KKaeser Posted July 25, 2009 Share Posted July 25, 2009 A true democracy is one in which there are no leaders/representatives and the people vote on each policy issue as and when it arises, with each vote carrying the same weight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pip Posted August 8, 2009 Share Posted August 8, 2009 A true democracy is one in which there are no leaders/representatives and the people vote on each policy issue as and when it arises, with each vote carrying the same weight. yes but you can never have this system in practice or everyone would spend their entire lives in a voting booth and not actaully living life. This is the reason we elect representatives to vote on our behalf. what our MPs are suppose to do in the house of commons, but as we all know the goverment uses its whips to forces the votes to comfirm to party lines. The problem I see with democracy is it is majority rule, and the majority are not always correct. Take an obsurd example. majority of people decide it would be a good idea for everyone to jump of a 200ft cliff, the ignorant magority who do not realise this will result in your death vote yes, they educated few try and speak out against it but the votes speak and... weeeeee off we go. An extreme yes, but the same thing applies to general running of a country. I am not a professional ecomonist, I know very little about world trade, international debts, budgets etc... should I get a vote on such matters, a vote which could cancel the vote of an expert in this field? (maybe a bad subject in todays ecomonic climate as the experts fucked it up, but that was down to greed combined with bad decisions). We do at time get a vote on such matters, referendums, where the country gets to vote on important matters, but still the government can choose to ignore this (or keep having referedums until they get a favourable result ). But the princple is sound, Do I want to join the Euro, should there be a referedum, do I have enough knowledge to make the right decision, if I have all the information am I clever enough to interpret it correctly, apply this to every Sun, Star and daily mail reader and high school drop outs in the country. What is best for everyone is not always what everyone wants. This also leads to a problem I have with our current government system, we have idiots in charge, we have people who are voted in to government by the people regardless if they they have any qualification for the role they will fulfill. If I was applying for a Job as a nuclear scientist, could I get the job from a popularity contest or should the job go to the most competant person in that field. Any business would eventually fail on the voting for employees system over a best qualified person. There is a but, people want to be heard, right or wrong people have a need to have their opinion voiced, they need to feel they have some input in the running of their lives. There is no perfect government system, we can look all over the world at the different governements, true democracy, dictatorships, representative democracy they all have their problems, there is no utopia. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
groovelick Posted August 8, 2009 Share Posted August 8, 2009 what needs to be added is a system where if a certain percentage of a constituancey sign a petition then that constituancey representavie is forced to stand again in a by-electon which would force the rep to listen to their constituants Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest below5 Posted October 8, 2009 Share Posted October 8, 2009 (edited) I would like to answer your questions Rand. I am a UK citizen (cultural bias). Should the leaders do what is best for the social group as a whole? Yes they should. Should the leaders only do what they are told? Yes they should be true to their mandate. They must also though be able to think on the hoof, respond to new conditions. If elements of society are to be favored over society as a whole, which group should be favored? No elements should be favoured. The above are the answers I give when I am faced with my current situation (reality). I think this is interesting. Boojum: And by the way, I'm not saying that I even consider democracies to be the best form of government, for the vote of an intelligent, well informed person to mean the same as the vote of a Daily Mail or Sun reader - fuck that. But I dunno the alternative. It seems to me that an enlightened dictator ship would be a viable alternative perhaps. How such a system could work is another question. Plato and his republic comes to mind. At the very least we need PR combined with a “good” education system. Democracy is t00 slow in its response to the environmental crisis. Not sure if this is reason enough to abandon the present system though. The larger the political unit (I’m thinking gang, local, national, international) the further it seems to get from the people. Yet it is the people who matter. peace Edited October 8, 2009 by below5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randalizer Posted October 8, 2009 Author Share Posted October 8, 2009 Nice of you to drop in and revive this thread below 5. Here is my view; Politics is an evolving science. One that evolves, or devolves, with society. A well informed and knowledgeable political system would obviously take better care of society than an uneducated one, inexperienced one. Obviously this educated and experienced system does not appear out of no where, nor can we expect a voting populace to be all well educated. For now. In complex systems, I often see a bootstrap system of progress. One part progresses, than relaxes while another part progresses. Then the two help a third part progress and so on. In my mind, the educated elite should be ruling with strong input from educated social workers. Educated people who work with the uneducated masses. The #1 goal of the ruling class should be to educate the uneducated as much as is compassionately possible, in order to help empower them to take part in governing and empowering society at large. Perhaps then a true democracy would be possible. The technology is almost there. Are we? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest grandad Posted October 8, 2009 Share Posted October 8, 2009 you can please some of the people some of the time, but you cant please all of the people all of the time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddiesilence Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 A true democracy is one in which there are no leaders/representatives and the people vote on each policy issue as and when it arises, with each vote carrying the same weight. yes but you can never have this system in practice or everyone would spend their entire lives in a voting booth and not actaully living life. This is the reason we elect representatives to vote on our behalf. We now have the technology to rule by referendum. Pretty much all of us vote via the internet: we rate eBay transactions, we vote posts up or down on the Mail 'comment' sections, we vote on Digg, on Stumble, and on facebook. There are even votes here on UK420. Internet voting in referenda would not be a bind for any of us; even if there was a referendum every week, it'd be a login and a click. Voila. More democracy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weedio Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 In Australia it's illegal not to vote. I think we should make it illegal not to vote here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddiesilence Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 In Australia it's illegal not to vote.I think we should make it illegal not to vote here. Sod that! Making it illegal not to participate in a fundamentally corrupt sham is a total infringement of my right to refuse to play their stupid game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
