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RE: Full-Blown American Engagement in Doublethink
...wait, so the system is corrupt and horrible, and your current solution is vote for someone to take part in it? After you just got done expounding on how the pawns in the game have no ability to affect the larger machinery?
I do applaud you for point out the doublethink. This is a constant obstacle that I struggle with when I talk to just about anyone here in the US. I can't tell you how many times I've heard the words "but this time, if we..." come out of the mouths of otherwise sensible, rational people. You're right; they acknowledge the state is a horrific monstrosity while simultaneously calling for it.
Right, so there is a difference between voting for someone who will take part in it by being elected to it, and voting for someone who will oppose it by being elected to it. That's why Hedges still supports Stein instead of nobody. Bernie Sanders said, "No president, not Bernie Sanders or anyone else, can effectively address the economic crises facing the working families of this country alone. No president can do it alone. The truth is – and it’s important that every American understand this – the truth is that Wall Street, corporate America, the corporate media and wealthy campaign donors are just too powerful." We need to replace the corrupt system and the corrupt pawns in it, but if we could shove an outsider into the White House they could be an incredibly galvanizing leader. I made sure to emphasize every time I said that electing someone into the system will be ineffectual that I noted electing someone who represents that system into the system will be ineffectual.
Jill Stein is the entire reason I was able to write and think like this, so clearly there is value here.
Also, I am focusing right now on getting more involved with a local group, not just voting for a single candidate. There's no one solution, but if Americans voted in a candidate like Jill Stein, that would be an incredible step in the right direction. The Green Party and Stein are system outsiders. They are 100% noncorporate-funded, and their actions and words bear that out. My hope is that Stein will not cease to lead people and fight corruption after November 8th. We need strong leaders very badly right now. Voting for her is just a tiny, tiny thing in this oligarchy, but it is still a good thing. Many other actions and bigger things are needed, but supporting her does not disable me or anyone from taking other actions simultaneously.
The problem with what you're suggesting is that it preserves the system that has given rise to all of the problems you cited in your article. So long as the system exists, corporatocracy and corruption will always inevitably follow. Note that it only took a decade for the newly approved Constitutional federal government to enact more invasive and restrictive laws than the very monarchy the Founders sought to undermine.
The first, and by far the most vital, step is no longer accepting that men and women with special moral authority exist simply by the will of other people. We are all of us individuals. If it is immoral or unethical for me to do something to you, it is thus in all cases, whether I am just a guy or I'm an agent of the state. No one can delegate to someone else rights they do not have, and as no one has the right to violate the consent and ownership of another person, the state is immoral on its face.
This, more than everything else, has to be understood and accepted. This has to become a mainstream line of thought first. As it grows in acceptance, solutions to government-provided services will present themselves. Cryptocurrencies are a prime example of this, and they have the capacity to subvert the authoritarian central bank system. Cell 411 is another example of consensual services displacing traditional state-provided services, like police and fire departments.
So you think the answer is to just spread the idea of people deserving to be free of authoritarian constraints? I think that's just one of many paths. I think many roads, from BLM to the Green Party's ideals to the protests against the Dakota Pipeline, etc., can get us to a better place. People have to believe they have the power and they have the ability and right to acquire better lives and things like free healthcare. I currently lean more toward socialism than anarchy. I don't think it matters. You and I both have the same basic goal: disrupt the corrupt system that currently stands. Supporting candidates who have people's interests at heart is not a solution, but one very easy path. I think everything that is wholly good should be supported. Some anti-establishment people are communists. Some are socialists. Some are anarchists. Some are not certain exactly what they want. But all of these groups have to agree on certain goals, I think, for the American people to most effectively deeply alter or reinvent their government. The country is just too big and diverse to aim for total alignment.
This happened during the Civil Rights movement -- MLK Jr. called for full integration, Malcolm X for some time called for breaking away and living in a separate society. It's like ants moving a heavy object. Eventually they get it where it should be by having a basic shared goal, even though some are pulling in the opposite or sideways directions.
If you think we have the same goal, then I think you misunderstand what my goal is. My goal is for everyone to have the chance to live free of the coercive violence that is the state; I want freedom for humanity, not a nicer group of sociopaths ruling everyone. Socialism is abhorrent to human dignity for the same reason our current system is: it doesn't respect individual bodily ownership, it ignores individual consent, and it assumes authority where none actually exists.
