7 ms·

Sometimes people take The Matrix quite literally, while it is actually a very good metaphor for government and democracy. Morpheus hints at this very transparen

by snitko 13y ago

Sometimes people take The Matrix quite literally, while it is actually a very good metaphor for government and democracy. Morpheus hints at this very transparently in a couple of monologues: Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes [grins]. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth. Neo: What truth? Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Born into a prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison for your mind. So what Neo later sees are endless fields of human beings being grown for the very purpose of obtaining energy from them. Still don't see what's going on here? And then later in the training program he tells Neo this: Morpheus: The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Business men, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it. And indeed, I see that all over again. Even if you hint to people that maybe we don't really need a government to live our lives in peace, at the very best it is suggested you go to Somalia. The very idea that maybe the dearest leaders of whatever country you live in don't actually care about you doesn't seem to be able to penetrate people's minds, even though time and again they lie and abuse their powers. Those who hint to this idea are called radicals and extremists, even though it is not them, but the elite in power, who have a stake in this whole game.

md224 13y ago
Right, but... what if the reality is that there's a mix of better and worse-intentioned people in government, as well as emergent structural inefficiencies and competing ideologies? I understand that we need a good narrative to comprehend the world, but I think we can do better than the "government = bad" one. The truth seems like it would be more nuanced.
- TausAmmer 13y ago
  How would you help punch of people? Why would you? Why would you imprison them and tell them it is for they own good. So that some of them do not turn evil and kill rest. Keeping people in prison, saying that if they are let out of prison, fear and danger will emerge. But if you want to leave prison on your own, you are shot. There is no one who cares about you, if he is looking for power to control you. Eat, shit, reproduce, obey. Ah yeah, vote something, haha.
- snitko 13y ago
  The thing to look at is incentives. What behavior the system incentivizes? People are elected for some n years and it is very difficult to fire them even if they don't keep their promises and are doing a crappy job. More importantly, they take away taxes by force from the population, then redistribute those money and pretend they are doing something useful. "We built those roads, we gave you education". Yes, except you didn't. When you take someone else's money by force, for whatever reason, even if you intend to give it to the poor, it is theft. But when a government does it, it suddenly becomes taxes. It can be argued that in a democracy people generally agree that taxes should be payed, but when you actually ask people whether they want to fund wars and NSA spying, turns out they really don't want that. It is sold as a package and people are tricked and forced (whichever is needed) into financing horrible things with their own money. Finally, you see, if a politician does a bad job, he still gets paid and keeps his job at least until the next election. If a private company messes up, people leave in droves and it goes bankrupt. There might be some good people in the government, who truly believe they are doing some good. That doesn't make the system good and they have zero chances to make it a good system.
  - nemothekid 13y ago
    I don't think this supports that the government is bad or inherently bad, its just inefficient. The question you have to ask yourself, can you run a country (not even America, take a small country first like Belgium, less than a 10th the pop. of America), and can you run that country efficiently. Like it or not, most government systems humans have invented so far are woefully inefficient and provide perverse incentives from time to time. However it seems our current democratic/republican system works the best, if not on any objective scale, but for the fact is the most relatively stable and proven. Now, anyone can see that our current government has issues, much like the ones you pointed out. And most people have known that for ages, the hard part is can you devise a better system, and how would you go about testing it without ruining a generation? How do you go about minimizing corruption. Sure the "lets-all-live-in-the-forest" and "burn-down-the-institutions-and-the-rich" route is nice and ideal, but its a pipe dream that will fall apart instantly (some people like to point out examples of small villages living without electricity and money - but you simply cannot scale that "lifestyle" to 300 million people). I'm not a political philosopher or an economist so I won't assert that the system we have now is greatest and you are wrong. I just want to see more expanded thought on the idea that "politicians are crooks and we should get rid of the system."
IanCal 13y ago
The system being better than the alternatives and the system caring about you are two different things. > The very idea that maybe the dearest leaders of whatever country you live in don't actually care about you doesn't seem to be able to penetrate people's minds, even though time and again they lie and abuse their powers. Really? Because the prevailing opinion with people I speak to is that politicians are bastards, and that's replicated here. In fact, politicians are very rarely looked at in a good light. People dislike what we have! What's the approval rating of Congress? Your rhetoric is the same I see time and time again. People need to "wake up" and see that the system is terrible, and they're so stupid for not seeing it. People do see it, we've got well past that point. The idea that there are significant problems with the way we run countries is painfully fucking obvious. You're not smarter than everyone else for seeing that there is corruption, or that people lie. These revelations are not new, they're not anything different from what we've seen for thousands of years. The problem is nobody has a good plan for what else to do. > Even if you hint to people that maybe we don't really need a government to live our lives in peace, at the very best it is suggested you go to Somalia. Well it's a good point, we can point at countries without democratic-ish rule and they're often really terrible places to live. I get to complain about MPs spending expenses money on duck houses on the internet because I have reliable infrastructure and enough money to buy a computer and an internet connection. I'm not worried about a group of teens in the military coming in and raping my wife. > Even if you hint to people that maybe we don't really need a government to live our lives in peace We don't, not if everyone is nice. But "wouldn't it be nice if everyone was nice" is the kind of political plan I'd expect from a 5 year old. Unless you have a concrete suggestion, something better than "not this", then you have nothing to add to an incredibly important conversation.
- SwellJoe 13y ago
  "What's the approval rating of Congress?" There's an old saying, I dunno who said it first: People hate congress, and love their congressman. That may not be as true these days...there's a pretty big disconnect, and a big part of the issue is that nobody votes because nobody believes it makes a difference (because it doesn't). At best you get to choose the lesser of two assholes.
Osiris 13y ago
If you look at the whole of human history, you'll see that government is a direct result of the human compulsion for power. Wherever there is an opportunity to assert power and dominion over others, someone will step up and take power by force or coercion. Governments formed as those that took power needed a system by which to subjugate those within their territory and indoctrinate them to help expand their influence. It took centuries for people to adjust those political systems to remove ultimate power from one individual and disperse it amongst many. The more people that have influence over the power structure, the less likely that it'll be able to do really evil things. Our modern democracies are literally the result of thousands of years of evolution of our social contract. If you think they are so bad, look at countries/places where the government has very little power to control its population. What results are militias and other armed groups that use force to exert influence and maintain power. This struggle is happening pretty opening in Mexico, for example. If you were, today, make all government disappear, the world would become a chaos of small groups fighting for power. Over years/decades, groups would push out other groups, and gain larger territories. As size increases, the need to keep the population in line (to remain in power) would require those in power to maintain order through laws, police, and provide services. Government is inevitable.
127 13y ago
>While it is actually a very good metaphor for government and democracy. It is also a very good metaphor for social norms. Power people have over others by misleading them, lying to them, shaming them, threatening them, having something they want, etc. People create their own matrix to fit in, to adapt. People start lying to themselves, stop following logic and start to rationalize away bad feelings and bad ideas that hurt.
Houshalter 13y ago
Well I thought this was another crazy fan theory but those quotes actually make more sense in the context of government than talking about the matrix. The choice of words doesn't seem like a coincidence.