withnail Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 In Australia it's illegal not to vote.I think we should make it illegal not to vote here. :wink: I think it suits the main political parties very well that there is often a low voter turnout Do you know what the punishment for not voting is in Oz Weedio ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weedio Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 Fine i think. They obviously have you registered so if you don't vote i think it's just a fine through your letter box. I'm reading about emigrating so finding out bits slowly . Sod that! Making it illegal not to participate in a fundamentally corrupt sham is a total infringement of my right to refuse to play their stupid game. You're missing the point mate, if everyone votes it wouldn't be a sham, it'd actually be democracy. Everyone would have to make a decision about who to vote for and do it based on their beliefs. It'd be a fucking revolution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimmyPage Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 What a fascinating thread ... my 2p ... Just something to think about, but a while ago, (On "question time" I believe) an MP (possibly tory, BICBW) answered a question about "how come public opinion is always in favour of the death penalty, but politicians ignore us." with a statement that MPs are *representatives*, not *delegates*, and that if we simply wanted public opinion to run the country, we'd have referenda on everything, and get rid of MPs. Which made some kind of sense. To all those who think simply using referendums to rule would work, think of what you'd get ... the basest, most bestial elements in society whipping up a nightmare ... you wouldn't just get hanging bought back. You'd have public hanging drawing and quartering of "peedophiles" and "drug pushers" ... The problem is we have to *trust* MPs to be wise and foresighted on our behalf. And frankly I wouldn't trust any of them to sit the right way round on a toilet at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weedio Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 (edited) Interesting JimmyPage. I think a swing to a more american style system (bear with me) not in total terms but in terms of how they run referendums. When there is an election, you can get a question on the ballet "should weed be legalised?" etc. with 2000 votes on a petition. Everyone goes, votes, and sais yes or no. You get a majority vote from the voters and you get your answer. Genius, i imagine it would cost fuck all to run alongside it aswell. I believe it's only locally they do this, ie in states and not nationally. But there's no reason why it can't be run both nationally and at a more council level. Why aren't we doing this? Edited October 9, 2009 by Weedio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddiesilence Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 (edited) Sod that! Making it illegal not to participate in a fundamentally corrupt sham is a total infringement of my right to refuse to play their stupid game. You're missing the point mate, if everyone votes it wouldn't be a sham, it'd actually be democracy. Everyone would have to make a decision about who to vote for and do it based on their beliefs. It'd be a fucking revolution. I'm not missing any points - the sham happens before we get to see the candidates. Elections are a fore-shortened multiple choice question presenting us with the apparency of choice. In fact, all the candidates on my last ballot coupon were capitalist parties committed to the insanity of economic growth - that includes the Greens and the Lib Dems. When do I get a real choice? Where is the box on the ballot I can tick for 'none of the above'? This is why elections are the poor relation of real democracy. History teaches us that real democracy comes from direct action: the following advances were achieved NOT via the vote, but because people got out into the streets and protested and campaigned and applied mass pressure to force the government to act. That is direct democracy: The eight hour day, the end of the Vietnam War, the end of child labour, the end of judicial homosexual repression, the end of racial discrimination, the end of slavery, votes for women, gender equality, (the list is very much longer). Not ONE of the above was granted by voting. Every single advance above was hard-won, wrestled from the grasp of those purporting to represent us. Real democracy is when you participate - not when you abdicate your responsibilities by putting an effete x in a box. Entrusting politicians to carry out your will is the most naive expectation. They won't. Only you can protect your democracy. Edited October 9, 2009 by Eddiesilence Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddiesilence Posted October 9, 2009 Share Posted October 9, 2009 What a fascinating thread ...my 2p ... Just something to think about, but a while ago, (On "question time" I believe) an MP (possibly tory, BICBW) answered a question about "how come public opinion is always in favour of the death penalty, but politicians ignore us." with a statement that MPs are *representatives*, not *delegates*, and that if we simply wanted public opinion to run the country, we'd have referenda on everything, and get rid of MPs. Which made some kind of sense. To all those who think simply using referendums to rule would work, think of what you'd get ... the basest, most bestial elements in society whipping up a nightmare ... you wouldn't just get hanging bought back. You'd have public hanging drawing and quartering of "peedophiles" and "drug pushers" .. The problem according to John Stuart Mill, is that a real democracy is impossible without an informed electorate. That doesn't mean an electorate propagandised by wealthy tabloid publishers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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