All states are like this. Unless a state has the consent of the people by actually giving people a choice whether or not they want to be held to its rules - and then respecting that choice, it should be dismantled and destroyed.
The reason I mentioned spreading the message is because that is how things change. Culture influences society, society influences politics. Trying to change a cultural norm (which is what accepting corrupt authority is) through politics is similar to trying to keep a ship from sinking by bailing water out of it, while ignoring the holes in the hull, or trying to cut down a tree but only focusing on the branches.
It seems to me to be unnecessary to insist on focusing semi-aggressively where we disagree, especially when I barely even have a developed and informed idea of the best way to go about dismantling the corruption of the US government. I don't know why discussions online so often have to focus on disagreement. Do we both want to tear apart the current system? Yes? That's my idea of the same goal -- not having the exact same plan for what we replace it with. So wouldn't it behoove us to work together to seek the best ways of accomplishing that?
I think it would be good if there were someplace people could go when they want to live in a state of anarchy. But imposing anarchy on people who don't want it isn't freedom, either. Of course everyone in history who topples the government replaces it with what they want, and sometimes that turns out to be worse.
I'm not fully opposed to anarchy because I know far too little about history and political science to talk, but basic logic and certain knowledge tells me that a state of anarchy when you're working with a massive number of people would inevitably result in temporary chaos and civil war followed by the establishment of a government. To wit: mass anarchist communities inevitably fail, and people left to their own devices are inevitably violent. I should say this isn't so much human nature as simply nature. Nature is a violent, unsafe place because each organism is focused on the survival of itself and [generally unwittingly] its species. Existence is selfish. A state of anarchy is a state of nature. I'm sure that since you seem so informed you must be aware that the concept that people were ever nonviolent is a myth.
"Decentralized government" sounds a lot better to me than purely leaving people to their own devices. There must be ways of both checking people's natural propensity for violence and maintaining people's rights to live their lives as they see fit provided that does not impugn upon the rights of others. I think you could hardly say that a society like Denmark's is a horrible thing. The scenario is not simply "government like that of the US" or "no government."
For example, here is a local green party platform:
It seems to me you're throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. I want massive overhaul and reform, but can you convince me that your way is the only and correct way?
I really would like you to see me more as a curious person who likewise wants the earth and its inhabitants to be as contented as they can be, rather than an opponent.
I don't see you as an opponent at all, and I'm sorry if I gave you that impression. I address things very directly, so if I came off as though I was criticizing you harshly, I apologize. However, where you and I differ is that, as of right now, you are still calling for a state to exist. I'm simply arguing that a state, by its very nature, does more to damage and infringe on people's lives than a world without states would.
I agree that nature is unforgiving and cruel, and this has been the struggle of humanity since we first discovered how to create and use fire, or how to fashion tools to make our tasks easier. However, I'd also like to point out that over the course of the last three hundred years, concepts such as individuality, property rights, bodily ownership, and individual liberties that are inalienable have come into existence, where previously no such concepts existed (or had taken such universal forms). To say that, because it failed in the past, it won't work in the future, is simply an appeal to antiquity. That's why the focus should be on spreading the message of individual liberty and a rejection of arbitrary authority.
I'm not seeking to impose anything on anyone. I'm simply pointing out that a state, by definition, restricts the rights of people with or without their consent, and this is objectively immoral; put another way, every state on this Earth lays a monopolistic claim to a territory and enforces its rules on all people within that territory, whether they consent to be ruled by that state, through the use of violence. Aside from the immorality of such an organization, it is a guarantee that it will be abused by people who would seek to be a part of it for their own personal gain. This has been proven throughout history, where benevolent rulers and governments that didn't abuse their people are the exception, not the rule. Lest I also make an appeal to antiquity, think of it logically: if I'm a sociopath and want to use other people for my own purposes and interests without running afoul of people with power, what's the best way to do it in modern society? Become an agent of government. The more power I wield in government, the more far-reaching and widespread the effect of any policies I manage to put into practice.
I don't see you as an opponent, Noelle. I just don't want you to expend your energies on supporting a structure that necessarily inflicts suffering on other people. Your heart is absolutely in the right place, and I applaud you for it; most people don't even make it that far.
Please let me know your thoughts on what you think will help.
Will in a bit. Am on my phone now and this deserves a good response.