Why is communism held in such a grave regard?

RussellTuring

sarumite wrote: »

Well you said they could be recalled instantly...that would require a vote surely? And since putting a motion is different to drafting legislation...so in effect they do have the power as they get to choose which motions go before the people and which don't. Furthermore they get to decide how the legislation is written.....and as anyone who knows anything about polls, the way the question is worded can sometimes me more important factor than the actual question in determining the outcome.

Well perhaps I didn't explain it clearly enough. They have no power in and of themselves. They only express the views of the people they are sent by. They put forward motions as decided by those people but don't take the initiative in presuming to think for them, as a TD might do.

I don't see a workable system whereby everyone is going to read and understand the finite details of all legislation however complex and then we wait until everyone is satisfied with their understanding of said legislation before putting it to a vote.

Why not? And is your alternative to just allow others to make the decision for you, knowing the diversity of people's opinions? As I said already, if you don't want to take part in the decision, you don't have to. The difference is you have the choice to do so if you wish and don't just have to do as your told.

Friends yes (though my friends are a little too homogenous for any major conflict anyway), strangers....not always. Within friends if there are a few people, its generally possible to figure out an arrangement. With more it become difficult and anyone who has ever tried to organise a trip for more than 30 people will know that you never satisfy everyone and eventually you have to put the foot down and say "this is the way it is, like it or not". Now transfer that disagreement to a company of 1000's or a community of 10,000's or a country of millions.

Fair point. However not everyone has to be in complete agreement on everything all if the time. This is indeed unreasonable. But conflict can be resolved by discussing matters instead of affirming one's own position and expecting everyone else to go along with it. In fact doing this can often be the cause of conflict.

I don't expect you to resolve the problem of human conflict, though if you are suggesting we get rid of authority you will eventually have to.

I don't see why I do. Does the fact that conflict exists mean that right now there are no organisations of any kind that aren't authoritative?

sarumite

RussellTuring wrote: »

Well perhaps I didn't explain it clearly enough. They have no power in and of themselves. They only express the views of the people they are sent by. They put forward motions as decided by those people but don't take the initiative in presuming to think for them, as a TD might do.

But motions are coming from every delegate and if the delegate has to send all motions (however inane) back to the people to discuss and vote on, they would spend all day deciding which motions go towards writing legislation and never get around to actually writing any legislation.....and thats before you even try and harmonise the many many many different budgetry motions.

Why not? And is your alternative to just allow others to make the decision for you, knowing the diversity of people's opinions? As I said already, if you don't want to take part in the decision, you don't have to. The difference is you have the choice to do so if you wish and don't just have to do as your told.

I am unable offer a workable alternative....I believe representative democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others (as paraphrased by Winston Churchill).
As for why not? I don't see how you can ensure that millions of people read 100's of pages of technical legislative language for 100's of legislative proposal before voting. And then you have to ensure that they fully understood the legislation they voted for in the first place...I find it hard enough to finish a novel in my spare time, never mid read dull legislative papers.

Fair point. However not everyone has to be in complete agreement on everything all if the time. This is indeed unreasonable. But conflict can be resolved by discussing matters instead of affirming one's own position and expecting everyone else to go along with it. In fact doing this can often be the cause of conflict.

However by "everyone" you could be referring to 10,000's if not 100,000's of people when running a country....and they may differ on 1000's of different things. Conflict can be resolved by discussion.....but they are not always (ask anyone who has been through a messy divorce with children). It may work at a very small local level, but at a regional or national level?

I don't see why I do. Does the fact that conflict exists mean that right now there are no organisations of any kind that aren't authoritative?

Conflict is a part of human nature. Not all conflicts are easily resolved. In a lot of cases an authority is used to resolve conlfict. That could be work place where the manager does it, civil situations and the Garda do it, legal situations and a Judge does it. If you remove that authority (and by doing so you remove traditional methods of conlfict resolution) then you will need to solve the problem as it isn't simply going to go away. How do you solve a situation like crime and punishment without authority?

RussellTuring

sarumite wrote: »

But motions are coming from every delegate and if the delegate has to send all motions (however inane) back to the people to discuss and vote on, they would spend all day deciding which motions go towards writing legislation and never get around to actually writing any legislation.....and thats before you even try and harmonise the many many many different budgetry motions.

