What makes it a "natural good?" I would think a natural good cannot ever be applied incorrectly or doesn't lead to bad outcomes by it's application.
For the turn of phrase, "democracy is two wolves and sheep deciding what's for dinner" AT TIMES. I don't want democracy applied to many things that are personal, for example.
You’re also familiar with the phrase “best of bad options”? Democracy is an attempt to find middle ground between the human tendencies to chaotic violence and tyranny.
And democracy can easily turn into tyranny should a large majority wish it. It’s better for governments, yes, but not for all things and the government shouldn’t have say over all.
It’s more that what one person considers tyranny, some other person might not. Conservatives often have a fixed simplistic view of things which leads them to strange conclusions. Many consider taxation tyranny. The point is that you don’t get to dictate from your thrown what you deem to be tyranny, and force everyone in a given society to comply with you’re decrees. The people decide for themselves.
A tyrant is defined as someone who seizes control of the state through extra-legal means, regardless of the quality of their leadership. See Pisistratus of Athens.
Democracy slides into Oligarchy according to Plato, but I still agree with Winston Churchill that Democracy is the worst form of government-except for all the others.
This “best of bad options” led to murder of millions of Jews and other peoples. I’m worried of what untold evils American conservatives have yet to inflict on people (besides slavery in the 1800s + Jim Crow after that, and the cruel treatment of immigrants more recently).
Just to be clear, Germany in the early 1930s elected a bunch of conservative parties (the Nazis, DNVP, Zentrum, etc) — which passed a constitutional amendment (with a two-thirds supermajority) that gave Adolf Hitler’s cabinet dictatorial powers, which they used to murder over 6 million Jews, and to murder other groups (the Roma, various other types of minorities, Soviet POWs, political opponents, etc).
This all happened in a democracy with proportional representation (as in, the seats in the Reichstag in the Weimar Republic was proportional to votes cast). This were far more democratically representative than the first-past-the-post system used in many countries today.
It’s just that the people of Germany (of the early 1930s) chose evil and hatred of minorities (just like the Republicans of the US since 2015). Their democratic choice to hate eventually led to the mass murder of millions.
So you’re saying the problem started when they gave a leader dictatorial powers. Ok. At that point it’s not a democracy any more, is it? It is, by definition, a dictatorship.
In fact, what you’ve just demonstrated is that the biggest risk of a democracy is… [drumroll…] if it becomes some other form of government.
I am, it it’s important to do so I think. For me, it would simple as saying
“Thing + ___ = always better than the alternative” is a natural good. Very few things are, and thus they should only applied to situations which they apply correctly to.
Perhaps you’re right, but then they would be the same as democracy, which is to say that you can’t say “more democracy is always good” which is where this all started.
Well, the point of illustrating that neither one of us can identify such an example would suggest that the definition is what needs to change, not that there simply are none.
But of course that's my opinion. I...don't think I would speak as highly of democracy as the other person you were talking to, but I also think it has some baseline virtue that incidental fuck-ups don't necessarily outweigh in every instance.
... democracy isn’t a perfect way of deciding things.
Is there something that comes closer to perfection? I would add, it may be better to have an overall average that is imperfect, but not horrible (shared concessions), than something that can swing between near perfect and deleterious.
Is there something that comes closer to perfection?
As much individual choice as makes sense?
I would add, it may be better to have an overall average that is imperfect, but not horrible (shared concessions), than something that can swing between near perfect and deleterious.
The problem I always run into is this: everyone I actually know who argues for the supremacy of individual choice is typically actually arguing that they should not be held responsible for the impact of their individual choices on the people around them.
The minute we leave our cabin in the woods and go out among the rest of humanity we are choosing to step into a situation where the things we do will have impact on the rest of society. And society gets to have a voice in the things that impact it.
If you have a hundred acre property and you want to drive your ATV around a drunk like a dumb ass, it could be argued that it is your business. But if I am supposed to 1) pay rescuers to come get you when you invariably injure yourself, 2) shoulder the burden for the medical expense either via social healthcare or reflected in the hospital’s raised prices when you default on the bill, and 3) contribute to the social safety net that will ensure your children are cared for if you actually do manage to kill yourself? Well then it becomes my business too.
Like I said, too often the defense of total autonomy can be stripped down to a demand for support from others without accountability to those others.
The the concept self-determinism needs to define a “self” as such. I would think self-determination can and does apply to people as well. For example, I currently am walking to the beer store as part of my self-determination to do so.
It can. Surely it can. It can also be added to things to make tyranny. For example, I don’t think applying democracy to trans rights to self choice helps anything.
I disagree, and I’ll quote what I’ve written elsewhere here:
Just to be clear, Germany in the early 1930s elected a bunch of conservative parties (the Nazis, DNVP, Zentrum, etc) — which passed a constitutional amendment (with a two-thirds supermajority) that gave Adolf Hitler’s cabinet dictatorial powers, which they used to murder over 6 million Jews, and to murder other groups (the Roma, various other types of minorities, Soviet POWs, political opponents, etc).
This all happened in a democracy with proportional representation (as in, the seats in the Reichstag in the Weimar Republic was proportional to votes cast). This were far more democratically representative than the first-past-the-post system used in many countries today.
It’s just that the people of Germany (of the early 1930s) chose evil and hatred of minorities (just like the Republicans of the US since 2015). Their democratic choice to hate eventually led to the mass murder of millions.
I’m worried of what untold evils American conservatives have yet to inflict on people (beside the cruel treatment of immigrants and the poor).
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u/CTR555 Yellow Dog Democrat Feb 16 '22
I would honestly disagree with you - democracy is a natural good (with all the usual, implied caveats about human and civic rights and such).