Democracy

[hugolp]

[grondilu]

Although I despise democracy as much as anyone, I don't get the point of this picture  

PS.  However, this thread might be a place where to collect pictures on this topic.

[paraipan]

[AyeYo]

[Hawker]

To be fair, that's what the libertarians here advocate.  Gollum looks like he has used his personal nuke already.

[Anonymous]

[Hawker]

Here's a link that probably confirms the worst fears of democracy.  After seeing the fate of the Christians of Iraq, Christians in Syria are supporting the regime as the alternative of majority rule is so terrifying for them.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/28/world/middleeast/fearing-change-syria-christians-back-bashar-al-assad.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

Money quote:

“I am intrigued by your calls for freedom and for overthrowing the regime,” wrote a Syrian Christian woman on her Facebook page addressing Christian female protesters. “What does freedom mean? Every one of you does what she wants and is free to say what she wants. Do you think if the regime falls (God forbid) you will gain freedom? Then, each one of you will be locked in her house, lamenting those days.”

[hugolp]

Although I despise democracy as much as anyone, I don't get the point of this picture  

The idea of a lot of people supporting democracy is that if they vote "the right guy" (TM) it will do good for everybody and everything will be dandy. In reality what they mean is if you vote ME and do what I tell you everything will be perfect. If you ask a democratic person they always have this plan on what to change and what to do to solve all the problems in the world. A democratic guy is always a dictator with the need of justification to impose their will.

[Hunterbunter]

To be fair, that's what the libertarians here advocate.  Gollum looks like he has used his personal nuke already.

omg I lol'ed so hard at that....

[speeder]

Fun facts about "Democracy"

1: Most democratic countries use water fluoridation.
2: Most non-democratic countries, consider water fluoridation a serious crime...


Water fluoridation at 0.9 is known to cause lower IQ in adults that have been drinking it since childhood, sometimes even retardation.

Brazil (a democracy), mandatorily fluoridates all water to 0.8.




In Lybia, Ghadaffi government proposed elections several times, in fact proposed elections ran by UN, not by his own government, and the rebels refused...

A CNN reporter, found some Ghadaffi suporters by accident in a city already taken by rebels, when he asked why it was hard to find them, the reply was: "We do not like to talk when THEY are around. But I assure you, if those elections happened, Ghadaffi would be elected."


So, are you pro-democracy? Why the UN, that defends democracy so much, denied it to Ghadaffi?

Are the rebels pro-democracy? They they refused elections?


You think Ghadaffi is evil? Thus, what you do with the fact he was likely to win democratic elections?


If you think democracy would save Libya from Ghadaffi, you are wrong...


Interesting situation there, no? The one that actually democracy was the one that was actually being removed by force to have a democracy installed by force...


But woooray, democracy won! And the first thing announced by the new government is: We will use Sharia law! Go freedom! Kick out all christians!!!

[Rassah]

Damn glad we live in constitutional republics instead!

[NghtRppr]

Damn glad we live in constitutional republics instead!

Which is a form of liberal democracy. The two aren't mutually exclusive.

[hugolp]

Damn glad we live in constitutional republics instead!

Which is a form of liberal democracy. The two aren't mutually exclusive.

Well, it can be argued that a representative republic will always degenerate into a democracy, but from a theoretical point of view they are completely different (and exclusive).

[NghtRppr]

Liberal democracy, also known as constitutional democracy, is a common form of representative democracy. According to the principles of liberal democracy, elections should be free and fair, and the political process should be competitive. Political pluralism is usually defined as the presence of multiple and distinct political parties.

A liberal democracy may take various constitutional forms: it may be a constitutional republic, such as the United States...

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_democracy

[gopher]

It appears that I am one of the few supporters of democracy here...

Well not this democracy that everyone is talking about here, but democracy nevertheless.

I see that a lot of people get frustrated by the concept of democracy - and that I contribute to their own ignorance as well as the unrealistic expectations they set to themselves to see from the real democracies they live in.

I think the reason for that is that the common people mix social and political structures, attributing certain faults of the society to the political structures they have adopted - the most adopted form of representative democracy today is also sometimes referred to as "dictatorship of the government"

From my perspective dictatorship is a dictatorship, irrespectively how the dictator was elected - but one thing is for sure - all dictatorships are characterised by a single feature - the lack of accountability and mechanisms to stop the elected dictators from acting in their own as well as their allies' interests and against the interest of the people they were elected to represent (...I remember some of the Mr Bush Jr's actions were some 75% unpopular with the US people at the time, but there was not a mechanism that could stop him from acting as there is no mechanism that could hold him accountable for those actions, so he went ahead and the rest as they say is a history...)

In a modern "democratic" society (you read "dictatorship of the government") there is nothing democratic - not even the elections are not democratic, the laws are not made by the people but against them, the police is not there to serve and protect the people but their rulers, and if you think that agencies such as IRS, FBI, CIA, NSA and the Pentagon are democratic, you need to some reality check - those are agencies of the government and not the people, as in a representative democracies the government will always put their own and their allies' interest against the interests of the people they govern. Always.