It could be the case that they are provided with more than one motion to put forward, perhaps a few listed in order of preference from most acceptable to entirely unacceptable. I also never said that they had to send back every item to be decided upon at the local level; that would make the delegates' roles redundant. As I said this is all off the top of my head so forgive me if I contradict myself or am unclear on anything.

I am unable offer a workable alternative....I believe representative democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others (as paraphrased by Winston Churchill).
As for why not? I don't see how you can ensure that millions of people read 100's of pages of technical legislative language for 100's of legislative proposal before voting. And then you have to ensure that they fully understood the legislation they voted for in the first place...I find it hard enough to finish a novel in my spare time, never mid read dull legislative papers.

Do you support representative democracy or do you just accept it? There is a difference. And I'm not promoting some way of making people do this. Do you not expect current legislators to read something before they vote on it? If you can't be bothered informing yourself on an issue, that's your choice but if you care about it enough you will read it. I've said numerous times now that you won't be forced to take part in any discussion if you don't want to and I'm not going to say it again. We already have systems in place for referenda in which people vote on simple questions, like in Switzerland. These questions would instead be formed by delegates of the people who will vote on them, instead of a non-choice passed down from on high.

However by "everyone" you could be referring to 10,000's if not 100,000's of people when running a country....and they may differ on 1000's of different things. Conflict can be resolved by discussion.....but they are not always (ask anyone who has been through a messy divorce with children). It may work at a very small local level, but at a regional or national level?

People not only may but will disagree on many different things. Such is our nature. The regional level delegates will act just like the individuals at the local level, and so on to national level. I think I should also point out that many issues are not national. What works for one community will be awful for another so I would like to avoid falling into the trap of applying solutions at a national level that never should be.

Conflict is a part of human nature. Not all conflicts are easily resolved. In a lot of cases an authority is used to resolve conlfict. That could be work place where the manager does it, civil situations and the Garda do it, legal situations and a Judge does it. If you remove that authority (and by doing so you remove traditional methods of conlfict resolution) then you will need to solve the problem as it isn't simply going to go away. How do you solve a situation like crime and punishment without authority?

In a lot of cases an authority is used to resolve conflict when there could be better solutions arrived at through consensus. For instance the Gardaí in some hypothetical situation, may decide to crush dissent by baton-charging a group of protestors. Is this a good way to solve conflict? Whether you think it is or not is your opinion, but I don't see it as democracy in action and think it opens the door for even greater abuses of power. Just because you may be used to being subject to an authority in many areas, doesn't necessarily mean that it is right. One can always justify using just that little bit more authority for "the greater good" until it gets to the stage where you find you have given up all of your power willingly and are now told what to do in every facet of your life, bringing us back to my original point of totalitarianism only being possible within authoritarian structures.

As for crime, I believe it is legitimate for a community to organise in collective action against those who would try to inflict harm on it using coercion. As long as this does not involve having a standing army or police force, it could be compared to self defence by the group against an aggressor. Individualists and egoists might contend that such collective action is illegitimate, but then they wouldn't be communists.

sarumite

RussellTuring wrote: »

It could be the case that they are provided with more than one motion to put forward, perhaps a few listed in order of preference from most acceptable to entirely unacceptable. I also never said that they had to send back every item to be decided upon at the local level; that would make the delegates' roles redundant. As I said this is all off the top of my head so forgive me if I contradict myself or am unclear on anything.





Do you support representative democracy or do you just accept it? There is a difference. And I'm not promoting some way of making people do this. Do you not expect current legislators to read something before they vote on it? If you can't be bothered informing yourself on an issue, that's your choice but if you care about it enough you will read it. I've said numerous times now that you won't be forced to take part in any discussion if you don't want to and I'm not going to say it again. We already have systems in place for referenda in which people vote on simple questions, like in Switzerland. These questions would instead be formed by delegates of the people who will vote on them, instead of a non-choice passed down from on high.

Currently I just accept it as it is imperfect. My issue is not whether someone can be bothered to read and inform themselves of specific legislation, its that people who haven't read it or understand it would still be allowed to vote on specific piece of legislation. Having a referenda on every small piece of legislation would be slow would more than likely lead to a massive delay on passing important legislation. I honestly don't see how an effective bugdet could ever pass under such a system.

People not only may but will disagree on many different things. Such is our nature. The regional level delegates will act just like the individuals at the local level, and so on to national level. I think I should also point out that many issues are not national. What works for one community will be awful for another so I would like to avoid falling into the trap of applying solutions at a national level that never should be.