by snitko 13y ago

md224 13y ago

Right, but... what if the reality is that there's a mix of better and worse-intentioned people in government, as well as emergent structural inefficiencies and competing ideologies? I understand that we need a good narrative to comprehend the world, but I think we can do better than the "government = bad" one. The truth seems like it would be more nuanced.

TausAmmer 13y ago
How would you help punch of people? Why would you? Why would you imprison them and tell them it is for they own good. So that some of them do not turn evil and kill rest. Keeping people in prison, saying that if they are let out of prison, fear and danger will emerge. But if you want to leave prison on your own, you are shot. There is no one who cares about you, if he is looking for power to control you. Eat, shit, reproduce, obey. Ah yeah, vote something, haha.
snitko 13y ago
The thing to look at is incentives. What behavior the system incentivizes? People are elected for some n years and it is very difficult to fire them even if they don't keep their promises and are doing a crappy job. More importantly, they take away taxes by force from the population, then redistribute those money and pretend they are doing something useful. "We built those roads, we gave you education". Yes, except you didn't. When you take someone else's money by force, for whatever reason, even if you intend to give it to the poor, it is theft. But when a government does it, it suddenly becomes taxes. It can be argued that in a democracy people generally agree that taxes should be payed, but when you actually ask people whether they want to fund wars and NSA spying, turns out they really don't want that. It is sold as a package and people are tricked and forced (whichever is needed) into financing horrible things with their own money. Finally, you see, if a politician does a bad job, he still gets paid and keeps his job at least until the next election. If a private company messes up, people leave in droves and it goes bankrupt. There might be some good people in the government, who truly believe they are doing some good. That doesn't make the system good and they have zero chances to make it a good system.
- nemothekid 13y ago
  I don't think this supports that the government is bad or inherently bad, its just inefficient. The question you have to ask yourself, can you run a country (not even America, take a small country first like Belgium, less than a 10th the pop. of America), and can you run that country efficiently. Like it or not, most government systems humans have invented so far are woefully inefficient and provide perverse incentives from time to time. However it seems our current democratic/republican system works the best, if not on any objective scale, but for the fact is the most relatively stable and proven. Now, anyone can see that our current government has issues, much like the ones you pointed out. And most people have known that for ages, the hard part is can you devise a better system, and how would you go about testing it without ruining a generation? How do you go about minimizing corruption. Sure the "lets-all-live-in-the-forest" and "burn-down-the-institutions-and-the-rich" route is nice and ideal, but its a pipe dream that will fall apart instantly (some people like to point out examples of small villages living without electricity and money - but you simply cannot scale that "lifestyle" to 300 million people). I'm not a political philosopher or an economist so I won't assert that the system we have now is greatest and you are wrong. I just want to see more expanded thought on the idea that "politicians are crooks and we should get rid of the system."

