The Politics Thread v2

[MrWolfe]

Oh crap, I found a politics thread.

The thing about the "hate the game, not the player" argument is that there wouldn't be a game if there weren't people willing to play it. So yes, I absolutely hold the players accountable.

As for this:

The world is not perfect, and as such the government exists to fill in the gaps and prevent abuse in the system by imperfect people, and protect other imperfect people from damaging mistakes that they would not otherwise be able to deal with fairly.

The problem with that notion is that the people who make up the government are just as imperfect as everyone else, so the whole system is doomed to fail from the start.

In fact, there really isn't any way to rationally justify one mature adult having authority over another without discarding the notions of equality and personal liberty. Either all people have equal rights, including the right to live their lives as they see fit (so long as they don't infringe on the rights of others), or some people have the right to rule and others have no choice but to serve. The two concepts are incompatible.

Also, regarding Disney copyrighting other people's shit? See also: Every fairytale- or historically-based movie they've ever done. (Aka 90% of their catalogue)

Their standard MO is literally: Take someone else's idea -> Sell it -> Sue anyone else who tries to base something off of the same source

Now that they own Marvel and Star Wars I seriously expect them to start coming down on the fanfiction community.

[dman11235]

huh?  That's frankly some high school idealistic bs right there.  IN a democratic society, the government isn't individuals having control over people, it's an entity controlled by everyone setting rules for people to follow so that some people who want to take advantage of others have a significantly harder time doing so.  And that includes things like crime, war, humanitarian services, etc. etc.  Pretty much every facet of government works this way.  It's a way to have a structure of rules in place to protect and help people.

The end result of no government is anarchy, and anarchy sucks.  It really sucks.  You have no recourse, no options, no help.  You live in a world where you can TRUST NO ONE, not even your family.  It really sucks.  "oh, I can totally handle myself" no you can't.  You really can't.  It's you living on your own.  Someone steals from you?  What do you do?  Common answer is "I shoot them and take it back" you've just died because they have bigger guns.  It fairly quickly turns into a situation where the strongest rise up and take command of the weaker, and boom, government again.  Only this time, instead of a civilized government, it's a monarchy.  Back in the 5000 BC monarchy too, not even the nicer AD monarchies.  In a democratic society like we have, the populous has power, they hold the reigns, they are in charge of themselves.  Your characterization of modern governments is very wrong, and dangerous.

On the disney thing?  I didn't even go for that because it's too obvious and too well known.  They also cannot copyright the original things.  All of their copyrights are on the original movies, not the stories they stole.  All of those are in public domain.

[Raineh Daze]

Please don't use anarchy to mean chaos. It makes talking about political theory harder.

[Solo]

The end result of no government is anarchy, and anarchy sucks.  It really sucks.

Viva la revolucion

[phaedrusxy]

I admit I'm not fully into that story (although I know he did reduce the price a couple days ago....by a small amount...), but I'm not really all that into hating him.  He's taking advantage of a system that encourages this sort of behavior.  That's the free market at work, and it sucks.  From my understanding, that initial price was a pittance compared to a competitor's less effective pill, and he wanted to raise it to obscene amounts to take advantage of something like that.  I do blame him for stopping being a saint if the above is true, and being an a-hole for raising it that much instead of a "decent human being" level of something like $30, or whatever his competitor was doing.

Patents.  Copyright.  Trademark.  How is the market even remotely free?  He's taking advantage of a system established by the government, not his own abilities or fortunes.  He only thought he could get away with it because the government would ensure he wouldn't face any competition. 

The Free Market is as much a fantasy as Communism ever was.  Capitalism only works in the long run with a firm hand at the tiller.  Without it, it'll just devolve into feudalism.  "Conservatives" natter on about the free market as the new form of Divine Right, an exculpatory principle meant to justify their crapulence while their practices consistently destroy the economy.  They love to rail against government regulation, but never seem to notice the sweetheart deals they constantly get from the government.   

As was mentioned earlier, the patent on this drug expired a long time ago. It's just such a small market that no other companies thought it was worth spending the money to get a generic approved because this one had been around for so long and was so cheap.

Of course now some other companies might push to make a generic of it, because this guy has showed that the market is worth more than people originally thought.

I still think he's a complete douche, of course.

[MrWolfe]

huh?  That's frankly some high school idealistic bs right there.  IN a democratic society, the government isn't individuals having control over people, it's an entity controlled by everyone setting rules for people to follow so that some people who want to take advantage of others have a significantly harder time doing so.  And that includes things like crime, war, humanitarian services, etc. etc.  Pretty much every facet of government works this way.  It's a way to have a structure of rules in place to protect and help people.