I am not only limiting to the regional delegate, it would be pervasive in all aspects of life from health, education, employment etc. withuo

In a lot of cases an authority is used to resolve conflict when there could be better solutions arrived at through consensus. For instance the Gardaí in some hypothetical situation, may decide to crush dissent by baton-charging a group of protestors. Is this a good way to solve conflict? Whether you think it is or not is your opinion, but I don't see it as democracy in action and think it opens the door for even greater abuses of power. Just because you may be used to being subject to an authority in many areas, doesn't necessarily mean that it is right. One can always justify using just that little bit more authority for "the greater good" until it gets to the stage where you find you have given up all of your power willingly and are now told what to do in every facet of your life, bringing us back to my original point of totalitarianism only being possible within authoritarian structures.

Your approach would not be to limit the actions of authority, but to remove it completely. I don't think authority always resolves conflicts adequately, though I do think in more cases than not it does.

As for crime, I believe it is legitimate for a community to organise in collective action against those who would try to inflict harm on it using coercion. As long as this does not involve having a standing army or police force, it could be compared to self defence by the group against an aggressor. Individualists and egoists might contend that such collective action is illegitimate, but then they wouldn't be communists.

I could be wrong, but you sounds like you are advocating vigilantism? Even if this is the case (though I can't think of anything worse than disbanding police and replacing them with vigilanti's) this would not resolve a lot situations where definitive proof is not available.

To get back to the original point about removing authority....Since I agree in principle that removing authority would remove totalitarianism (but I don't think in practice it is possible)....how do you avoid an anarchic society turning into a place such as Somalia?

RussellTuring

sarumite wrote: »

Currently I just accept it as it is imperfect. My issue is not whether someone can be bothered to read and inform themselves of specific legislation, its that people who haven't read it or understand it would still be allowed to vote on specific piece of legislation. Having a referenda on every small piece of legislation would be slow would more than likely lead to a massive delay on passing important legislation. I honestly don't see how an effective bugdet could ever pass under such a system.

I accept it as imperfect also, so am willing to look at other options. People who have no idea about the issues at hand are currently allowed to vote on them so I don't know why you see this as a specific issue with the hypothetical system in question.

Although it may be slow, it would more be more likely to lead to a decision that more people find acceptable, as is the point. And it's a communist society so about what kind of budget are you talking?

I am not only limiting to the regional delegate, it would be pervasive in all aspects of life from health, education, employment etc. withuo

I think there's something missing here so I'll wait until you fill it in to comment.

Your approach would not be to limit the actions of authority, but to remove it completely. I don't think authority always resolves conflicts adequately, though I do think in more cases than not it does.

Yes and as I said, as long as you grant some people special privileges, there will be some who seize it and use it to take advantage of others. Authority does often solve conflicts, but is this all that matters? There are many perceived problems that have been "solved" by asserting authority, but these can retrospectively be seen to have horrible consequences.

I could be wrong, but you sounds like you are advocating vigilantism? Even if this is the case (though I can't think of anything worse than disbanding police and replacing them with vigilanti's) this would not resolve a lot situations where definitive proof is not available.

Vigilantism occurs when people are dissatisfied with the effectiveness of the established peace-keepers. When every citizen is expected to take responsibility for peace and justice, the process becomes a lot more transparent, whereas now we have a special group who we allow to effectively take the law into their own hands and call it legitimate. You're also assuming that people are going to form a lynch mob and kill the first person they see. Do you think police are some special breed of people who are beyond reproach and have special reasoning skills? They are people just like you and me and as such are susceptible to corruption, especially given what they can get away with. They are allowed to do things for which other citizens would be arrested.

To get back to the original point about removing authority....Since I agree in principle that removing authority would remove totalitarianism (but I don't think in practice it is possible)....how do you avoid an anarchic society turning into a place such as Somalia?

Bear in mind that Somalia has also seen some progress in areas such as healthcare since the civil war, with average life expectancy actually increasing on pre-war levels and although undoubtedly impoverished compared to somewhere like Ireland, has quite a good economy when compared to nearby Ethiopia and Eritrea. But the chaos in areas of Somalia came about as a result of a breakdown of the established order. I am proposing a conscious, thought-out move to a specific system of cooperation amongst the citizenry, as decided by them. I have said that if this change only comes about through violence and coercion then it would be wholly hypocritical and I would abhor it.