Is representative government really that bad? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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The 'no government' movement.
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#14139917
Government is unjust by its very nature. The presidents who are most admired tend to be the biggest killers. The bigger the war, the bigger the casualties. Roosevelt won more electoral victories than anyone at his level, but he was also an extreme authoritarian (he surely ranks with the great killers of all history, as well). His propaganda posters look just like Hitler's: The everyman worker, anvil in hand of course, staring off with a stern expression, as if captivated by the sheer magnitude of his next prospective rape-of-nature (a more abstract style seems typical for such posters, because individual features are suppressed in the abstract style, and that makes it easier to identify with the ever-suffering and always-triumphant hero).

On the other hand, Roosevelt was giving the people what they want. What's wrong with that?

I have a theory. All of the order and government in society could dissolve in a single day, in a single second, if people spontaneously decided to withhold their consent. The entire structure is supported by consent on every level, and if that dissolved, the entire house of cards would come down.

The process would not be painless. These are not cards collapsing harmlessly onto a table. There will be many mangled corpses left in the wreckage of this admittedly unjust structure, once it is destroyed. Is it worth the casualties, in order to destroy it?

It may very well be, but then there is the question of what kind of society you expect to rise from the rubble. As man begins to rebuild in the ashes, the question of government will come up before too long. A very small community can manage its own affairs through direct democracy. But once your community grows beyond the size of a modest village, there will be a natural tendency, almost an instinct, to elect representatives to manage the broader aspects of civic affairs (waste management, drinking water, military defense, etc.).

The more I think about, even drug-addled and starvation-prone primitives have their representatives. The process of election may be radically different. They may pound a sack of mushrooms, and then in some nonsensical and hallucinatory process, decide on their next chief or shaman or whatever they call him. None the less, he is a representative of the community, and the ghosts and gods which he summons in order to accomplish his ends are also representatives of the community, in terms of symbolism or poetry, anyway (what else is mythology and religion?).

I would rather have elections in the modern style. If we reduce everything to ashes, then the survivors will still elect representatives, but they will preform the election according to a primitive and backward procedure. You cannot eradicate man's desire to order the affairs of his community through representatives, unless you would prefer to live under something even more primitive than the Iroquois confederacy. I like air-conditioning too much!

In the absence of any other process, we might as well stick with representative democracy. Counting votes may be imperfect, but it is better than pounding shrooms and throwing I-Ching sticks, or any other proposal I have heard.

When our society finally collapses, the CHUD's who crawl out of the rubble will still elect representatives, unless they are so shattered that they devolve into another species, incapable of using the powers of speech to order their communal affairs. But, if they survive as people, they will continue to elect their representatives, only now the method of election will be even more primitive and random. Shouldn't we stick with what we have?
#14140191
Well as long as we keep everything voluntary, it doesn't really matter. There will be many different systems and methods use to organize society, because humanity is dynamic.

Let's think about how silly voting is. Let's suppose Pizza Hut were to, instead of letting you choose what you want on your pizza, only offer one pizza based on a majority vote. How well would that work? They'd obviously quickly go out of business....unless they had a monopoly on pizza making backed by a professional military.

Now, if a system or method is not able to work with something as basic and simple as 'what do I want on my pizza', why would anyone want to use it for complex social problems and issues? That's insane, if you ask me.
#14140334
Rothbardian wrote:Well as long as we keep everything voluntary



Bingo

If its voluntarily done, it's good. No matter what some busybody third-parties think.

If it is involuntarily (coercively) done, it's evil, no matter what rationalisations are used to justify it.

No other consideration merits moral calculation.
#14141315
SecretSquirrel wrote:Bingo

If its voluntarily done, it's good. No matter what some busybody third-parties think.

If it is involuntarily (coercively) done, it's evil, no matter what rationalisations are used to justify it.

No other consideration merits moral calculation.


I think this is an excellent 5 minute explanation of the concept:

#14148075
Spouter wrote:On the other hand, Roosevelt was giving the people what they want. What's wrong with that?

What's wrong with that is what the people wanted. If the people want something immoral (e.g. killing enemy civilians), giving them what they want is wrong.

The key to human moral evolution is the recognition that more and more instances of initiation of force against others are wrong, even if done in the name of the community.

Sure, we can imagine a revolutionary transition from statist to non-state society. It is fun. In practice, the change is much more likely to be gradual, evolutionary. An excellent example is the gradual retreat of governments from imposing religious values and practices on their population. Whether through explicit constitutional clauses (the US) or unwritten practices (UK), the idea that the majority will force its religious sentiments on a minority is all-but-unthinkable in most western nations.

A similar (and later) process progressively excludes government intervention in people's private sexual choices (e.g. de-criminalisation of birth control, homosexual and extra-marital sexual relationships).

I hope that at some point, a similar transition will make government regulation of economic activity similarly taboo. With continual shrinking of the scope of legitimate government action we will find ourselves inching towards an anarchy.
#14369721
To me, all I see, or a lot of what I see in representative government is people who are highly manipulative rising up to represent the public. I also feel that many of these representatives feel a primary duty to themselves first rather than representing. You see that representatives try to paint a picture of who they are for you to elect them. The picture may be somewhat accurate in certain ways. However once they are elected into office I feel they don't deviate very often for the public but rather they hold on to their interests which we may have had a glimpse of. If they do deviate than it often seems to be because they have to out of self preservation, or it is in their selfish interests. It is said that the type of people who rise to the top of the corporate and the government ladder have a higher degree of psychopathy than other sections of the population.

We may want to consider that direct democracy is more feasible with our heavy technology today including the internet. I certainly do not think that the politicians are more wise on deciding important matters but that doesn't mean I have a huge trust in the public either. Sometimes it may make sense to choose a scientist to represent or make decisions on matters of science for you as example and other people to their respective talents.
#14369726
If you could excuse me I forgot to mention one more thing. In fact I could type a lot more than I do but I don't want to type more than necessary, tediously, and boringly. When you said that the government is there by consent you must mean by consent of the majority. But even as government seems to be there by the consent of the majority we see in polls, here in the U.S, that people are more dissatisfied by congress than ever. It seems as if they don't consent to congress. However we see through peoples actions that they do not fight against the U.S government itself. While they say "I don't agree with this" ( a particular policy) they have no choice it seems to them but to go along with it or in some cases just ignore it. Many of the population decides not to consent to certain laws like drug laws. But let's get back to the topic of the state or government. It seems to be "horizontally enforced". Several people may object to it but do to how many people do enforce government, and submit to government, it makes those who would object in a situation where they must also submit or their livelihood is threatened as they don't have the numbers to fight back effectively. You are always going to be born into a situation where not everything is up to you. But I feel that the current situation does not support everyone to the fullest.
#14369728
note: My final point will be that to progress as people we need to try new solutions alternatives ect. and not be afraid to broaden or horizons. I do not think we should just stick to the old out of uncertainty about anything new. In the past there was not representative democracy as widespread as today. There were monarchs, there was feudalism, there was slavery. But we change, and we progress and we come up with "radical" ideas

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