The end result of no government is anarchy, and anarchy sucks.  It really sucks.  You have no recourse, no options, no help.  You live in a world where you can TRUST NO ONE, not even your family.  It really sucks.  "oh, I can totally handle myself" no you can't.  You really can't.  It's you living on your own.  Someone steals from you?  What do you do?  Common answer is "I shoot them and take it back" you've just died because they have bigger guns.  It fairly quickly turns into a situation where the strongest rise up and take command of the weaker, and boom, government again.  Only this time, instead of a civilized government, it's a monarchy.  Back in the 5000 BC monarchy too, not even the nicer AD monarchies.  In a democratic society like we have, the populous has power, they hold the reigns, they are in charge of themselves.  Your characterization of modern governments is very wrong, and dangerous.

I'll forgive the knee-jerk reaction because, as an anarchist, I'm used to it. (Hence the "oh crap, I found a political thread" in my previous post.)

Anarchy as a political philosophy is actually quite different from the way it gets portrayed by politicians/media/etc. (What a shock.) If you're actually interested, here's some info that touches on some of the points you made above:

(click to show/hide)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateless_society
http://libcom.org/history/how-hunter-gatherers-maintained-their-egalitarian-ways-peter-gray
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_anarchist_communities
http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FPPS%2FPPS12_03%2FS1537592714001595a.pdf&code=4ff84c2fe62c2cea91f4e05f6aebbcf2

It really isn't all that hard to find more.

Suffice to say that a lot of what you just said doesn't hold up under scrutiny, but it gets taught to us from a very young age by those that benefit from the present system of hierarchical power. Statism is a lot like other -isms that way, such as racism or sexism.

On the disney thing?  I didn't even go for that because it's too obvious and too well known.  They also cannot copyright the original things.  All of their copyrights are on the original movies, not the stories they stole.  All of those are in public domain.

Yeah, but what the law says and how it works in practice are two different things. In practice wealthy companies can and do use litigation to threaten, intimidate, and extort people well beyond what the bounds of the law allows. In fact, most copyright lawsuits never see the inside of a courtroom, because it's more cost-effective to bully the defendant into a settlement. As a result, the cases aren't resolved based on the law, but on the defendant's inability to mount an effective legal defense against a pack of high-priced corporate lawyers.

[stanprollyright]

The end result of no government is anarchy, and anarchy sucks.  It really sucks.  You have no recourse, no options, no help.  You live in a world where you can TRUST NO ONE, not even your family.  It really sucks.  "oh, I can totally handle myself" no you can't.  You really can't.  It's you living on your own.  Someone steals from you?  What do you do?  Common answer is "I shoot them and take it back" you've just died because they have bigger guns.  It fairly quickly turns into a situation where the strongest rise up and take command of the weaker, and boom, government again.  Only this time, instead of a civilized government, it's a monarchy.  Back in the 5000 BC monarchy too, not even the nicer AD monarchies.  In a democratic society like we have, the populous has power, they hold the reigns, they are in charge of themselves.  Your characterization of modern governments is very wrong, and dangerous.

Congratulations! You just summed up 10,000 years of history in one paragraph.

You know what happens to those BC monarchies though? Pitchforks. The people realize that more guns is better than bigger guns, and they put someone in power that is a little nicer to them. And this cycle gets repeated with nicer and nicer monarchs until the revolutionary leaders either install a democracy, or the monarchy gives up so much power that they effectively become a democracy anyway.  But with democratic equality of opportunity comes a very similar playing field as the "no government" option, where the strong (read: rich) take control of the weak (read: poor). The thing about power is that only people with both the ability and desire for it have it; it's been like that forever and is in no danger of changing. Every government is and always has been a de facto aristocracy.

[dman11235]

@MrWolfe: I'm very familiar with all (or at least most) of those, and I think they're pretty much bunk.  See, the problem is that in a truly anarchic society, is is chaos (Raineh...it really is).  Anything else is some sort of government that has established some set of rules.  It may look different, but it's still a government.  All of those real world "anarchic" societies have a set government.  They really do.  Anarchy is much like capitalism and communism, of the pure forms.  Sounds great in theory, really doesn't work in practice.  I'm not saying that freedom is a bad thing, far from it.  It's just that anarchy does not equal freedom.  Not any more than any other governmental system means freedom.  In fact, one could easily argue that in our current system we are more free than under anarchy in many ways.  I mean, the governments can provide aid and humanitarian help in ways anarchy never can.  And no, anarchy literally cannot, it's not something that "nature of human good" can just wish into existence.  If it weren't for governments, we would never have the internet.  It simply would never be created under anarchy.  You cannot assume in a world with an anarchic community (which by definition has a government) that everyone everywhere is following the same rules (hey, rules, government).  So what's to stop someone from taking over?  A government.  Governments protect from other governments.  This protection from other governments is becoming less important as time goes on and hopefully it won't be a thing anymore (although that will never happen because sentient beings are not perfect).  What's your recourse when something bad happens?  Don't count on the good nature of humans in a truly anarchic setting, you literally cannot.  there's a wealth of evidence that humans won't help in those types of situations.  Depending on the situation of course.  In general, humans are "good" but also in general they won't help in more dire situations that are not immediately threatening.  Essentially, the good from governments so much outweighs the bad it's not even a contest anymore.  Otherwise, there would be more successful truly anarchic communities out there.  The pseudo anarchic ones barely survive as it is.  In order to go to an real anarchic setting you would have to throw away pretty much all technology and go back to before we had tribes.  That's what you're looking at.

