist/socialist style systems where the government is supposed to take care of everyone: Productive work is no longer incentivized enough to support the society, and rollback is politically impossible, so they keep right on following an unsustainable course until there's a complete collapse. Unfortunately, people who are in favor of things like universal healthcare, minimum income, etc., fail to appreciate that good intentions don't always lead to good outcomes. (I'm speaking about typical HN readers who support these things who won't personally immediately be getting a piece of the pie.) As you say, the fact that people will vote for things that are in their self-interest at the expense of the society as a whole is a problem with democracy. In the US this has traditionally been avoided by a strong sense of patriotism / nationalism and an ideology of individual responsibility, but these barriers are eroding with cultural changes, increases in minorities with different values, a dysfunctional education system, and various economic disruptions.
- cheald 13y ago
  To simplify: When 51% of the people discover that they can vote themselves the wealth of the other 49%, they will.
asperous 13y ago
Actually this is interesting because America's representative democracy was set up because taking votes on things such as war was too expensive and slow. But today we have the technology to take a nationwide vote within a day so it is within the realm of possibility.
snitko 13y ago
So why don't you skip the government and vote with your own money for the things you support? If enough of people buy the product, then the company makes profit and the product deserves to exist on the market. Be it protection, war or helping the poor. Your choice.

by rorrr2 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

w_t_payne 13y ago

Our democratic systems are not really as democratic as they claim to be. Indeed, it could be argued that the democracy that we have is a thin veneer that hides the autocracy instead. Certainly, in the UK, the unelected civil service wields a huge amount of power, and whilst they do answer to elected officials, and do have to implement the policies of the ruling party, in reality they have a huge amount of freedom on those matters not explicitly laid out in policy, and can lobby ministers very effectively to get what they want. If a minister is weak, he will end up acting (unknowingly) as the de-facto press officer for the department. In any case, we end up electing representatives, not delegates. Our power to influence policy starts and stops at the ballot box (actually, we have rather more power than that through MP's letters & party policy groups - but for the sake of argument we will ignore these). Indeed, even in systems with impeccable democratic credentials, decisions end up being made by relatively small numbers of individuals; individuals that can be effectively lobbied, influenced or coerced into making decisions that are not in the best interests of the nation, or of the people. We need a technological solution that will help facilitate a general broadening of participation in the legislature. Universality is unrealistic, but open and broad participation is both achievable and realistic - Why should we limit government to a small fixed number of permanently employed elected representatives? Why not a larger, more flexible group of part-time specialists, each participating in only one or two issues?

embolism 13y ago
Who other than Google could set such a thing up?

_k 13y ago

I understand what you're saying but letting people vote on individual issues isn't always good. Here's an example : I live in Belgium, a country where 3 million people are paying for 8 million others. Those 8 million include kids, people without a job and people in retirement or who got sick. And we should help them. But it also includes 1.3 million government employees (hundreds of thousands more than The Netherlands where they got 6 million more citizens), people who aren't really sick, people who aren't willing to work, people who retired at an age way below the average European retirement age. So they want the system to continue even though it's unsustainable. When asked, they aren't going to vote against a system they are taking advantage of.

csense 13y ago
This is the fundamental problem with communist/socialist style systems where the government is supposed to take care of everyone: Productive work is no longer incentivized enough to support the society, and rollback is politically impossible, so they keep right on following an unsustainable course until there's a complete collapse. Unfortunately, people who are in favor of things like universal healthcare, minimum income, etc., fail to appreciate that good intentions don't always lead to good outcomes. (I'm speaking about typical HN readers who support these things who won't personally immediately be getting a piece of the pie.) As you say, the fact that people will vote for things that are in their self-interest at the expense of the society as a whole is a problem with democracy. In the US this has traditionally been avoided by a strong sense of patriotism / nationalism and an ideology of individual responsibility, but these barriers are eroding with cultural changes, increases in minorities with different values, a dysfunctional education system, and various economic disruptions.
cheald 13y ago
To simplify: When 51% of the people discover that they can vote themselves the wealth of the other 49%, they will.

asperous 13y ago

Actually this is interesting because America's representative democracy was set up because taking votes on things such as war was too expensive and slow. But today we have the technology to take a nationwide vote within a day so it is within the realm of possibility.

snitko 13y ago

So why don't you skip the government and vote with your own money for the things you support? If enough of people buy the product, then the company makes profit and the product deserves to exist on the market. Be it protection, war or helping the poor. Your choice.