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Jastiger posted:Even in old democracies and republics that were formed before, there was always a class system where some had more power and say in government than others-no system treated or even purported to treat each and every citizen as equal in the eyes of the law. How can the phrase "all men are created equal" possibly be taken as an intent to treat every citizen the same? It too nearly 150 years after those words were written before the franchise was extended to women. The intent of that statement is quite clear - not to provide equal opportunity to all, but to provide equal opportunity for all those who counted as competent and intelligent people, as judged by the rich white men who wrote those self-serving phrases. In the context of modern Founding Fathers worship, it's easy to take as a declaration of equality hundreds of years ahead of its time, but considering the circumstances of the time and the manner in which it was put into practice, it can just as easily be read as an implicit declaration that the many groups prohibited from voting did not even qualify as human (which was effectively true for women and openly acknowledged for non-whites). You spoke at length about the corrupting influence of capitalism, but quite a few of the Founding Fathers were capitalists themselves, and many quite successful. If capitalism is such a corrupting influence, then what does that say about the democratic ideals and proclamations of equality written by those capitalists? Let's not forget that the person who wrote "all men are created equal" owned a massive plantation and more than a hundred slaves, and there were other figures in the Revolution with even larger plantations.
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Apr 29, 2014 19:58
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Jastiger posted:I think that is kind of my point, that the United States claims one ideal, but in reality that ideal is very different and very beneficial for a select group of people from the outset. Which, as you point out, puts the accumulation of capital at odds with a fair and equal government that applies equally to all citizens. Note, I am using the US Constitution for this description, not that all Democracies have to include all citizens. The US Constitution (or Declaration which is often read into the Constitution when deriving meaning) straight up says all people born here are citizens, all people are equal, and that tyranny by an elite is Bad News Bears. You missed my point, which is that it doesn't really say that. Again, the Declaration said "all men are created equal" - which openly excludes fifty-ish percent of the population. It's just another case of "all people worthy of equality are equal". I don't think the concept of "all (rich, white, male, of sufficient birth) people are equal" was new in 1776. It's real easy to proclaim equality for all when you don't count women, poor people, or religious and racial minorities as "people". Idealistic rhetoric has always been a useful tool to draw attention away from conditions which were often nothing like the ideal. Just look at how many of the Communist states ended up. Jastiger posted:As a super liberal dude, I have to agree with the above poster: protests don't really do anything in my view. The only real way to effect change in a capitalist society is either through direct violence i.e. breaking into a place and harming or imprisoning everyone that you find to be "wrong" in an establishment, or by getting a ton of capital to change the system from within. Protests, by themselves, don't do anything. Their sole purpose is to indicate to the elites that a large number of people are pissed off. That, alone, accomplishes nothing; the elites already know that their policies aren't popular among the rabble. The factor that gives protests their effectiveness is that they ask a silent question: "if these pissed off people demonstrating their willingness to act collectively for their cause aren't thrown a bone, what will they do next?" They're basically a threat, demonstrating to the elites just how many people the movement's next step - be it mass disruption, property damage, or open violence - could potentially have involved. Since Occupy disavowed any and all escalation that might go so far as to inconvenience someone, it didn't matter how many people it mobilized, no one had any reason to fear their next move. chairface posted:Are we really going to argue that "democracy" involves zero protections for minorities vs. mob rule? Sure, why would it be otherwise? That seems to be consistent with history, too.
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May 2, 2014 10:53
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