Forum Post: How about this for systemic reform: We Demand Democracy
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 12, 2011, 2:28 a.m. EST by dankpoet
(425)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
The system we are using is a Republic. This is not democracy. We Demand Democracy (at least it has a better ring to it than Campaign finance reform) ;) bonus=fits easily on a sign/soundbite.
the system we are using is corporate oligarchy.
democracy is fer sure the evolutionary direction and whats fair.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=169262663125231#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=165096780208486 V.I.I.R.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=168277696557061
University Project First Steps
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=168279776556853
University Project Brainstorm
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=168142193237278
NICE University
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=167877999930364
Psychonautics Textbook
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=167448986639932
Socratic Method
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166330673418430
Different Kinds of Geothermal Power
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166259990092165
Common Myths and Misconceptions About Geothermal Power
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166255476759283
Zero Carbon Cities
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166254060092758
Energy cost Benefit Analysis
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166057976779033
Applications In Practice and Theory for Arcologies
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=166041926780638
Mega Scale Engineering Criteria
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=docs#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=163547577030073
main Problems Clusters
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=169262663125231#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=165334013518096
sugestions on how to proceed
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=169262663125231#!/home.php?sk=group_163532010364963&view=doc&id=165099426874888
WAR vs Economic Social Justice
And what if the answer to this demand is "no"?
We Have Permission to Change the System http://www.JeffBlock2012.com
I'll leave the light on for ya...
Exactly, but they need a comprehensive strategy that implements all their demands, and although I'm all in favor of taking down today's ineffective and inefficient Top 10% Management Group of Business & Government, there's only one way to do it – by fighting bankers as bankers ourselves. Consequently, I have posted a 1-page Summary of the Strategic Legal Policies, Organizational Operating Structures, and Tactical Investment Procedures necessary to do this at:
http://getsatisfaction.com/americanselect/topics/on_strategic_legal_policy_organizational_operational_structures_tactical_investment_procedures
Join
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/StrategicInternationalSystems/
if you want to be 1 of 100,000 people needed to support a Presidential Candidate – myself – at AmericansElect.org in support of the above bank-focused platform.
Well, better start getting some democracy here then, as they'll never going to give it to us, they're bought and paid for.
This OWS forum is nothing but one endless rant without any real democratic value. I would propose to have the sociocratic model implemented, as democracy itself is obsolete. The sociocratic model ensures social cohesion and involvement of everyone. Read about it, educate yourselves. We can't demand democracy from anyone else when this movement itself isn' t set up to be 100% democratic from the start. Let US be the example.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociocracy is a good starting point.
I don't demand democracy. No thanks. A republic is fine whereas a democracy you get the tyranny of the majority.
Beats straight tyranny ;)
This is hard for peeps to understand. They feel like if "everyone has a voice" then somehow it's equal.
must be sound engineers
Google is your friend. "The chief characteristic and distinguishing feature of a Democracy is: Rule by Omnipotent Majority. In a Democracy, The Individual, and any group of Individuals composing any Minority, have no protection against the unlimited power of The Majority. It is a case of Majority-over-Man."
I don't know about you, but I shudder to think how this would play out between our warring factions.
Step 1) Repeal everything those other guys did while they were in power
Step 2) Paartay!
I'll fight to get our Republic back, thanks.
the bill of rights is supposed to protect the minority
Gee, that doesn't sound much like this one from dictionary.com:
de·moc·ra·cy [dih-mok-ruh-see] noun, plural -cies.
In which politburo publication did you find your definition? 1) That's the system already in place 2) I wasn't implying you couldn't have a constitutional democracy or that Congress should operate by majority rule. Enjoy your quality-of-life-enhancing, uber-effecient Republic.
You need to dig a little deeper into the social and economic ramifications of what you propose. Communism sounds great on paper as well, but it is far more likely to breed elitism and corruption, and to stifle individual excellence, than to have everyone singing Kumbayaa and living in relative luxury.
Don't get me wrong, you're on the right track though.
Sorry LO but the last 2500 years is a little short on case studies ;) I do not wish to argue stale ideologies with you but am more than willing to listen to your thoughts on the ramifications of a more democratic government without hyperbole.
Scroll to the bottom to read the quotes on democracy. There's some evidence on what great minds thought about it.
http://ablogandabrain.blogspot.com/2011/10/open-response-to-occupy-wall-st-and.html
Actually I read the entire thing.. Can't say I was impressed or persuaded.
Appreciate your reading it.
Appreciate the link to anything not a clip of fox news ;) was it yours?
yes.
I just posted this in another thread "I'd like fox news, and republicans, to go away forever. I'm confused on what part of my writing you didn't read right. I'm talking about economics and basic math. I'm not talking about made up political paradigms."
If people could live with integrity, political parties would be irrelevant. In much the same way government would.