IanCal 13y ago

The system being better than the alternatives and the system caring about you are two different things. > The very idea that maybe the dearest leaders of whatever country you live in don't actually care about you doesn't seem to be able to penetrate people's minds, even though time and again they lie and abuse their powers. Really? Because the prevailing opinion with people I speak to is that politicians are bastards, and that's replicated here. In fact, politicians are very rarely looked at in a good light. People dislike what we have! What's the approval rating of Congress? Your rhetoric is the same I see time and time again. People need to "wake up" and see that the system is terrible, and they're so stupid for not seeing it. People do see it, we've got well past that point. The idea that there are significant problems with the way we run countries is painfully fucking obvious. You're not smarter than everyone else for seeing that there is corruption, or that people lie. These revelations are not new, they're not anything different from what we've seen for thousands of years. The problem is nobody has a good plan for what else to do. > Even if you hint to people that maybe we don't really need a government to live our lives in peace, at the very best it is suggested you go to Somalia. Well it's a good point, we can point at countries without democratic-ish rule and they're often really terrible places to live. I get to complain about MPs spending expenses money on duck houses on the internet because I have reliable infrastructure and enough money to buy a computer and an internet connection. I'm not worried about a group of teens in the military coming in and raping my wife. > Even if you hint to people that maybe we don't really need a government to live our lives in peace We don't, not if everyone is nice. But "wouldn't it be nice if everyone was nice" is the kind of political plan I'd expect from a 5 year old. Unless you have a concrete suggestion, something better than "not this", then you have nothing to add to an incredibly important conversation.

SwellJoe 13y ago
"What's the approval rating of Congress?" There's an old saying, I dunno who said it first: People hate congress, and love their congressman. That may not be as true these days...there's a pretty big disconnect, and a big part of the issue is that nobody votes because nobody believes it makes a difference (because it doesn't). At best you get to choose the lesser of two assholes.

Osiris 13y ago

If you look at the whole of human history, you'll see that government is a direct result of the human compulsion for power. Wherever there is an opportunity to assert power and dominion over others, someone will step up and take power by force or coercion. Governments formed as those that took power needed a system by which to subjugate those within their territory and indoctrinate them to help expand their influence. It took centuries for people to adjust those political systems to remove ultimate power from one individual and disperse it amongst many. The more people that have influence over the power structure, the less likely that it'll be able to do really evil things. Our modern democracies are literally the result of thousands of years of evolution of our social contract. If you think they are so bad, look at countries/places where the government has very little power to control its population. What results are militias and other armed groups that use force to exert influence and maintain power. This struggle is happening pretty opening in Mexico, for example. If you were, today, make all government disappear, the world would become a chaos of small groups fighting for power. Over years/decades, groups would push out other groups, and gain larger territories. As size increases, the need to keep the population in line (to remain in power) would require those in power to maintain order through laws, police, and provide services. Government is inevitable.

127 13y ago

>While it is actually a very good metaphor for government and democracy. It is also a very good metaphor for social norms. Power people have over others by misleading them, lying to them, shaming them, threatening them, having something they want, etc. People create their own matrix to fit in, to adapt. People start lying to themselves, stop following logic and start to rationalize away bad feelings and bad ideas that hurt.

Houshalter 13y ago

Well I thought this was another crazy fan theory but those quotes actually make more sense in the context of government than talking about the matrix. The choice of words doesn't seem like a coincidence.