Forum Post: Only One Demand

There is only one demand worth making: Democracy.

Ask nothing of the ruling elite except for what the Egyptians asked of Mubarak: leave. The Plutocracy is not to be negotiated with. Make no demands from them: not free education, not a living wage, not debt removal. Pluto rules the underworld. They are snakes in the garden.

With a direct democracy we can work everything out. Without it we beg for table scraps. Without it the natural human fallibility of self-interest opens the door to cronyism. All bottle necks and choke points must be removed so that bribery is ineffective.

At this crucial hour we must beware of those who will give us half a democracy, and leave in place vulnerabilities to exploit. Representative Democracy was a system created before telecommunication, the best that could be done then. Now we must update our system. The first question needing to be: "What percentage is a majority?"

Our new system needs to learn from the old and propose sober solutions to irrationalities like addictive acquisition and addictions to control and force. No starry eyed constitution will save us. A system which allows exploits tacitly approves them. What can be done will be done. Laws are ineffective, like a sign above an open doorway saying 'do not enter.'

Money also must be democratized, with no central banks, and a currency that is based on something of social, economic and ecological value, not shiny metals. If it is to be digital then let us begin a new currency to supplant the old; a peoples' money, with the ability to add the social value of being 'shined,' or 'tarnished' to the digital silver I cross your palm with.

Whatever it is we we build, and revise, and achieve in unanimity or multivalued discourse, none can exist before we have direct democracy. So shout at power to tell them we are coming, but begin the new verifiable voting system as an application on our phones. Begin the new money in the same way.

Whatever snags along the way, they do not compare to the horrors and abuses of the Plutocracy. Trial and error require the courage of humility and not the hubris of quick perfection. We must remember that stumbling is not failure, it is beginning to learn to walk.

Democracy: government of the people, by the people, for the people. Let's try it again.