On the copyright thing, your point is?  Nothing you said contradicted what I said about its purpose.  All you said is something I said earlier about the game being rigged.

@stan, For the most part, yeah.  But there's varying degrees, it's not a black and white issue.  None of politics is.  I'll take the democracy over the monarchy any time.  Ours (US) needs a revamping in a major way, but it's still one of the better systems in the world I feel.  I'd rather have the British system in some ways, the Canadian as well, and some of the other democratic nations' systems in some ways, but overall it's not terrible.  Oh, and I didn't sum up 10000 years.  I summed up 2.5 million years.

[Raineh Daze]

I think you missed my point. >_>

... and a world with an anarchic community would by definition not have a government. If it had a government, it's not anarchy. I'm not going anywhere near the debate on effectiveness at all after having to do essays on it, but if you're going to argue against anarchy, don't start by saying "and it has these things it is defined by not having". That changes the argument entirely.

[KellKheraptis]

I think everyone missed the literal definition of anarchy.  Let's look at the Greek here :

An- Without, lacking, in absence of.
Archon- ruler, monarch, king

Literally an anarchy is without a sovereign ruler.  Which sounds a lot like a direct or representative democracy (i. e. a republic).  The latter has its own inherent flaws as well (the representatives are generally either the brightest, or in our case the richest or ones with the richest backers), though the former also tends to not filter the cruft very well (rule by the herd - aka the Dark Ages devoid the intervention of a higher feudal lord).

[dman11235]

So by literal entomological definition we are already in an anarchy!

But seriously, anarchy is a fun thought exercise, but then the real world comes in.  Every single argument for anarchy comes with the assumption "people are all 100% inherently good/smart/competent/whatever" just like the arguments for pure communism or capitalism or whatever.  And once you don't make that assumption, it just ends up terrible.

Also, you know what it's called when you have no central government and it's just people doing what the community needs?  That's called communism.  That's what communism is.  Not anarchy, communism.

@Raineh: Why is that so?  How is a purely anarchic society not an anarchic society if somewhere else there's a government?  And when did I say that "it has these things it's defined as not having"?  What things are those?

[Solo]

Also, you know what it's called when you have no central government and it's just people doing what the community needs?  That's called communism.  That's what communism is.  Not anarchy, communism.

What then is anarcho-syndicalism?

[Raineh Daze]

On rereading, you didn't say that, but your use of brackets was confusing.

"This is non-functional in the purest form". And? What difference does that make?

Also, you know what it's called when you have no central government and it's just people doing what the community needs?  That's called communism.  That's what communism is.  Not anarchy, communism.

What then is anarcho-syndicalism?

Or more questionably, what differentiates communism from anarcho-communism (and let's not get into mixing anarchism with capitalism)?

[altpersona]

anarchy works perfectly

as long as you never have more than 2 people interacting with each other.

[dman11235]

@Raineh: it was what, 2 AM when I typed that or something?  After having watched the entire URealms and after party streams?  So yeah, my organization wasn't the best.

@alt:  true.

And it leads me to the whole point of all of this.  Every system of government has flaws.  Some have more than others.  And every form works better in certain circumstances.  There is no "best" government.  There is, however, a worst: no government.  The proof is that there are no truly anarchic societies.  If it worked in some competitive way with other forms, there would still be some somewhere.

[Raineh Daze]

The lack of anarchic societies says more about scale than how 'bad' it is. And 'no government' is definitely arguably better than one that's outright malevolent.

[dman11235]

And how long do malevolent governments last?  And I mean outright malevolent.  Cartoonishly evil.  Although I agree with the statement, I will say that "evil governments" are more capable than anarchy at succeeding, meaning that they can be competitive on a global scale.  It's just that they don't last long due to internal pressures.

[Solo]

And how long do malevolent governments last?  And I mean outright malevolent.  Cartoonishly evil.  Although I agree with the statement, I will say that "evil governments" are more capable than anarchy at succeeding, meaning that they can be competitive on a global scale.  It's just that they don't last long due to internal pressures.

Best Korea has resisted American Capitalist Oppression for over sixty years, and will continue to do so indefinitely under the glorious leadership of the Kim dynasty! All hail the Democratic People's Republic of Korea! Long live Dear Comrade! May he life for ten thousand years! May he live for ten thousand ten thousand years!

[altpersona]

for my money, its looking like the constitutional monarchies are winning.

[bhu]

You know given the size of our arsenal im surprised we dont use the corbomite defense.  "Attack us and we distribute the nuclear weapons evenly enough to ensure the entire world is cleansed of life."