The only solution for this small problem is to change the representative democracy model with a direct democracy model. But you see, the government-dictator-mongers are clever - in million sessions of their parliaments and senates they made sure that there is no mechanism left that will see their "DEMOCRACY" overthrown and replaced with any other inferior political model.

Don't believe me - go ahead, research and find even the tiniest small legal quirk that will allow a society to abolish the representative democracy model for something else.

Doesn't matter what that will be - as long as the abolishment is a legal process though.  Coup d'état does not count.

But let me warn you - if you succeed finding such legality, and then decide to generously point it to the freedom loving world, I am sure you will be noted in the history of man kind as a the next proverbial "saviour".


So let me finish this with a quick quiz to determine ones level of naivety and if he/she understands the difference between social and political system.


Does the democratic society you live in is just and fair?

Are all people in the said society treated equally? If yes, are you sure? If yes again, really? If yes yet again,

Does the democratic society you live in treats equally, justly and fairly all the minorities (people with different ethnic/religious/racial/social etc. backgrounds)?

If 95% of the society is religious, who do you think should play leading social role in a society - the government or the religious organisations?

If you answer the government, why do you say that - because the religious organisations are too commercial and the government is not?

Do you believe in independent judiciary - going back to the equality question above

What does the rule-of-law means to you?

What about free market - do you believe the government has right to manipulate markets so to bring social balance in the society - even if that comes to the detriment of the justice in that society (do I hear "fuck the poor!").

Do you think the government owes you something - because you are a "taxpayer"? If the government abolishes taxes, would you still think they owe you something. What about providing protection from terrorists, real or implied? What if you discover that they HAVE been using your tax money to fund terrorist and supply them with weapons manufactured with your tax money for years and you did not even know, because they did not feel obliged to tell you (that info is classified)

When you old-man lost his service business to the newly outsourced call centre in India, why do you think the government did that - to choose foreign business to buy the service from instead of supporting it's own citizens. Did you felt that it is for the "greater good"?

I can continue this forever...

[speeder]

So, you defend direct democracy instead of broken democracy...

Brazil has a very broken democracy... democracy here never worked...

Anyway, if we place direct democracy here, you know what is the first thing that people will do?

All people living in southeast and south will vote for something like genocide of the "stupid lazy people" on northeast.

Then, knowing brazillians, and stuff that they already stated, the second thing they will do is tax everyone that is not themselves, and give lots of free money to themselves.

And also some other "rights".

Brazil more than half of the population is black or black-leaning mixed race, they will probably vote that white people institutions (like, private universities) are to have huge black people quotas (more than it already exists), and so on...




It will NOT work... direct democracy like I said earlier, only make sense in some contexts, and a multi-cultural country is NOT one of them....

And let's remember, that most people here are from such countries, even the US has several different cultures (like, Quakers, Hillibilies, Playboys, Californians, Texans, people that live near Canada on some crazy frozen lands... the almost isolated populations in places like North Dakota... the latinos in Florida, and so the list goes on...)

[hugolp]

Liberal democracy, also known as constitutional democracy, is a common form of representative democracy. According to the principles of liberal democracy, elections should be free and fair, and the political process should be competitive. Political pluralism is usually defined as the presence of multiple and distinct political parties.

A liberal democracy may take various constitutional forms: it may be a constitutional republic, such as the United States...

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_democracy

Yes, thats why wikipedia is not a reliable source.

As I said, it can be argued that a reperesentative republic will degenerate into a democracy (thats what I believe), so they can seem similar, but from a theoretical point of view they are very different.

In a democracy the decission of the majority is the rule of the country. What the majority decides its what happens. A republic is the opposite. In a republic there are a certian set of rules that are supposed to be inmutable, the constitution, including equality in from of the law, etc..

[NghtRppr]

Yes, thats why wikipedia is not a reliable source.

Grab an encyclopedia or do a Google search then. The number of credible sources is limited unless you have access to some non-free sources. Simply saying "it's Wikipedia" isn't going to cut it. It's more reliable than you are, clearly, since you're wrong.

[hugolp]

Yes, thats why wikipedia is not a reliable source.

Grab an encyclopedia or do a Google search then. The number of credible sources is limited unless you have access to some non-free sources. Simply saying "it's Wikipedia" isn't going to cut it. It's more reliable than you are, clearly, since you're wrong.

Wow, where did the anomisity came from?

There is a big debate about this issue, because the progressive liberals have always wanted to portray the USA system as a democracy, while in reality the founding fathers always were very wary of democracy and wanted to have a republic. Thats why you find a lot of sources saying that republic and democracies are compatible.

[TiagoTiago]

People are stupid, no wonder things are way far from perfect when they are the ones making the decisions, on the other hand individuals often also are quite flawed as well...i'm not sure where i'm going with this, TBH i'm not sure where we are going at all...