:) I'll critique. Really briefly but I'm getting awful tired so if I'll be blunt nothing personal. It seemed long, might have been the background/font color. Way too many ironic questions, never use ?! as punctuation; If the question is solid, ? is sufficient. If you feel compelled to use both you should rephrase. There are a couple of logical leaps not specifically addressed, for instance you assume that a protester couldn't/shouldn't oppose a bailout because the government did it, apparently as Americans we have so much say in our political system. In the same paragraph you seem to say that anger is misdirected at corporations instead of towards government but skip over the a central point of the protesters, namely that its a corporatist government.. These jumps probably work for people who share your assumptions but make for poorly constructed debates for people who don't. I guess if written as entertainment dumbocracy is a fair transition. But really you should save it for after your most persuasive argument. You don't want to show all your cards at once..I should be thinking to myself how dumb democracy is before you play it. I'm to tired to actually argue the specific points of your argument. Suffice it to say I'm not in favor of majority rule and am in favor of democracy...use some imagination for how that could work, it isn't contradictory. A discussion of democracy with no reference to the ancient Athenians isn't worth having and find something/everything from Pericles.
Thanks, I will consider your words.
Yes, this. There actually are reasons why systems like the electoral college are beneficial - even if they produce seemingly odd results. They protect the slight minority from repression by a slight majority, and in so doing force politicians to appeal to a broader base. A system like the electoral college means that the less numerous a certain bloc is, the more powerful each individual will be. It's like a seven game series in baseball. You can win one game 15-0, but if you lose the next four games 1-0, you still lose. It means it's harder to win by stacking one game - or pandering to one demographic.
I believe that actually these antidemocratic institutions are protecting a very small minority from having to yield any political power to an overwhelming majority. Thanks for the baseball analogy though. But if something doesn't change we'll be playing hockey...
Eh, Canadia has its own problems with corruption.
Anyway, I agree that some systems are problematic. But I have another analogy for ya. This one involves babies and bathwater. I, personally, have no problem protecting the slight minority. I do not advocate investing absolute power in anything - majority or no. As such, I think the Electoral College is fine; gerrymandering is the problem. Want to solve that? I'm on board (pending explanation of your proposed solution).
I just don't advocate careening around the ideological extremes like a drunkard in a tilt-a-whirl. But now I'm all out of analogies.
I'm not advocating majority rule just more democracy. I'm not even particular if its the electoral college, or the Senate, or on a state level, or ballot initiatives. But this isn't working, not for most people. I don't understand how the electoral college is preventing anything bad, what is it protecting you from Civil War? (implication here: that it didn't, not that I want one) I just don't see how elected representatives electing representatives to elect a representative does anything except create the opportunity for corruption and diffuse the will of the people. And its is a lot simpler to fix then gerrymandering I have no idea how to address that one..
I agree that what we have now isn't working. But I would argue that we need to be choosy about what we take apart, lest we end up with something worse - or, just as bad, something equally ineffective. All that effort for no gain would be terrible, not just for us but for any reform in the future.
So I think it's important to look closely at the specifics of the system to identify points of failure. "This is broken" is a perfectly valid complaint - we wouldn't be here if it wasn't - but "anything but this!" is not a valid solution.
In that vein, the Electoral College: it doesn't prevent Civil War wholesale - but a quick mental step back (i.e. think in "discussion" mode, not "debate" mode) will tell you that nothing, anywhere, ever, will guarantee no Civil War. What the Electoral College does is - in an indirect way - make it harder for civil wars to start. What it does directly is make it harder for a 51% majority to run roughshod on a 49% minority. This, independent of everything else, is a Good Thing. The short way to think about it is this: as an individual voter, what are the chances of your single vote swaying a National popular vote? Very small, yes? Under the Electoral College system, your single vote doesn't have to sway the National vote. It "only" needs to sway the vote at the state level (yes, still a small chance, but your odds are better). If you cast the deciding vote at the state level, you get the Electoral votes of your state behind you on the National level.
In other words, in a close election, each individual vote has more voting power.
It leads to things like winning the popular vote and losing the election - but that only happens in very close elections, and that is a good thing. If it were not possible, then there would be no reason for politicians to appeal to a broad voter base. All they'd have to do is identify the majority, promise them riches at the expense of the minority, and let the repression begin.
For more details on the math, Google "Math Against Tyranny" and check out the article form Discover magazine. It's pretty old, but the math holds.
It is not true that the votes of all electors are bound to the popular vote in their respective states..it is entirely possible that you cast your "deciding vote" even by over whelming majority and that all of your states electoral votes go to a different candidate. There is nothing nationwide that prevents this from happening. Constitutional protections defend minorities from repression not the lack of actual democratic governance.
You can't just "demand" a change. If you want your government to be more democratic then you have to participate in the political process or you won't have any leverage to change it. So you have to VOTE.
Please take a look at the Rolling Stone article that I cited in this post about how people who DO understand how to participate in the political process are successfully changing government so that it's what you would probably call less of a democracy.
Disenfranchising people, interfering with voting rights, and gerrymandering are all steps in the wrong direction, right? Those things are happening because not enough people are participating, and voting.