Yeah, agreed. To me the key factor is this: Nobody’s got all the answers. Whatever ideology it is, it can be gangbusters in some situations, but then there are going to be places and times and situations where it isn’t true or doesn’t work. As soon as people get themselves wrapped up into this thing where such-and-such is always the answer, and it’s universal, for all police departments in and outside the US for example, and in all cities, and across all modern time periods, as long as the situation is “police” then the answer and judgement of the situation is: (blank)… as soon as people start thinking that way I feel like they start making basic mistakes because nothing in the world works like that.
There are principles that hold true pretty widely, and some models are better than others, but as soon as it’s like “this is my way, and it is ALWAYS right, shut up so I can tell you about it,” I feel like the productive conversation and thinking just stops. And unfortunately that’s how a whole lot of people tend to look at issues in the world, like they just have to pick the right ideology and then go HAM with it applying it to all situations, and then it’ll all be simple and clear.
Very true. And this is why I would like to see a more pluralistic world. Although I have very strong opinions about what kind of politics is best (I usually identify as anarchist or libertarian socialist), I also acknowledge that I can’t necessarily see my own blind spots, and the only way to sort through the miasma of political disagreements is through empirical experimentation. If we can find a way to live and let live and allow different communities to follow their own ideas more free from top-down interference, we can learn a lot more about what works and what doesn’t than we do in the present world.
A funny alignment for me is that despite disagreeing on almost everything else I absolutely loved Marjorie Taylor Green’s suggestion of a national divorce… let the right devolve into some kind of insane dystopia if they want to, as long as they don’t impose it on anyone else. And the rest of us with more sane politics can try out our ideas too, and hopefully make a lot more progress than the current divided and paralyzed system we have had for the past few decades.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel like that was the original idea of each state doing its own thing, and the federal government basically only being around for refereeing and standardizing stuff between the states, or organizing things when we had to fight a war. And other than that it was just your state.
I feel like a national divorce between two sides, which is what it would be, would mean war, and also we’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of being one massive unified economic and military force instead of a little Europe-style bunch of little ones. But also that kind of ruined us, spiritually and karmically, so maybe you’re right. During Covid it somewhat collapsed back down to state governors in charge of a lot of things, and I feel like maybe that wasn’t the worst thing in the world. And it might happen, like it or not, or it might be the only alternative to a unified fascism.
It’s hard to predict. Frankly I’m not sure whether staying with the current federal tug of war or some kind of separation is more likely to lead to war. If I knew better then that would strongly influence my thinking because that is perhaps the worst possible outcome aside from maybe some kind of systematic mass-murder like under the USSR or Nazi Germany. Terrifying that these do not seem impossible anymore.
To be clear I don’t think it’s a good idea for blue states to unilaterally secede. I think it has to be some kind of compromise where both sides take their ball and go home. I’m not sure Trump would allow this though so I don’t see it happening immediately. In the current context secession would likely lead to a war and one we might lose since Trump would have a stronger grip on the military.
I wouldn’t be so sure. He might, but then again, the high-level leadership of the US military is extremely constitutionally minded. All their training and a lot of their pride in what they do is rooted in it. He might decide, as the real horrors are starting to begin and no one really knows what to do about it, to fire anyone in the military who isn’t loyal to him, and he might get quite a severe shock when they took the loyalty of most of their troops with them when they left.
Firing the military because they won’t do what you want, so that then they’re kicking around loose in civilian society ready to be slotted into the rebellion and increase its power tenfold, is a pretty traditional rookie coup mistake.
Yeah, agreed. To me the key factor is this: Nobody’s got all the answers. Whatever ideology it is, it can be gangbusters in some situations, but then there are going to be places and times and situations where it isn’t true or doesn’t work. As soon as people get themselves wrapped up into this thing where such-and-such is always the answer, and it’s universal, for all police departments in and outside the US for example, and in all cities, and across all modern time periods, as long as the situation is “police” then the answer and judgement of the situation is: (blank)… as soon as people start thinking that way I feel like they start making basic mistakes because nothing in the world works like that.
There are principles that hold true pretty widely, and some models are better than others, but as soon as it’s like “this is my way, and it is ALWAYS right, shut up so I can tell you about it,” I feel like the productive conversation and thinking just stops. And unfortunately that’s how a whole lot of people tend to look at issues in the world, like they just have to pick the right ideology and then go HAM with it applying it to all situations, and then it’ll all be simple and clear.
Very true. And this is why I would like to see a more pluralistic world. Although I have very strong opinions about what kind of politics is best (I usually identify as anarchist or libertarian socialist), I also acknowledge that I can’t necessarily see my own blind spots, and the only way to sort through the miasma of political disagreements is through empirical experimentation. If we can find a way to live and let live and allow different communities to follow their own ideas more free from top-down interference, we can learn a lot more about what works and what doesn’t than we do in the present world.
A funny alignment for me is that despite disagreeing on almost everything else I absolutely loved Marjorie Taylor Green’s suggestion of a national divorce… let the right devolve into some kind of insane dystopia if they want to, as long as they don’t impose it on anyone else. And the rest of us with more sane politics can try out our ideas too, and hopefully make a lot more progress than the current divided and paralyzed system we have had for the past few decades.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel like that was the original idea of each state doing its own thing, and the federal government basically only being around for refereeing and standardizing stuff between the states, or organizing things when we had to fight a war. And other than that it was just your state.
I feel like a national divorce between two sides, which is what it would be, would mean war, and also we’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of being one massive unified economic and military force instead of a little Europe-style bunch of little ones. But also that kind of ruined us, spiritually and karmically, so maybe you’re right. During Covid it somewhat collapsed back down to state governors in charge of a lot of things, and I feel like maybe that wasn’t the worst thing in the world. And it might happen, like it or not, or it might be the only alternative to a unified fascism.
As Trump likes to say, we’ll see what happens.
It’s hard to predict. Frankly I’m not sure whether staying with the current federal tug of war or some kind of separation is more likely to lead to war. If I knew better then that would strongly influence my thinking because that is perhaps the worst possible outcome aside from maybe some kind of systematic mass-murder like under the USSR or Nazi Germany. Terrifying that these do not seem impossible anymore.
To be clear I don’t think it’s a good idea for blue states to unilaterally secede. I think it has to be some kind of compromise where both sides take their ball and go home. I’m not sure Trump would allow this though so I don’t see it happening immediately. In the current context secession would likely lead to a war and one we might lose since Trump would have a stronger grip on the military.
I wouldn’t be so sure. He might, but then again, the high-level leadership of the US military is extremely constitutionally minded. All their training and a lot of their pride in what they do is rooted in it. He might decide, as the real horrors are starting to begin and no one really knows what to do about it, to fire anyone in the military who isn’t loyal to him, and he might get quite a severe shock when they took the loyalty of most of their troops with them when they left.
Firing the military because they won’t do what you want, so that then they’re kicking around loose in civilian society ready to be slotted into the rebellion and increase its power tenfold, is a pretty traditional rookie coup mistake.